While I was reading fear by Laura Franks in the sidebar on page 51 of “Components of Gender” I saw that the way Laura decide to face her problem was by facing them straight forward. Laura is someone who has “refused to play gender games what I think that means is she is not going to follow the norm about how she should react to different stuff. What it has to do with fear is that she won’t let it control her she will overcome. You know when you go to amusement parks and you get on a ride and the first time your freak out but the more you ride it the less scary it becomes the fear you once had decreases each time you face it until it disappears completely. In Esther experience I believe that She faces discomfort when she does not properly perform the gender role that is expected of her by society. In the group of girls she feels like the odd one out the needle in the haystack. Esther has changed though the story from the past and present and has perform gender roles properly out of fear. In a flashback in my book on page 31 where we get a girl telling Esther she has a “male”visitor and when we get that she decides to comb her hair and put on some lipstick even take a book to make it look that she on my way to the library if it turned out to be somebody awful. In those lines we see how as a women she is expected to keep herself nice and neat even when meeting an unknown man. Esther cared what the unidentified man thought of her so she made herself presentable. Now in the present we have her saying “I hadn’t washed my hair for three weeks, either.”. Her reason being that is was silly to her to wash one day when she would only have to wash again the next day. Her past self is gone she doesn’t care about what society sets for her anymore she is going to do her and not care about anyone opinions any more.

Laura Franks, a women whom stands differently. She is tired of trying to fit into what society has constructed out for her, and most importantly she is tired of hiding herself from the fear of humiliation.

She refuses to play “gender games,” which we all know is the fine standard division between men and women. She states, “now I know what it feels like to be laughed at. It is frustrating, but not frightening.” Meaning, she knows the amount of humiliation that will be brought out to her by the public and her peers if she chooses to go against her gender role but, at the end of the day it wont be something “frightening” in other words, terrifying, tragic, or a sight not worth seeing.

Laura is able to brake through and indifferent herself from the rest of society/public and her peers. She gives herself/readers comfort with the statement, “broken bones don’t hurt forever.” Therefore, she is strong to her beliefs and with a new revolutionary it is however natural to have a bit of fear. Laura enhances readers her changeling breakthrough as a women.

In the book the Bell Jar, written by Sylvia Path, the narrator Esther is also living in the fear of humiliation. She states “if I ever get to Chicago, I might change my name to Elly Higgginbottom for good. Than nobody would know I had thrown up a scholarship at a big eastern women’s college and mucked up a month in New York and refused a perfectly solid medical student for a husband who would one day be a member of the AMA and earn pots of money. In Chicago, people would take me for what I was.” (pg.136 pdf) Esther is going through depression and figures by running away to Chicago all her problems will be solved. She doesn’t have to worry about anyone’s opinion and most importantly she no longer has to hide her real identity. She doesn’t eat or sleep for many days. Her in law sends her of to Dr. Gordon who is a psychiatrist and he later sends her of the shock institution. At this point Esther’s mom is now effected, she gets emotional about her daughters rout. Esther doesn’t properly perform the gender role that is expected of her because, she states “and, one day I might just marry a virile, but tender, garage mechanic and have a big cowy family, like Dodo Conway. (pg. 136 pdf) Like most typical girls who would rather have a man with good income and good status Esther is the opposite. She also refuses to play “gender games” just like Laura however Esther isn’t able to breakthrough yet.

     When Laura Franks says that she has “refused to play gender games” I think she means that even though in society they make it seem like you have to choose, you don’t. A lot of people don’t identify with the gender they were assigned at birth or don’t identify with a gender at all and prefer pronouns such as they/theirs, it’s all about the persons perspective on their gender identity. I believe this has to do with fear because people fear not being accepted in society. Wether it has to do with the hate they may receive for not fitting into social norms and being themselves or just because people don’t agree with their view points when it comes to gender because they view things as simple as male or female depending on the genitalia of the person.

     Their are instances in The Bell Jar where Esther does or doesn’t conform to her gender expectations. One scene where she doesn’t comply with gender norms is when she mentions that she was still wearing Betsy’s clothes that now drooped because “[she] hadn’t washed them in [her] three weeks at home.” (Plath 127) Esther even goes further to mention that she “hadn’t washed [her] hair for three weeks, either.” (Plath 127) Usually when you think of a young woman, you think of them taking care of themselves and their personal hygiene. Its not like a young lady to not take care of themselves and let themselves go. This is a perfect example of not performing the gender role that is expected of her because this wouldn’t be acceptable to other people if they saw her or knew that she was behaving like this. At this point in the book Esther is falling deeper and deeper into a depression and her reasoning for behaving as such is that it seemed “silly to wash one day when [she] would only have to wash again the next.” (Plath 128) This isn’t reasonable thinking and it’s one of the first times that her falling into a depression is showing physically and can be noticed by others.

According to Laura Frank, fear is something that comes naturally when you experience something new for the first time. The fear becomes smaller once a person does it more over time. In her own, experience her fear comes from her personal hardships. She has faced humiliation and she has learned to overcome it. She has also chooses to go against stereotypical ideas of women when she says, “refused to play gender games in public”(Frank51). She has learned to live the remarks and the fear goes away over time. However, with Esther in the Bell Jar, she shows the clear and evident fear revolving around her gender role. Unlike Frank, Esther Greenwood has a more difficult time overcoming some of her fears. Her fear of her future and choices around gender roles are evident when she mentions the fig tree and its significance. “One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion” (Plath77). Each fig represents a potential future for Esther. She is excited about each one for her future. But she couldn’t decide which future she would chose. “I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest” (Plath77). She feared that if she chose one fig or option the others would become unavailable. Eventually the fear of losing all other option would force her to lose all future options. Even the fig wherein she has a husband and a home and a family, which most women at the time would have easily chosen.

 In the past women had to endure a lot of expectations placed on them by society. A society usually run by men that had almost impossible expectations. The passage about fear by Laura Franks from “Components of Gender”, proves that she is someone who doesn’t play by gender games. I think it  that means she doesn’t believe in the things that society wants her to believe in as a women. To study for jobs/ careers that don’t surpass men, to live for marriage, and to have the end goal to be a housewife. That has to do with fear, because in world/time like this women didn’t have many life choices. And in the eyes of men, they had complete power and say of a women’s life. For example in The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, the main character Esther goes through a similar situation where she experiences fear and discomfort when she does not perform the gender role that is expected of her by society. Such as when she hung out with a young navy boy, and she thought saw Buddy’s mother. She did not want to appear like a promiscuous women, so she started to act like the young man was mistreating her (ch.10 pg 128). Esther felt uncomfortable when she felt she got caught with the navy man. Although when she was with the navy boy she felt society’s pressure to see the possibility of marriage and children with the man. Esther does not usually perform outside her gender role, and when she does it’s little things like a lot of eating, a lot of alcohol drinking, lack of make-up, and casual attire. Women throughout history have had to deal with so much pressure, specifically to marry and stay at home. To be “allowed” an education but couldn’t pursue careers without looking like a failure in the eyes of society for not choosing a life with a husband, house and kids. Fear, is what used to suppress women. Fear, is what kept them from thinking they had more choices and they could choose more than one.

Fear is the main reason why we can’t do what we want. It stops us from achieving what we want, good or bad. Fear of getting laughed at, fear of pain, fear of getting hurt, fear of anything and everything. It is the root of discouragement. In the reading “Components of Gender,” Laura Frank’s explains that very well, “the fear is the worst before the fact” (Frank 51). She describes that almost everything we are afraid of, we get over it after we make the attempt and know how it feels. We’re only afraid of something until it happens. And then the “pit in your stomach” (Frank 51) gets smaller and smaller and then gone. Nothing lasts forever and nothing hurts forever, “Now I know that even broken bones don’t hurt forever” (Frank 51). I agree to that because once we feel what scares us, it doesn’t scare us anymore, the fear is just an illusion in our heads. She doesn’t want to play the gender games, meaning she doesn’t want to do what society expects of her but rather do the things that she’s fears. People are afraid to be laughed at and to get hurt, that’s why they act in the gender role. They do what society expects them to do instead of what they actually want to do. For example; a gay person wouldn’t want to be laughed at, that’s why they would not be open about it rather hide it and act normal within the society. Not now days but if we look back a couple of years, there was no freedom for them to be open about it.

Esther goes back and forth in playing the gender role. After she got back from New York, she became suicidal. She tried several different ways to kill herself, cutting herself with a blade in a bath tub, drowning, hanging herself, and finally taking pills, “then, one after the other, I lugged the heavy, dust covered logs across the hole mouth” (Plath 169). She took the pills and ended up in the hospital and then asylum. It’s affected her mother, she was upset and almost cried. A woman is not suppose to give up even if she feels depressed and confused, but Esther did and that shows how she didn’t fit into her gender role. Her trying to commit the suicide made her seem crazy. It affected herself negatively and everyone around her.

In the “Components of Gender,” Laura Franks speaks on her view of what exactly makes you who you are. She obviously does not agree with the way society defines gender roles or how those roles form a person. She speaks of 5 components of gender which are gender assignment, gender roles, gender identity, gender expression, and gender attribution. Each having their own definitions of what specifically describes a persons gender. Laura Franks is someone who has “refused to play gender games,” in other words she doesn’t follow up with the rules society has set up for what makes a male a male and a female a female. Like a game there are rules you must follow and if you don’t follow them you lose, she basically feels like society is playing the same game with gender. If your a male you have to be masculine and be the head of the household, and if your a female you have to be feminine and love being a housewife. Some people fear if they break societies expectations they would be looked at as the opposite of their gender or seem different from everyone else, like they don’t belong. Laura feels its time to break these rules and when you do your still who you are no matter society says.

With Esther in The Bell Jar she doesn’t but does seems to experience fear or discomfort  when she isn’t following the role that is expected of her by society. In the scene in chapter 11 where it says, “I was still wearing Betsy’s white blouse and dirndl skirt, I hadn’t wash them in my three weeks at home. I hadn’t wash my hair for three weeks either” (Plath 67) Esther isn’t performing proper femininity. Esther thought it would be silly to wash her clothes and her hair when she would have to just do it again the next day. Her mother thought she should have done so because as society would believe its dirty for a female to not wash her clothes, being that its one of the jobs they believe females should have which is cleaning and washing. I would say wearing Betsy clothes instead of her own was her choosing to perform gender roles properly because she maybe feared her own clothes wasn’t as fancy, or less feminine than what others would expect a female to wear to a special occasion.

As I was reading “Components of Gender” I admired her braveness in fighting against her fears. I thought that she what she meant by refusing to play gender games was refusing to act the way society expects her to act according to her gender. This has to do a lot with fear because it meant not fitting in and being judged by everybody around her. As she explained in her passage “I didn’t know how I would survive humiliation”(Franks,51), “I didn’t know how to face my friends again”(Franks51), I interpreted these quotes as if she was trying to say that she fears that she would be rejected and pushed away by everybody and just not being accepted. There are times that Esther has feared not being able to perform the expectations by society, but I don’t recall reading a part where she would act like what society expects her to. One example would be when she wants to hang out more with Betsy because she was very feminine and therefore she was respected. She ended up hanging out with Doreen, someone who doesn’t show pureness and respect to herself the way other “normal” women do.
A scene in which Esther doesn’t properly perform gender role is when she doesn’t keep correct hygiene. She says “ It seemed silly to wash one day when I would only have to wash again the next.”(Plath,128). In those times, and even now, a women is expected to keep herself clean and neat even if it means doing it every single day. Esther didn’t care what every body else thought, she didn’t even care about her odor. I feel like she doesn’t really care what society think of her because she feels that she won’t be able to succeed as a female in the future.

According to Laura Franks’ gender role is the qualities, mannerism, duties and cultural expectations to a specific gender. I believe she means what society’s expectations of what a woman or man should be. Those expectations vary from generations to generations and culture to culture. In the 1960’s when The Bell Jar is written, a woman’s duties are clearly defined. A woman has been expected to be married and has children; she also is expected to be a housewife, awhile the man is supposed to be the provider. Laura refuses to play gender games means that she refuses to do what society expect her as a woman  to do like getting married, have children and become a housewife  which in part is society’s definition of what a woman should be. She decides to be her own person and she mentions that the first time it was frightening because going against everything society tells you to be and how you are raised create fear, fear of the unknown. Naturally, when someone does something the first time, that person is afraid, but over time it becomes natural to the person. Laura learns to defy society’s expectations without fear. Laura could have been cast out because she did not conform to what is expected of her and she surely is aware of what is expected because she talked about the 5 components of gender. In The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, Esther defies society’s expectations and definition of what makes a woman over and over. On chapter 11 on page 133, Esther is talking to a sailor alone, back then a proper woman would not be going out without chaperone and all throughout the books, there are many examples that she goes out all the time on her own.  She also lies to the sailor about who she was. I cannot imagine that a proper woman would be telling lies about her life. I do not get the feeling that Esther even gets afraid of doing the opposite of what is expected of a woman in the book. She constantly breaks society’s roles of a woman. Esther does not what society is expecting a woman to be. Matter of fact, she thinks it would be “11 years of straight A’s” wasted to become a housewife.