Food in books: the crab, avocado and mayonnaise in Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar

There’s more to Sylvia Plath’s classic novel than grey despair. Kate Young summons up a slice of summer from The Bell Jar – minus the food poisoning

By Kate Young for The Little Library Café, part of the Guardian Books Network

Arrayed on the Ladies’ Day banquet table were yellow-green avocado pear halves stuffed with crabmeat and mayonnaise, and platters of rare roast beef and cold chicken, and every so often a cut-glass bowl heaped with black caviar. I hadn’t had time to eat any breakfast at the hotel cafeteria that morning, except for a cup of overstewed coffee so bitter it made my nose curl, and I was starving.

The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath

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