#fig tree

[bitterswtdvll]

[starbelliedgirled]

[antiquedeuce]

the fig of life

[noseysilverfox]

May 2026

Young fig fruits (lat. Fícus cárica)🌤

Молодые плоды инжира (лат. Fícus cárica)🌤

[huariqueje]

The Big Fig, Fitzroy Gardens, Melbourne - Mike Kowalski ,2019.

American , b. 1950s

Watercolour on paper , 24 x 30 cm.

[xanaxfarts]

The knotted branches of a 'Spider's Web' tree (strangler fig) in a park in Nanning, Guangxi, China

[shakespearesdaughters]

[academic-vampire]

I learned something today while reading Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. Most people, even those who haven’t read TBJ, are aware of Plath’s metaphor of the fig tree. Well, I noticed something new today.

On the very next page, after the initial quotes about the fig tree, the message “elongates,” and I think it does a disservice to Plath to leave this extension out of the conversation.

I call the first part of the metaphor “The Fig Tree Lament,” and the second half of the metaphor, “The Fig Tree Volta.” (“Volta”- used in poetry, a volta (Italian for "turn") is a rhetorical shift or dramatic change in thought, emotion, or argument). To entirely exclude the volta section from the metaphor abandons the reader to misery, which, I don’t think is kind nor Plath’s intention. Consider the metaphor again with this new information:

(P.77) The Fig Tree Lament:

(P.78) The Fig Tree Volta:

Don’t think of the fig tree and despair any longer. Eat a snack. Drink some water. Get some sunlight. Take a nap. Usually that does the trick. :)