Hannah Simpson

title: confessions of a novelist

date: 2017

about: this project was a written project based on the portrayal of mental health through literature.

I chose three novels, Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath and The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides, I then took these three novels and analysed each to look into how each one depicted mental health, which I then turned into a 14,000 word essay illustrating my findings.

 

This book came afterwards, I looked into the key themes and ideas that came out of my essay, and then came to the conclusion that I needed to illustrate this idea of everything black and white, and the ignorance we have towards the ‘grey area’. This is when I came up with the idea to use data visualisation to visually show this concept. 

 

I started by creating a circular map of constellations, which showed the life of Esther Greenwood, Plath’s main character in The Bell Jar. Each constellation has a different meaning, and shows how each event and aspect of her life affected her mental health.  I developed this book as a way to educate people on the issues surrounding mental health and it’s portrayal in the media.

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