Initiation

“Initiation” shares its title with the second phase of the “Hero’s Journey” as laid out by literary scholar Joseph Campbell in The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Drawing on the theories of psychoanalyst Carl Jung and stories from around the world, Campbell outlined a basic narrative pattern in which the protagonist literally or figuratively leaves home, experiences various escalating dangers, vanquishes them, and returns changed. Campbell published his theory in 1949—virtually contemporaneously with Plath’s story—so it is unlikely the reference was intentional. Nevertheless, “Initiation” follows the basic framework Campbell proposed, paying particular attention to the trials its protagonist must undergo.

The most obvious of those trials are of course those the sorority itself poses as part of hazing; this is, ostensibly, the “initiation” the title refers to. The hazing rituals are not random tasks designed to demoralize initiates, however. As the requirement that the girls not wear makeup or style their hair makes clear, the hazing process aims to embarrass initiates by placing them at odds with societal expectations—particularly the Societal Pressure to Perform Femininity in Set Ways. This might seem unorthodox given that the sorority itself clearly privileges conformity; it rejects