Esther and her education mask

After being kind of lame and reading the first seven chapters of The Bell Jar tonight, I noticed a few differences and similarities between Rachel in A Jest of God and Esther.

While the novels are written in about the same kind of style (first-person narration, kind of random thoughts everywhere), I felt that The Bell Jar had a little more smoothness to it. I was able to understand Esther a little more than I really ever understood Rachel. I was still able to detect some similarities and differences, though. Not of just the characters, but also the writing styles as well.

The narrators are both women, although different ages, who seem to care a lot about education (Rachel as a teacher, Esther with her constant reference to her 15 years of straight A's) but also do not really know themselves. While I thought Rachel was more stream-of-consciousness when explaining her thoughts, I feel Esther provides deep accounts of past occurrences that prove her academic-like personality she uses to shield the fact she doesn't really know herself.

For example: page 40,
"I dabbled my fingers in the bowl of the warm water a Ladies' Day waitress set down in place of my two empty ice cream dishes...."
"I thought what a long way I had come."

Then Esther flashes back to the first time this happened to her, when she was young and didn't know what it meant or what to do in that situation. This is an example of many where I believe Esther thinks she has changed and grown up, partly because she has learned something new, but will soon find out that moments like this have not really prepared her for anything and that she might not be able to use her education as a mask of seeming mature and grown up.