“From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked… but choosing one meant  losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped  to the ground at my feet.” In this passage from Sylvia Plath’s  "The Bell Jar," a young woman imagines  an uncertain future– and speaks to the universal fear of becoming paralyzed by the prospect of making  the wrong choice.
„S vrha svake grane, poput krupne grimizne smokve, jedna od čudesnih budućnosti dozivala me i namigivala, no izabrati jednu značilo bi odreći se svih ostalih i dok sam sjedila ondje, ne mogavši odlučiti, smokve su se počele mežurati i crnjeti, i jedna po jedna rasprsnule su se o tlo pod mojim nogama.” U ovom odlomku iz „Staklenog zvona” Sylvije Plath mlada žena zamišlja neizvjesnu budućnost i dočarava univerzalni strah od paraliziranosti mogućnošću pogrešnog izbora.