Analysis Of A Birthday Present By Sylvia Plath

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How Ironic, Celebrating The Gift Of Life With Death May it be her elegiac, disturbing poetry or her dramatic finale of life, Sylvia Plath is one of the most praised writers in the history of time. From the age of eight, Plath lived an unfortunate life, dealing with the death of her father, a failed marriage, and upholding the strict expectations of women held by society (Poets.org 1). “A Birthday Present”, written by Sylvia Plath, demonstrates an obvious representation of her emotions and attitude toward life. Other than being straight forward, Plath establishes her thoughts within her poetry through distinct structure, diction, and figurative language. Her techniques not only allowed readers to understand her despair, but convinced herself …show more content…

However; Plath’s structure within “A Birthday Present” is strictly free verse as shown with the lack of a rhyme scheme and the different lengths of stanzas throughout. This I find to be very ironic. Though free verse emphasizes specific ideas and words, her thoughts to compose literature in her own way mirrors the egocentric decision to take her own life. There are precise moments in the poem when Plath chooses to indent the second line in a stanza. For example, “They are like carbon monoxide” (A Birthday Present 2) is compared to a cloudy sky; indenting this line shifts a reader’s focus toward observing why carbon monoxide is significant to her life. After further research, it is understood why Plath indented this line as she committed suicide by the intake of carbon monoxide (Santana …show more content…

Plath writes ‘Is this the elect one, the one with the black eye-pits and a scar?” (A Birthday Present 1) when asking herself if her next suicide attempt would be the last. The image of black eye-pits refers to her acknowledging the evilness and darkness of her decision. Therefore, the image of the scar symbolizes that if her attempt was successful, it could never be reversed. Plath also uses personification to force the reader to understand how enticing this “birthday present” was to her. For example, writing “When I am quiet at my cooking I feel it looking, I feel it thinking” (A Birthday Present) personifies death as a person antagonizing

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