How Sylvia Plath's Life is Reflected in the Poems Daddy, Morning Song, and Lady Lazarus Sylvia Plath has had an "exciting" life, if I can use this word. Her father died from an undiagnosed diabetes when she was eight. At the same time, a short couplet that she wrote was published in the Boston Sunday Herald. Later, she won scholarships to study in Smith, Harvard, and finally Cambridge. There, Plath married Ted Hughes, who was a good poet, too. What amazes me in her life is that she had attempted suicide three times, once every ten years. In 1963, she succeeded in killing herself as she gassed herself to death. In an outsider point of view I always wonder how a woman with so much going for her would want to end her life: though her husband's infidelity, she was nevertheless successful--her poems appeared in various prestigious newspapers and magazines, and she was even invited to teach English in Smith College. Plath's death has been subject to unending analysis and interpretation, framed by the kind of inquiry that usually guides classroom literary discussions. What was Plath's intention? What did her suicide mean? What did it reveal about her family, her society, her time, her sex, herself? Two years after her death, "Ariel" was published. This small book includes Plath's poems written not long ago before her death. She wrote about the crucial issues of her life, but she made outstanding art from those issues. In foreword, Robert Lowell writes that "Though lines get repeated, and sometimes the plot is lost, language never dies in her mouth…Everything in these poems is personal, confessional, felt, but the manner of feeling is con... ... middle of paper ... ... vampire probably suggests Otto Plath's study of parasites, "Muscid Larvae of the San Francisco Bay Region Which Sucks Blood of Nesting Birds", a study that documents the endurance, tenacity, and enormous destructiveness of these larvae. This may also explain why Sylvia Plath uses "Frisco Seal" in the first place: not only because there are seals in San Francisco, but also because this is the place where her father conducted his research on muscid larvae. The vampire here also refers to Hughes, whose marriage with Plath had lasted for seven years. At last, Plath decides to slay the two images which have always haunted her peace of mind: "There's a stake in your fat black heart/And the villagers never liked you./They are dancing and stamping on you./They always knew it was you./Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I'm through."
In American society, the common stereotype is that the father has the role of the dominant figure in the household. Sylvia Plath and Sharon Olds may come across as two seemingly different poets, however, they are really quite similar, especially in their driving forces behind their writing styles in poetry. The lives of Plath and Olds are both expressive of the realities of a father-dominated family, in which both of these poets lost their fathers at a young age. This is significant because both poets have faced a similar traumatic event that has had everlasting effects on their adult womanhood, which is reflected in their writings. For both these woman, their accesses to father-daughter relationships were denied based on life circumstances. Ironically, their fathers were their muses for writing and are what made them the women they are today.
Sylvia Plath a highly acclaimed twentieth century American poet whose writings were mostly influenced by her life experiences. Her father died shortly after her eighth birthday and her first documented attempt at suicide was in her early twenties. She was married at age twenty-three and when she discovered her husband was having an affair she left him with their two children. Her depression and the abandonment she felt as a child and as a woman is what inspires most of her works. Daddy is a major decision point where Plath decides to overcome her father’s death by telling him she will no longer allow his memory to control her.
Emily Dickinson is regarded as “America’s most original poet” and was born on December 10th, 1830 (CITATION1). During her life, she spent most of her time alone in her house, spending time with only herself and writing poetry. When she died at the age of fifty-five, her sister decided to publish the 1,800 poems Emily had written. Before her death, Emily had only published ten of her poems. Because of this, she was not widely known before she died, unlike Sylvia Plath. Sylvia Plath, on the other hand, is a well-known author and poet. She even won the Pulitzer Prize award for Poetry in 1982 (CITATION2). Sylvia was similar to Emily Dickinson in that she was not an outgoing person. In fact, she was often depressed, and eventually took her own life in 1963 (CITATION3). While unfortunate, Sylvia Plath had written many popular poems, such as “Daddy”, short stories, and a semi-autobiographical novel called “The Bell Jar”.
Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” emphasizes the ill-fated relationship between a woman and her deceased father. The speaker conveys her paradoxical feelings for the one man who she worshipped during her young years, but feared his malicious influence and domination after his death. “I used to pray to recover you” and “at twenty I tried to die… and get back… to you” ( line 14, 63-64). Throughout the poem, Plath uses simplistic language, rhyme, and rhythm in order to charm and delay the malevolent spirits from her father.
Plath’s works were known for their extremely feminist and suicidal themes. Plath wrote about whatever came to her mind and used writing as a way to express her feelings. Plath is credited with furthering the genre of confessional poetry. Plath was also the first poet to receive the Pulitzer Prize after death. Although Plath had taken her life, her legacy still lives on in many ways.
Giles, Richard F. “Sylvia Plath.” Magill’s Critical Survey of Poetry. Ed. Frank N. Magill, b. 1875. Pasadena: Salem Press, 1992.
In the poem, “Daddy,” Sylvia Plath shows her character to have a love for her father as well as an obvious sense of resentment and anger towards him. She sets the tone through the structure of the poem along with her use of certain diction, imagery, and metaphors/similes. The author, Sylvia Plath, chooses words that demonstrate the characters hatred and bitterness towards the oppression she is living with under the control of her father and later, her husband. Plath’s word choice includes many words that a child might use. There is also an integration of German words which help set the tone as well. She creates imagery through her use of metaphors and similes which allow the reader to connect certain ideas and convey the dark, depressing tone of the poem.
Known for her distinctive voice and exploration of dark, violent emotions, Sylvia Plath was one of the most acclaimed poets of the twentieth century. In her poems she discusses many common themes such as family relations, marriage, self-image and death in unique ways. Among these topics, she expresses a particularly original perspective on motherhood and its effect on the individual that often deviates completely from the traditional view of child rearing. In her poems “Moonrise,” “Heavy Woman” and “Morning Song,” Plath conveys the idea that motherhood, although necessary, is a personal as well as physical sacrifice that involves much pain and suffering.
Less than a week before her suicide, Plath wrote, "the woman is perfected" (qtd. in "Scenes"). In "Daddy," she was, in a sense, "perfecting" herself for death, but her desperate grasps at sanity ended in self-destruction. She proved herself that she could not be through with her problems. So, while the last line of this poem may seem like a statement of closure, it is better interpreted as a statement of capitulation. Plath was indeed through: She was through trying to overcome her distress, through loving her husband, through fighting with the memory of her father, and through living
Sylvia Plath’s life was full of disappointment, gloominess and resentment. Her relationship status with her parents was hostile and spiteful, especially with her father. Growing up during World War II did not help the mood of the nation either, which was dark and dreary. At age 8 Plath’s father of German ancestry died of diabetes and even though their relationship was never established nor secure, his death took a toll on her. “For Sylvia, who had been his favorite, it was an emotional holocaust and an experience from which she never fully recovered” (Kehoe 90). Since she was so young she never got to work out her unsettled feelings with him. Even at age eight, she hid when he was around because she was fearful of him. When she was in his presence his strict and authoritarian figure had left an overpowering barrier between their relationship. Sadly enough by age eight Plath instead of making memories with her dad playing in the yard she resented him and wanted nothing to do with him (Kehoe). These deep-seated feelings played a major role in Plath’s poetry writings. Along with his “hilterian figure,” her father’s attitude towards women was egotistical and dismissive, uncondemning. This behavior infuriated Plath; she was enraged about the double standard behavior towards women. Plath felt controlled in male-dominated world (Lant). “Because Plath associates power so exclusively with men, her conviction that femininity is suffocating and inhibiting comes as no surprise” (Lant 631). This idea of a male-dominated world also influenced Plath’s writing. Unfortunately, Plath married a man just like her father Ted Hughes. “Hughes abandonment apparently stirred in her the memories and feelings she had struggled with when her ...
According to “Sylvia Plath” Sylvia Plath struggled with severe depression throughout her life. She first experienced depression during her third year of college because of insecurities and self-esteem issues. Furthermore, Plath’s troubled marriage with Ted Hughes fueled her depression later in life; he had cheated on her with a younger woman and left her to raise their two children. Once again, she was overcome by self-esteem issues and anxiety that led her down a dark path. Plath attempted suicide three times, and she succeeded on her third attempt at the age of thirty. She died
In poems of Sylvia Plath, entitled "Lady Lazarus" and "Daddy" some elements are similar, including used hostile imagery, gloomy atmosphere as well as recurring theme of suicide, but the poems differ in respect of the speaker’s point of view and attitude towards addressed person or unfavorable surroundings. These elements are employed by Plath in order to intensify the impact on her audience and convey all extreme emotions. Another issue that is considered to be worthy of thinking over is the question why the poet refers to Holocaust and the suffering of the Jews in Nazi concentration camps.
Death is inevitable and a lifelong process in every individual’s life. Most importantly, we are unaware of when or how it will happen and, because death can come at a time when we least expect it, it allows some individuals to fear death. In both poems, Lady Lazarus and Daddy, by Sylvia Plath, show different ways to view death. In Lady Lazarus, Plath talks about the characters attempts to commit suicide. Throughout the poem, we discover that the first time she tried to commit suicide was an accident while her second and third time were intentional. While Daddy reveals the process of how a girl came to terms with her father’s death. Although some may assert that the poems show rebirth, both poems reveal death as a way to escape from reality.
Plath’s father died early in her life leaving her with unresolved feelings, and this brought a lot of troubles later on in life. Sylvia was a great student but when she was overwhelmed with disappointments after a month in New York, she attempted suicide (“Sylvia Plath”). After receiving treatment and recovering, she returned to school and later moved to England where she met her future husband, Ted Hughes (“Sylvia Plath”). Their marriage with two children didn’t last when Ted had an affair. They separated and Ted moved in with the new woman, leaving Sylvia and their two children. Battling depression during this time, Sylvia soon ended her life. She left behind numerous writings that many might see as signs of her depression and suicide attempts.
As stated above, some teenagers do have a problem to build the relationship with their parents. As she said in the poem, attempting suicide took place regularly when she was ten. Even though, Sylvia Plath did not mentioned her mother in the poem, the reader can found there is a something wrong with her mother. She did not say one word about her mother like the poem, Daddy. She does not have a companion to share her feelings, she does not have a supporter who could stop her first or second suicide attempt while she get accustomed to try to kill herself “like the cat.” This causes the reader to speculate that she might failed to bond with her mother from an early age.