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Sylvia plath imagery in lady lazarus and daddy
Explication essay on lady lazarus by sylvia plath
Analysis of daddy sylvia plath
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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.
First of all, it should be decided who is the speaker in poem "Daddy". This issue as well as the controversial use of Holocaust imagery by Sylvia Plath may be resolved with quoting here her own words, which explain who the speaker is :
The poem is spoken by a girl with an Electra complex. Her father died while she thought he was God. Her case is complicated by the fact that her father was also a Nazi and her mother very possibly part Jewish. In the daughter the two strains marry and paralyze each other—she has to act out the awful little allegory once before she is free of it.
The daughter “Barely daring to breathe or Achoo” (5) addresses the memory of the father with increasing rage which contribute to impression that the poem is out of control. The poem begins with a series of images about father/ oppressor which progress from godlike: “Marble-heavy, a big full of God, / Ghastly statue with one gray toe / Big as Frisco seal” (8-10) to demonic. Although expressions, such as “swastika” (46), “brute” (49), “the rack” (66) indicate victimization, the poem is also about longing and love. In place of what is really frightening, that is a...
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“Daddy” contains allusions to World War 2 with images of a swastika in the sky (line 46-47) and references to German concentration camps, “A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen” (line 33). She states her father clearly to be a German man with “I thought every German was you” (line 29), “with your Luftwaffe” (line 42), “And your Aryan eye, bright blue” (line 44). Plath alludes to the popular anti-Semitism of her era in Germany depicted in lines 31-40. She then describes herself as a “Jew” to degrade herself against her German father. The diction of her lines “Chuffing me off like a Jew” (line 32) and “I think I may well be a Jew” (line 35) dehumanizes Jews in which she uses to also describe herself. To describe even more hatred towards her father, the multiple usages of the word “black” (lines 2, 51, 55, 65, 76) depicts her father as a dark menacing shadow in her life that has a evil dark “black” heart. She compares him to the man she married when Plath states, “I made a model of you” (line 64). She then describes that husband as a vampire that drank her blood (lines 72-74), because he reminded Plath of her father in the statement “They always knew it was you” (line 79). In Plath’s mind she only married her husband to be reminded of her father but soon realized it was a toxic relationship in line 80 in which she says “Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through”.
The Holocaust was a vile and horrific event that took place in Germany under the dictatorship of Adolf Hitler, gruesomely taking the lives of around 6 million Jews. To compare one self’s experience to that of those gassed and subjected to atrocious conditions is unbecoming at the least. The vast majority agree with this notion as well, including Irving Howe. Irving Howe, writer of the article “The Plath Celebration: A Partial Dissent” describes making Plath’s comparison her life to that of a Jew in her poem “Daddy” as “monstrous” and “utterly disproportionate” (1082). While Howe makes a reasonable argument, I disagree when he states that “Sylvia Plath tries to enlarge upon the personal plight” (1082). Accusing Plath of using the
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.
The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica. "Sylvia Plath (American author)." 23 September 2013. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 9 April 2014 .
Rosenthal, Lucy. Modern American Literature: A Library of Literary Criticism. Ed. Elaine Fialka Kramer, Maurice Kramer, and Dorothy Nyren. Rev. ed. New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., 1976.
A phenomenal writer’s work generates a powerful bond between their words and the reader. This is factual of Sylvia Plath’s poetry. It contains universal, timeless themes of depression and death that, in these dejected days, many people can relate to. Sylvia Plath was a confessional poet whose oppressive life led to her relatable story. She wrote many astonishing poems, such as “cut”, “Among the Narcissi”, and “A Birthday Present” that all chronicle and showcase her struggle for a release from the suppressed world she subsisted in, a world that many remain to live in today. Sylvia Plath’s poetry narrates both her distinct, individual story and yet universal tale of a woman who searches for a way out of her depressed state of mind.
"About." Personal Blog, n.d. Web. 15 Nov. 2015. [When finding an explanation for the similarities between the writers, it is important to play close attention to biographies. In case the psychoeconomic factors that Ruonco describes are true, then biography constitutes most of the development of the Sylvia Plath affliction. Moreover, the biography provides an insight into the views of the author for a better and more accurate understanding of her poetry. Furthermore, it is imperative to use her auto-statement since she referres to her "muse" as something out of her control which can be traced to Kaufman's
Sylvia Plath’s jarring poem ‘Daddy’, is not only the exploration of her bitter and tumultuous relationship with her father, husband and perhaps the male species in general but is also a strong expression of resentment against the oppression of women by men and the violence and tyranny men can and have been held accountable for. Within the piece, the speaker creates a figurative image of her father by using metaphors to describe her relationship with him: “Not God but a Swastika” , he is a “… brute” , even likening him to leader of the Nazi Party; Adolf Hitler: “A man in black with a Meinkampf look .” Overall, the text is a telling recount of her hatred towards her father and her husband of “Seven years” and the tolling affect it has had on
When Sylvia Plath was told her father died at the tender age of nine, she bitterly said, “I’ll never speak to God again.” In her brief but indispensable writing career, Plath distinguished herself in the poetical realm with her body of work that includes but is not limited to poems, short stories, and one semi-autobiographical novel. Her legacy lives on through her dark themes laden with powerful images such as the moon and skulls, while a father-type figure acts as a significant force either as a central antagonistic power or an influential shadow looming in the background. Brooding thoughts and despondent emotion overcome the reader when faced with one of Plath’s numerous works such as “Daddy,” “The Colossus,” and “Lady Lazarus.” Sometimes straightforward in understanding, Plath’s works contain intermittently placed, unique choices in diction like “mule bray, pig-grunt” throughout her works. On February 11, 1963, Plath was found with her head placed in her kitchen oven (death by carbon monoxide), yet she continues to resonate with people to this day; is it because we are able to relate to her melancholy and heartache? Or because of our sickening-interest in her suicide and the events that led to it? Maybe it is both. Because of her father’s death at a young age, Sylvia Plath’s poems underlies a theme regarding her suicidal demise and victimization at the hands of a patriarchal society, particularly from her husband, Ted Hughes, and late father, Otto Plath.
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.
Throughout the poem "Daddy" by Sylvia Plath, the author struggles to escape the memory of her father who died when she was only ten years old. She also expresses anger at her husband, Ted Hughes, who abandoned her for another woman. The confessional poem begins with a series of metaphors about Plath's father which progress from godlike to demonic. Near the end, a new metaphor emerges, when the author realizes that her estranged husband is actually the vampire of her dead father, sent to torture her. This hyperbole is central to the meaning of the poem. Lines 75-76 express a hope that they will stop oppressing her: "Daddy, you can lie back now / There ís a stake in your fat black heart." She concludes that her father can return to the grave, because she has finally rid herself of the strain he had caused her, by killing his vampire form. Despite this seeming closure, however, we will see that the author does not overcome her trauma.
Sylvia Plath uses a diverse array of stylistic devices in "Lady Lazarus," among them allusion,
Leenaars, A. A. & Wenckstern, S. (1998). Sylvia Plath: A protocol analysis of her last poems. Death Studies, October 1, 1998, Vol. 22, Issue 7, ISSN: 0748-1187. Retrieved May 6, 2005 from Academic Search Premier Database.
The poetry of Sylvia Plath can be interpreted psychoanalytically. Sigmund Freud believed that the majority of all art was a controlled expression of the unconscious. However, this does not mean that the creation of art is effortless; on the contrary it requires a high degree of sophistication. Works of art like dreams have both a manifest content (what is on the surface) and latent content (the true meaning). Both dreams and art use symbolism and metaphor and thus need to be interpreted to understand the latent content. It is important to maintain that analyzing Plaths poetry is not the same as analyzing Plath; her works stand by themselves and create their own fictional world. In the poems Lady Lazarus, Daddy and Electra on Azalea Path the psychoanalytic motifs of sadomasochism, regression and oral fixation, reperesnet the desire to return to the incestuous love object.
Sylvia wrote “Daddy” in 1963 about a girl’s emotional struggle with her German father who died and was like a monster. This father represents Sylvia’s own father who died when she was young. She wants to destroy him but he cannot come back to life. His death has caused Sylvia to have problems with all the men in her future including her former husband Ted, who she also refers to in the poem. This is the first type of literary criticism that stands out, feminist ...