The Silent Woman

Today marks the 45th anniversary of the death of German-American poet Sylvia Plath’s  in London at the age of 31.  Her poetry and the circumstances of her suicide continue to fascinate.  Critic A.N. Wilson has fallen under her spell:

"Today is the 45th anniversary of Sylvia Plath’s terrible death, when
she tucked up her children with bread and milk, went into the kitchen
of her small flat, placed a cloth inside the gas oven, upon which she
laid her head, and went to sleep.

Her most terrible poem is Daddy ("A man in black with
a Meinkampf look"), which ends "Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m
through", and which sees the only way out of her psychological torments
as self-destruction.

It became the anthem of
doomed 1960s feminists ("Every woman adores a Fascist,/The boot in the
face, the brute"…). But Plath herself wasn’t especially feminist.

To
meet, as the many biographies reveal, she seemed like a typical young
American housewife, the girl in a deodorant or detergent ad. The
discrepancy between her manner and her poems is shocking: as if Lucille
Ball had been cast as Medea."

To stay abreast of the "Sylvia Plath industry" – which shows no sign of recession – I recommend author Peter Steinberg’s blog Sylvia Plath Info.  German readers have ample resources for accessing translations of Sylvia Plath and learning about her short life. The Sylvia Plath Page of Anja Beckmann in Ulm appears to be dormant, but she has some good links.  Poet Erich Fried’s translation of Ariel is still in print by Suhrkamp Verlag, now in its 15th edition. Also indispensible is Sylvia Plath’s only novel Die Glasglocke (The Bell Jar) , her Tagebücher (Journals) – "edited" (censored) by her husband, poet Ted Hughes – and Briefe nach Hause (Letters Home). There is one biography of Plath in German – So leicht verletzbar unser Herz – which I haven’t read.  The best biography, by poet Anne Stevenson, is, thankfully, also translated into German. But the best book about Plath and her poetry, which takes us into to heart of the seduction, is Janet Malcolm’s The Silent Woman (Die schweigende Frau).

Most of her poetry has been made available online. You can listen to a haunting recording of Sylvia Plath reading "Daddy" (mentioned above by A.N. Wilson). And for the full effect, visit her grave in Heptonstall, Yorkshire.