Sylvia Plath reads her own poetry carefully, enunciating each
syllable and vowel, sounding very correct. Her poems from the
late 1950s are reminiscent of Ted Hughes’ work, describing iconic
animals, the raven, the sow, and figures from myth. Only a few
relate directly to her personal experience; Full Fathom Five (1958),
for instance, is about her father. But by 1962 her poems are far
more personal, self-revealing, and deliberately provocative. They
are the works that made her famous, and Plath is still one of
the central figures of the twentieth century to address the issue
of suicide.

Plath was born of immigrant parents in Boston in 1932. Her father
died when she was nine, and I’m sure the several biographies of
Plath discuss what effect this loss had on her. Her first suicide
attempt was when she was in college, and she writes about it often
in her poetry. After treatment she returned to college and graduated
summa cum laude. She married Ted Hughes in 1956, and was pregnant
in 1959. She separated from Hughes in 1961, and killed herself
in February, 1963.

It is the last eight poems in this collections of recordings that
are most memorable, recorded in October, 1962, When reading, in
Daddy (1962),

Every woman adores a Fascist,

The boot in the face, the brute

Brute heart of a brute like you.

it is very helpful to know how Plath herself reads these lines.
She is a little theatrical, enjoying her ability to shock. As
an audiodocument of one of the most famous poets of the twentieth
century, this is a fascinating recording. As an expression of
a woman who killed herself less than four months later, her readings
are utterly compelling.

The audiobook is on tape, although the format of reading poetry
is more suited to CDs, since a CD player allows one to listen
to particular tracks again and again. The tape comes with a book
of the poems as published – it is notable that the versions Plath
reads are sometimes different than the published versions.

Link:

• RandomHouse webpage for this audiobook

© 2001 Christian Perring. First Serial Rights.

Christian Perring,
Ph.D., is Chair of the Philosophy Department at Dowling College,
Long Island. He is editor of Metapsychology Online Review.
His main research is on philosophical issues in psychiatry.
He is especially interested in exploring how philosophers can
play a greater role in public life. He is available to give talks
on many philosophical or controversial issues in mental health.

Categories: Fiction

Tags: Suicide