Sylvia Plath: A Critical Guide

Description

This is a study of Sylvia Plath's work. Taking a roughly chronological structure, the author traces the unique nature of Plath's poetic gift, finding an essential unity in her inspiration. He outlines the evolution of recurring themes and demonstrates her development from the formal restraint of "The Colossus" to the ground-breaking techniques of "Ariel".

Sylvia Plath (1932-63) was born in Boston, Massachusetts, and studied at Smith College. In 1955 she went to Cambridge University on a Fulbright scholarship, where she met and later married Ted Hughes. She published one collection of poems in her lifetime, The Colossus (1960), and a novel, The Bell Jar (1963). Her Collected Poems, which contains her poetry written from 1956 until her death, was published in 1981 and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for poetry.