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| Sylvia Plath | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Feb 4 2009, 03:16 AM (201 Views) | |
| King Lear | Feb 4 2009, 03:16 AM Post #1 |
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I've wondered if it's possible that she's too clever for me to understand. My opinion of Sylvia Plath has always been that her work is nonsense, it doesn't make sense to me. Now Poe, he knew what he was doing, but no one knew what they were doing quite like Alfred Noyes. His work continues to keep me impressed, the clarity of his work is pleasing. Where hers leaves you unsure about what you read, what it meant, if she felt anything when she was writing random words together that meant nothing. I'm sure I'm being harsh on her work, I'd like to give her a chance, I'd like to admire her work, but I can't grasp the rythym her poetry. Does anyone have a favorite piece of hers? Something to sway my opinion? |
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| Midsummer Night | Feb 4 2009, 03:40 PM Post #2 |
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A lot of her work is scattered, but with poetry it never has to be perfect. I've always liked Tulips by Plath, it's one of her best pieces in my opinion. Tulips The tulips are too excitable, it is winter here. Look how white everything is, how quiet, how snowed-in. I am learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly As the light lies on these white walls, this bed, these hands. I am nobody; I have nothing to do with explosions. I have given my name and my day-clothes up to the nurses And my history to the anesthetist and my body to surgeons. They have propped my head between the pillow and the sheet-cuff Like an eye between two white lids that will not shut. Stupid pupil, it has to take everything in. The nurses pass and pass, they are no trouble, They pass the way gulls pass inland in their white caps, Doing things with their hands, one just the same as another, So it is impossible to tell how many there are. My body is a pebble to them, they tend it as water Tends to the pebbles it must run over, smoothing them gently. They bring me numbness in their bright needles, they bring me sleep Now I have lost myself I am sick of baggage My patent leather overnight case like a black pillbox, My husband and child smiling out of the family photo; Their smiles catch onto my skin, little smiling hooks. I have let things slip, a thirty-year~old cargo boat Stubbornly hanging on to my name and address. They have swabbed me clear of my loving associations. Scared and bare on the green plastic-pillowed trolley I watched my teaset, my bureaus of linen, my books Sink out of sight, and the water went over my head. I am a nun now, I have never been so pure. I didn't want any flowers, I only wanted To lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty. How free it is, you have no idea how free - The peacefulness is so big it dazes you, And it asks nothing, a name tag, a few trinkets. It is what the dead close on, finally; I imagine them Shutting their mouths on it, like a Communion tablet. The tulips are too red in the first place, they hurt me. Even through the gift paper I could hear them breathe Lightly, through their white swaddlings, like an awful baby. Their redness talks to my wound, it corresponds. They are subtle: they seem to float, though they weigh me down Upsetting me with their sudden tongues and their color, A dozen red lead sinkers round my neck. Nobody watched me before, now I am watched. The tulips turn to me, and the window behind me Where once a day the light slowly widens and slowly thins, And I see myself, flat, ridiculous, a cut-paper shadow Between the eye of the sun and the eyes of the tulips, And I have no face, I have wanted to efface myself The vivid tulips eat my oxygen. Before they came the air was calm enough, Coming and going, breath by breath, without any fuss. Then the tulips filled it up like a loud noise. Now the air snags and eddies round them the way a river Snags and eddies round a sunken rust-red engine. They concentrate my attention, that was happy Playing and resting without committing itself. The walls, also, seem to be warming themselves. The tulips should be behind bars like dangerous animals; They are opening like the mouth of some great African cat, And I am aware of my heart: it opens and closes Its bowl of red blooms out of sheer love of me. The water I taste is warm and salt, like the sea, And comes from a country far away as health. |
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| King Lear | Feb 4 2009, 03:45 PM Post #3 |
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After reading this, I know what it is now that I don't like about her. She has these deep feelings, but no deep words to describe them, she's an unpoetic poet. So even if what she's writing about is interesting, the writing won't be. |
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| Midsummer Night | Feb 4 2009, 04:09 PM Post #4 |
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Well, your piece here, is this more your idea of poetic? I'm not saying it isn't. I can tell you were going for this "dark" theme, but for me it barely came off as that. |
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| Pribble | Feb 5 2009, 12:27 AM Post #5 |
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That's a long freaking poem. It's ok. I've read better stuff on deviantart tho so.. why the hype? still remains a question. I'd never actually read her stuff, heard and read her name more than's worth counting tho. |
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| our*eclipse | Feb 9 2009, 03:11 AM Post #6 |
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I'd actually only ever read a few short poems of hers and I thought they were too.. going in every direction with ideas, but this one, I really like this one. I think the reason she didn't write with all that emotion is because she was kind of like outside of herself, like an observer, so she wrote thoughts. The funny thing is, I took away a lot more heavy feelings after reading that than I usually do when I read something that's very emotional. I think she was trying to touch on something that she wasn't even sure if she could, but she knew it was there just not how to describe it. I don't know. Something like that. |
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| Midsummer Night | Feb 9 2009, 03:26 AM Post #7 |
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Exactly, she is a great poet, hence why everyone has heard of Plath and not NOYES! |
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| our*eclipse | Feb 9 2009, 03:31 AM Post #8 |
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I like them both equally though, in different ways. |
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| Didier | Feb 9 2009, 03:32 AM Post #9 |
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Art isn't about praising one and downing another, it's about appreciating it for what it is, and what you take away from it. |
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| mydyingbreath | Feb 10 2009, 07:11 PM Post #10 |
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Sylvia Plath is overrated, overanalyzed, and overread. She lived in candyland. If you want proof just read some of her husband's bad poetry. |
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3:18 AM Jul 11