Yesterday was one of those Janus January days. Cloudy, windy, unseasonable warm and rainy in the morning, but by noon, the temperatures plummeted, the clouds pushed off and rain water froze seemingly instantly. I had to go to Logan Airport, and so I felt it would be a good day to use the new Ricoh Theta camera I got last month from Brandi. And O!, was I glad I went. That blue sky is amazing... right out of "The Colossus": "A blue sky out of the Oresteia / Arches above us" ( The Colossus , 1960, p. 20). Or, this recalls Plath's own visit to her father's grave from March 1959, written in her journals: "A clear blue day in Winthrop. Went to my father's grave, a very depressing sight" ( The Journals of Sylvia Plath , 2000, p. 473). Plath mined this experience for use in The Bell Jar , published on this day 55 years ago in London. But she changed the scene from that which she recorded in her journals. Here are the links to the Theta images: Th...

The following is a post first started between June and December 2012, revisited briefly in June 2014, and then forgotten about as I was working full time on the letters of Sylvia Plath project. I felt it was important to work on the blog some more this fall with the intention of posting it on 5 November, which was the 75th anniversary of the death of Otto Plath. But then other things got in the way... Recently, though, I had a change of heart about the bulk of this post. Much of what I wanted to say I learned years ago but will refrain from posting now as I believe that Heather Clark, in her forthcoming biography of Sylvia Plath, will discuss at beautiful and thorough length the history and biography of Otto Plath. However, what I do still want to relate is interesting information I obtained Warren's Plath's daughter Susan in June 2014 concerning something Paul Alexander wrote as fact in his biography of Sylvia Plath, Rough Magic . Alexander writes, "On April 13, 188...

This afternoon was also a good - no, a great - way to conclude the Symposium. As with the other post today, I've just decided to post my notes, relatively unedited! Julie Goodspeed-Chadwick: "Sylvia Plath and Trauma: Reading the October 1962 Poems" Part of a book on modernist and contemporary poets. Two terms in trauma studies are "acting out": nightmares and reliving experiences and "working through": the process of the subject trying to make sense of the traumatic experience. Attempts to come with a narrative that hangs together about that experience, enables her/him to begin to work through it, to put the episode behind her. "A Birthday Present" Calm and resigned voice anticipates "Edge" and "Words". Line "I am alive only by accident" is the trauma event about which the speaker needs to work through. Trauma leads to a fetishization of death. "Lady Lazarus" Founding trauma is part and parce...

Did anyone read the list of featured speakers at the Sylvia Plath 2012 Symposium: The October Poems that I posted on 19 July" ? Did anyone see the subject of Heather " The Grief of Influence " Clark's talk? Well, here it is, again: Heather Clark on Otto Plath's FBI files, Plath’s German heritage? Journalist Dalya Alberge has written an article for The Guardian newspaper in London titled "FBI files on Sylvia Plath's father shed new light on poet." The focus of the article is Heather's subject, and how recently uncovered archival documents provide insight into Sylvia Plath's father, Otto Plath, who was briefly investigated by the FBI in October 1918. But if you cannot wait until October to hear what promises to be a gripping talk, click here to read the article . Update: 18 August 2012 Daily Mail runs similar report: but with more photographs... Read "FBI files on Sylvia Plath's father show he was investigated during World War I...

I've been making Otto Plath cookies for years now. It started by accident several years ago with some friends. This is my 2009 Otto Plath cookie sugar cookie. Notice the amputated left leg, with residual evidence of gangrene, represented by green sugar sprinkles. (It was at this point my wife stopped talking to me.) The surgeon (at 2 a.m.) was a little sloppy and didn't clean up all the blood (red sprinkles). Notice the cleft in the chin instead of the foot. Notice, too, the doubling here by the cookie and its shadow. The sun makes a model of him, "A man in black with a Meinkampf look / And a love of the rack and the screw." The cookie is on the cooling rack and it is screwed because I ate it just afterwards. And I loved it. Don't you give me that Meinkampf look! Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, whatever you celebrate.

From Sweden comes Lady Lazarus . This is a website designed and created by Sonja and Florian Flur. Theirs is quite a unique relationship and situation; one that upon reading their webpages will lead many to have questions. The website looks at two living people who identify with Sylvia Plath and Otto Plath. They explore "the possibility of reincarnation and how a person possibly goes from one life to another." The Flur's have several separate webpages and two movies that detail the stories of their lives and some of the interesting connections with the lives of Sylvia Plath, Otto Plath, and Ted Hughes. Having read the pages now a couple of times, I'm still trying to process their story and the possibility of reincarnation. The Flur's are kind enough to include a link for leaving comments, should you have any. The site is beautiful designed, the movies wonderfully shot and edited, and easy to navigate. From Italy comes " Raccontando Sylvia " ("Abo...

Did you know that Sylvia Plath wrote her famous poem "Daddy" on the 22nd anniversary of the day her father had his leg amputated? In August 1940, Otto Plath stubbed a toe on his left foot. After some changes to his diet and medication with insulin, he developed pneumonia and spent about two weeks at the Winthrop Hospital. Eventually he developed gangrene and Otto Plath's left leg was amputated above the knee on 12 October 1940. Otto Plath died 24 days later on 5 November 1940. On 12 October 1962, twenty-two years later to the day, Plath placed a stake in his fat black heart when she wrote "Daddy". 24 days later, on 5 November 1962, Plath was in London. It was on this day that she applied for the lease on the house at 23 Fitzroy Road . Plath and Hughes visited San Francisco in the summer of 1959 while on a tour of the U.S. and Canada. It was here she likely saw the seals barking and basking in the sun off Pier 39. The image Plath uses in "Daddy" is ...

Otto Plath died 68 years ago today. Did you know that Ted Hughes died aged 68, 2 months, and 11 days? Plath died on 2/11/63. Did you know that 63 days before Plath died, she moved to London? Did you know that in Diane Middlebrook's Her Husband: Hughes and Plath - a marriage , the pagination coincides so that on page 211, the author discusses Plath's death? Middlebrook, who passed away last December, was 68. This was 123 days before her next birthday. To recap some numbers, this is 68 x 2 - 11 -2.