There were some letters referred to in this morning's blog post that I thought it might be nice to write a bit more about.  Sylvia Plath wrote two letters to Kenneth Allott which are housed by the Syndey Jones Library at the University of Liverpool. When in the midst of working on the paper that I gave for the Sylvia Plath Society's conference in March ( YouTube ), I found myself going down a bit of a rabbit hole which led to their being located. Naturally I wish they could have been included in volume II of the Letters of Sylvia Plath .  The letters date from 1 and 6 January 1961. In the first letter, written almost immediately upon return from the terrible visit to Yorkshire, Plath gives permission for Allott to reprint "Frog Autumn" and "Metaphors" in his anthology, Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse 1918–60 , 2nd edition (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1962, pp. 388–90), and provides some biographical details about herself. The second letter written just ...

In November 2008 , I posted about the collection of Sylvia Plath typescripts ( link to library's finding aid ) held at the Sydney Jones Library at the University of Liverpool. The typescript for "The Rabbit Catcher" is particularly interesting as written adjacent to the first line - in Plath's hand - is the world Chevreau. Recently I learned that this is likely not referring to a young goat . Rather, it is referring to a person, Cecile Chevreau. I wonder if she kept young goats? Cecile Chevreau, along with Gary Watson and Alan Wheatley, read poems for the BBC Third Programme 'New Poems' broadcast on 16 September 1962 (at 18.40, or 6:40 p.m.). Other poets included in the broadcast were Zulfikar Ghose (a reviewer Plath's The Colossus ), John Lehmann (an editor at London Magazine ), Christopher Hampton, Jenny Joseph, John Knight, Michell Raper, Anthony Thwaite (amongst other things, a producer for BBC radio), and Terence Tiller. The poems by Plath inclu...

The Sydney Jones Library at the University of Liverpool holds several typescripts of poems by Sylvia Plath. Typescripts held are: "Three Women" [MS.26.1(64)], "The Moon and the Yew Tree" [MS.26.1(65)], "The Rabbit Catcher" [MS.26.1(66)], and "Among the Narcissi" [MS.26.1(67)]. The reference number is: GB 141 Plath. The typescript of "The Rabbit Catcher" is annotated; the word "CHEVREAU" is handwritten in next to the first line, "It was a place a force." The handwriting does appear to be Plath's. There are other small annotations (not in Plath's hand) and variations on the typescripts to those Ariel typescripts held at the Mortimer Rare Book Room, Smith College. The typescript of "Three Women" appears to be a reading copy - or something similar - for a 1968 broadcast of the verse poem. The Special Collections also holds a respectible collection of books by Plath. The Sydney Jones Library ( Specia...