Plath and Hughes essay PDF

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Modula A - Plath and Hughes Essay...

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To what extent has textual form shaped your understanding of conflicting perspectives? Conflicting perspectives arise as differing viewpoints based on personal morals, beliefs and opinions clash. Situations and events throughout life are perceived in different ways, with greater emphasis placed on some aspects more than others. In the relationship of poets Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath, conflicting perspectives have arisen as each hold their own viewpoint, and at times, conflict with their own views. With the knowledge of Plath’s suicide, Hughes’ collection of poems, Birthday Letters, hold the conflicting perspectives of not only his word against hers, but also a conflict with his hindsight and understanding Plath’s point of view. These perspectives are showcased in the poems Fulbright Scholars, Your Paris and The Minotaur. Plath’s perspective is presented in her poem Daddy, which encompasses the inner conflict she has with her perception of her deceased father, as well as her existing husband Hughes. Hughes collection, Birthday Letters, was released 30 years after Plath’s suicide, and must be kept in mind when analysing the perspectives portrayed within his poems. The first poem in Hughes collection, Fulbright Scholars depicts his first sighting of Plath, drawing on both his memory of viewing a photograph of “Fulbright Scholars” and his hindsight. Due to the significant length of time between the event and the writing of this poem, tension is created between what he remembers, and what he has since learned about Plath’s suicidal state. The poem opens with a rhetorical question, “Where was it, in the strand?” This begins the tension between the conflicting perspectives of his memory, and of his hindsight. The poem is dominated by his use of rhetoric as well as his uncertainty with the repetition of maybe: “Maybe I noticed you. Maybe I weighed you up…” Hughes remembers Plath’s physical attributes, not from the photograph “in the strand”, but from their life together: “Your Veronica Lake Bang.” He continues by describing her grin as “exaggerated” and states that her grin was not out of happiness, but rather for “the cameras, the judges, the strangers, the frighteners” – a suggestion to the troubles that haunted Plath. This perspective he has of her is due to the knowledge he has of her psychological state. Hughes uses juxtaposition to further illustrate his uncertainty: “Then I forgot. Yet I remember.” The conflicting perspectives he holds within himself are clearly evident with the constant shifts he demonstrates in the poem. The last two lines: “At twenty-five I was dumbfounded afresh / By my ignorance of the simplest things.” – portrays the changes in maturity and knowledge Hughes has had through ageing, and implies the perspective that he ignored the signs of Plath’s deterioration. These conflicts are strong, and as the first poem in Birthday Letters, set the mood for the remainder of the collection. Your Paris is another poem within Birthday Letters which strongly portrays conflicting perspectives. The title implies that the poem is Hughes idea of Plath’s view on Paris, immediately setting out the conflicting perspectives which are to continue throughout the poem. The first line – “Your Paris, I thought, was American” – highlights that Hughes was incorrect in his belief of Plath’s idea of ‘Paris’. The two perspectives presented within the poem are of their different appreciations of Paris post WWII. Hughes demeans Plath’s perspective as he highlights that all she sees is the art, “through frame after frame” while he sees the destruction of war and can still see the horror in civilians’ faces: “I was a ghostwatcher.” Hughes perspective further conflicts with Plath’s towards the end of the poem as he uses the simile: “like a guide dog, loyal to correct your stumblings.” Hughes personifies the dog to represent himself. The conflict here is of Hughes hindsight as he did not know the extent

English Conflicting Perspectives – Gina Marovic

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of her problems, nor did he understand them. Upon writing the poem he knows that she had inner conflicts, and this knowledge conflicts with his past understanding of her. The Minotaur, another poem from Birthday Letters, highlights the perspectives during and after the event where Plath smashes Hughes “mother’s heirloom sideboard”. The poem begins with violent action. For Hughes, the damage goes beyond the physical destruction of the sideboard, by damaging “the scars of my whole life.” Hughes viciously responds with “Marvellous” and advises that her anger and emotions are “the stuff you’re keeping out of your poems.” The conflict in this poem is Hughes reminiscence of the event, and his current knowledge on how his words may have affected her mental state. By encouraging her to grasp her emotional scars and write about them, Hughes is encouraging Plath to strongly feel the pain she has resulting from the death of her father. Hughes conflict is his guilt as he may have strengthened the intensity of her feelings. The final two stanzas use an accusatory tone as Hughes repeatedly uses the term “your” – “your marriage”, “your children”, “your mother” and “your risen father”. In effect, Hughes claims no responsibility for her downfall. This juxtaposes the guilt he has demonstrated earlier in the poem, which may have triggered Plath’s decline, and this presents conflicting perspectives. Prior to her suicide, Sylvia Plath had written a confessional poem, Daddy, about her late father and husband Hughes. The title Daddy has positive connotations associated with being a child – innocent, happy and secure. This is sharply contrasted with the first line: “You do not do, you do not do.” The repetition appears accusatory as Plath uses the pronoun “you”. Plath begins to establish the image of a black shoe. She uses a simile to personify herself as a foot within the black shoe: “In which I have lived like a foot / For thirty years, poor and white, / Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.” This use of imagery conveys a feeling of restriction and fear towards her father. By describing herself as “poor and white”, Plath is conveyed as fragile, almost ghostly. The second stanza of Daddy becomes sinister, and remains that way for the remainder of the poem. Plath portrays her father as being larger than life: “Big as a Frisco seal”, this shows that Plath idolised her father. This perspective conflicts as she continues by stating she no longer prays “to recover” her father. The poem shifts here, and the reason for it appears to be due to her relationship with Hughes. She begins to show a strong disconnection with her father: “I have always been scared of you.” The changing perspective from idolising her father to being fearful of him exhibit that conflicting perspectives exist within textual forms. Plath’s perspective within Daddy reaches its climax as she shifts her perception of her father onto Hughes. Plath states, “Daddy, you can lie back now”. This is in response to “the vampire who said he was you”. Plath has portrayed Hughes as a vampire who has drank the blood out of her for “seven years”. For this reason she addresses ‘Daddy’ as she now has a new torturer. The final stanza is filled with anger and frustration, with the last two words “I’m through” implying a strong intention of suicide. Hughes poems Fulbright Scholars, Your Paris and The Minotaur shape ones understanding of conflicting perspectives as they highlight the shifts one can have with their thoughts as time goes by. Daddy by Plath highlights conflicting perspectives in a different way, shaped by the scars of her father’s death and inability to move away from her past.

English Conflicting Perspectives – Gina Marovic

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