Sept 15-21: The Plath more (and less) traveled...

So, just to jump on the critical bandwagon, I think I’m going to discuss “Daddy” by Sylvia Plath for a bit, before jumping off the bandwagon and moving on to my favorite poem this week (also by Plath), “The Arrival of the Bee Box.”

Listening to “Daddy” on YouTube, I definitely had a couple sharp intakes of breath. When I read through “Daddy,” the reading just reaffirmed my feelings that “Daddy” would definitely cause some waves if it had been published in the here and the now (as I’m sure it did when it was actually published). I feel like the need to compare one’s father to the Holocaust definitely implies some strong feelings behind the creation of the poem, and I’m sure that psychoanalysts and literary critics alike have many great party conversations concerning this poem.

Plath asserting that “every woman adores a fascist” (line 48) was the most shocking to me, but it shouldn’t be considering that Plath declares herself a “Jew” (line 35) and likens her experiences with her father to being carted off to a concentration camp. I think the fascist comment hung me up because I have never heard anyone declare love for fascism, but at the same time I thought I knew what she was getting at… To quote ZZ Top, “every girl’s crazy for a sharp dressed man.”

The other image that really stuck with me when reading the poem is the one Plath conjures when she states, “If I’ve killed one man, I’ve killed two…” (line 71). No wonder her marriage was on the rocks with that sort of statement.

“The Arrival of the Bee Box” was my favorite poem this week due to the imagery Plath invokes within the poem. After I read through the poem, I felt like the poet (I’m working under the assumption that the persona and the poet are one and the same) was attempting (somewhat in vain) to establish some control within her life. Why else would someone try so hard to establish that the bees were at the mercy of the poet? It’s obvious that the bees could die at the hands of the poet—they’re trapped in a box! The only reason for the obsession is that the poet is trying to reassure herself of the power that she has over the bees.

This control issue is especially obvious in the fifth stanza when the poet writes, “[The bees] can die, I need feed them nothing, I am the owner” (line 25).

Upon rereading the poem, I felt like the poet was also expressing some feelings of despair and hopelessness. When, in the penultimate stanza, the poet writes that she “wonder[s] if [the bees] would forget [her]” (line 27) if she turned into a tree, suggested to me that the poet is wondering if life would just pass her by if she consented to fade into the background—this further cemented in my mind my first reading that the poet is trying to establish control in her life. It’s been my experience that those who feel like they have no control are those that try to establish that they have control the most.

All in all, it was a good week for poems. Plath is truly gifted.

Fin.