2. z
Short Biography
Sylvia Plath October 27, 1932 – February 11, 1963) was an American poet, novelist, and
short-story writer. She is credited with advancing the genre of confessional poetry and is
best known for two of her published collections, The Colossus and Other Poems and
Ariel, as well as The Bell Jar, a semi-autobiographical novel published shortly before her
death. In 1981 The Collected Poems were published, including many previously
unpublished works. For this collection Plath was awarded a posthumous Pulitzer Prize in
Poetry in 1982, making her the first to receive this honour posthumously.
She married fellow poet Ted Hughes in 1956, and they lived together in the United
States and then in England. They had two children before separating in 1962.
Plath was clinically depressed for most of her adult life, and was treated multiple times
with electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). She died by suicide in 1963.
3. z
Confessional Poetry
Confessional poetry was written in rebellion against the demand for impersonality
by T. S. Eliot and the New Critics.
With shocking detail the poet reveals private or clinical matters about himself or
herself, including sexual experiences, mental an-guish and illness, experiments
with drugs, and suicidal impulses.
Confes-sional poems were written by Robert Lowell, Allen Ginsberg, Sylvia Plath,
Anne Sexton, John Berryman and other American poets
4. z
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the World War
II genocide of the European Jews. Between 1941 and 1945,
across German-occupied Europe, Nazi Germany and its
collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews,
around two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population.[a][d] The
murders were carried out in pogroms and mass shootings; by a
policy of extermination through work in concentration camps;
and in gas chambers and gas vans in German extermination
camps, chiefly Auschwitz, Bełżec, Chełmno, Majdanek, Sobibór,
and Treblinka in occupied Poland
5. z
Introduction to Daddy
Daddy" is a poem written by American Confessional poet Sylvia Plath. The
poem was written on October 12, 1962, four months before her death and
one month after her separation from Ted Hughes. It was published
posthumously in Ariel during 1965[1] alongside many other of her poems
leading up to her death such as "Tulips” and "Lady Lazarus.“
Daddy" employs controversial metaphors of the Holocaust to explain Plath's
complex relationship with her father, Otto Plath, who died shortly after her
eighth birthday as a result of undiagnosed diabetes.The poem itself is
cryptic, a widely anthologized poem in American literature,[4] and its
implications, as well as thematic concerns, have been reviewed
academically, with many differing conclusions.
6. z
Note that ‘Achoo’ is capitalised,
perhaps because it means more
than just a sneeze. It’s a
figurative Sneeze that is
disruptive, and upsets the rigidity
of Daddy’s control. The
capitalisation might also be a
play on words, foreshadowing
the use of ‘Ach, du’ in the third
stanza, and its English
translation ‘O, You’ in the ninth
stanza.
You do not do, you do not do
Any more, black shoe
In which I have lived like a foot
For thirty years, poor and
white,
Barely daring to breathe or
Achoo.
Plath’s “Daddy,” Otto Plath, had gangrene
(and diabetes), which eventually caused
his entire leg to be amputated. Plath was
heavily impacted by his death. In her
poetry, she often refers to him via
synecdoche,, using a part to refer to the
whole, specifically calling him a toe or a
foot.
The first stanza’s rhyming and repetition
sounds characteristic of a nursery rhyme –
a tone which is overturned in the second
stanza. This shift shows the
powerlessness of the persona and
emphasises the domineering nature of her
father.
“You do not do, you do not do” sounds like
a parent scolding a child. The poem is
titled “Daddy”, instead of “A Birthday
Present” – Plath’s other choice, and this
works well because the reader
immediately sees the words of a
disciplinarian.
7. z
The head of the statue
representing her father protrudes
from the Atlantic. This depiction
may suggest that his presence,
for her, stretches from coast to
coast over America, as it did
throughout her entire life
Nauset is in Massachusetts and
is where Plath and her family
would holiday in the summer.
This location is significant as she
spent many of her formative
years here and would have felt
the absence of her father,
praying for him to come back.
Daddy, I have had to kill you.
You died before I had time——
Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,
Ghastly statue with one gray toe
Big as a Frisco seal
And a head in the freakish Atlantic
Where it pours bean green over blue
In the waters off beautiful Nauset.
I used to pray to recover you.
Ach, du.
Plath’s father died when she was eight, so she had to ‘bury’ him before
she had a chance to truly know him.
The contradictory meaning communicated by Plath in the first two lines
may be interpreted as indicating that her father died before she had a
chance to metaphorically kill him herself which, of course, is the
purpose that this poem serves.
In this stanza, Plath describes her father to the reader as “Marble-
heavy…” depicting him as a statue and not a father. This could be a
reference to her father’s reputed Nazi sympathies and his coldness.
Her father was like God to her, so the marble casket contained God/her
father. God is good way to describe her feelings towards her father.
Awe and wonder, yet still terrified and distant from him. The heaviness
may also refer to the weight of the depression from which she suffered.
Plath also struggled with religion during her life, so some believe this
may also be a nod to those struggles.
The description, ‘marble-heavy’, also refers to the type of stone
commonly used in statues, such as the one mentioned in the following
line. The use of this imagery fits with the idea that Plath spent most of
her life putting her father on a pedestal, and yearning for a father-
daughter relationship that she could never have with such a cold, and
distant figure.
8. z
Frisco Seal
Uses a simile to compare her father’s
gangrenous big toe, to a Frisco seal
as pictured above. Harsh.
Plath did not get the chance to love
her father because he was in the
military and she did not have that
connection with him. Because of this
she saw her father as a man who
was empty on the inside, because
she did not know him, and that is
why she refers to him as a statue.
She cannot see him as anything
else.
10. z
In the German tongue, in the Polish town
Scraped flat by the roller
Of wars, wars, wars.
But the name of the town is common.
My Polack friend
Says there are a dozen or two.
So I never could tell where you
Put your foot, your root,
I never could talk to you.
The tongue stuck in my jaw.
This could be a reference to the renaming of
towns by the marauding Germans in WWII.
For example the town, Oświęcim was
renamed Auschwitz.
Her father, Otto Plath, was an ethnic German
born in Grabow, Poland. He spoke German
despite being born in Poland.
Here Plath seems to be describing the
destruction of the Polish town due to war.
Using “roller of wars”, it is implying that when
wars roll through (battles commence) town,
deconstruction is what they leave behind.
May be a specific reference for WWII’s
bombings and fighting.
Plath’s father was a German immigrant, but
whatever town he originally came from had a
common enough name that she was never
able to place it for certain on a map. Thus,
she feels she was never able to “find” her
father, to trace his lineage back far enough
that it might have given her some meaningful
insight into the man’s nature.
11. z
This example is very similar to the
imagery/metaphor that she uses in
Lady Lazarus as well: “My face a
featureless, fine/ Jew linen,” etc.
Plath uses the suffering of the
Jews to convey the suffering
caused her by her her late father.
This also could refer to the father-
daughter relationship; he is the
cruel, oppressive Nazi and she is
the weak, passive Jew.
It stuck in a barb wire snare.
Ich, ich, ich, ich,
I could hardly speak.
I thought every German was
you.
And the language obscene
An engine, an engine
Chuffing me off like a Jew.
A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz,
Belsen.
I began to talk like a Jew.
I think I may well be a Jew.
She describes feeling as thought her tongue were stuck in a
barb wire snare, which foreshadows the imagery of and
allusions to the Holocaust and the Nazi concentration camps
that preoccupied her in so many of her poems.
Otto Plath, her father, was born in Grabow Northern Germany in
1885. In this line, Plath is comparing her father to Nazis in World
War II and saying that she because she thinks of her father as a
monster, every other German must be a monster, too.
During the Holocaust the Germans took Jews to concentration
camps by train. The names listed in the third line are names of
Nazi concentration camps that existed during World War II. The
device whereby the mere mention of a name has significance,
without need of explanation, is known as holophrasis.
The line ‘chuffing me off like a Jew’ perhaps relates to Plath’s
feelings of abandonment that are connected to her relationship
with her father and to his death. From Plath’s perspective, her
father was a cold and distant authoritarian. The pain caused by
Otto’s detachment and death made Plath feel as though she has
been treated as something sub-human or persecuted, like the
Jews during the Holocaust.
12. z
Repetition Alert
The wire snare is an image
repeated in another poem
“The Rabbit Catcher”, about
the end of her relationship to
Ted Hughes. In that poem,
she compares being married
to the state of a rabbit caught
in a snare. The snare seems
to be a recurring image when
describing her relationship to
men.
13. z
The Nazi preoccupation with racial purity is an undercurrent in these lines, that
is undermined by Plath. Although they proclaimed themselves to be a pure and
superior race, given their actions, their purity was, in fact profoundly impure.
Tyrol is a western Austrian state in the Alps that’s known for its ski resorts,
historic sites and folk traditions. Vienna is the capital of Austria.
The narrator continues to distance herself from her German/Nazi-esque father
by highlighting her own “impure heritage.”
Taroc: An old card game played with a 78-card deck that includes the tarot
cards as trumps. The game was reportedly used by travelling gypsies to tell
people their fortunes. This connection is relevant and significant as it extends
the metaphor for Plath as a gypsy or Romany – another ethnic minority who
were persecuted by the Nazis during the Holocaust.
The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of
Vienna
Are not very pure or true.
With my gipsy ancestress and my weird
luck
And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack
14. z
I may be a bit of a Jew.
I have always been scared of you,
With your Luftwaffe, your
gobbledygoo.
And your neat mustache
And your Aryan eye, bright blue.
Panzer-man, panzer-man, O
You—
Gobbledygook is unintelligible nonsense, often a bunch of
big words that you can't comprehend. ... The inventor of this
term was a Texas politician who used "activation" and
"implementation" as examples of gobbledygook.
Luftwaffe, (German: “air weapon”) component of the
German armed forces tasked with the air defense of
Germany and fulfillment of the country's airpower
commitments abroad.
Panzer Man: Panzers were a type of tank that the Germans
used during WWII; they were virtually indestructible. Her
father, like the tank, was – to her at least – indestructible.
The word ‘panzer’ in German also means armour. As
portrayed throughout this poem and others, Plath perceived
her father as someone whose exterior (much like the tank)
could not be penetrated. The bitter and resentful tone
expresses the pain Plath carried for her whole life, as a
result of not being able to connect with her father on any
meaningful or emotional level.
“O You” is a repetition of “Ach, du” from earlier, this time
implied to be more exasperated than the original, sigh-like,
one.
15. z
Not God but a swastika
So black no sky could squeak
through.
Every woman adores a Fascist,
The boot in the face, the brute
Brute heart of a brute like you.
Swastika, the immediately recognisable symbol of the Nazi party.
His influence was so overwhelming that it allowed no light into her
life. This could also imply that she has been living under a dark
cloud as a result of him and Plath’s struggles with depression are
well documented.
In accordance with Freud’s Elektra complex, there is an implied
sexual admiration of her father who died before she reached
puberty. This interpretation is seemingly validated in the thirteenth
stanza, where Plath states: ‘I have made a model of you’ and ‘I
said I do, I do’, thus achieving the Freudian goal of marrying her
father and replacing her mother.
Plath was an early feminist, and much of her poetry may be
viewed as examples of the counter-culture that emerged
throughout the 1960s, in an era of Cold War conformity and
anxiety. In Plath’s case she was rebelling against the prescribed
gender roles of ‘mother’ and ‘wife’ that she was forced to play
within the patriarchal society that she inhabited. In many
countries, gender roles were still set and prescribed; patriotic
women were supposed to submit to their more dominant male
counterparts.
16. z
You stand at the blackboard, daddy,
In the picture I have of you,
A cleft in your chin instead of your foot
But no less a devil for that, no not
Any less the black man who
Bit my pretty red heart in two.
Her father was really a teacher. But the blackboard
echoes the reference to the ‘black shoe’ at the beginning,
the ‘black man’ and the ‘black telephone’. The
predominance of black in this poem is important as it
establishes a morose and vindictive mood. Black is the
colour of hatred, negativity, death, bad moods etc.
The devil is often described as having cloven hooves; her
father doesn’t have that, but he has a cleft in his chin.
She’s simply calling her father a devil by describing his
features.
Plath again uses synecdoche, as she did at the start, by
using her father’s ‘cleft foot’ to refer to the figure of her
father as a whole.
The figure of the ‘black man’ refers to both her father and
Ted Hughes at different points in the poem. Here, Plath
uses second person perspective to address her father
directly throughout this entire stanza, identifying him as
“…the black man who/Bit my pretty red heart in two.”
The term “black man” describes the cold, cruel man her
father was purported to be, though later biographies
challenge this, notably Rosenblatt and Breslin. At least
from Plath’s perspective this was how she viewed her
father and portrayed him in many of her poems.
17. z
I was ten when they buried you.
At twenty I tried to die
And get back, back, back to you.
I thought even the bones would do.
But they pulled me out of the sack,
And they stuck me together with glue.
And then I knew what to do.
I made a model of you,
A man in black with a Meinkampf look
And a love of the rack and the screw.
And I said I do, I do.
So daddy, I’m finally through.
The speaker was 10 years old when her father died. When she was 20, she tried to
commit suicide so that she could finally be reunited with him. She thought even being
buried with him would be enough. She even tried to end her life in order to see him
again. She thought that even if she was never to see him again in an after-life, to simply
have her bones buried by his bones would be enough of a comfort to her.
the speaker reveals that she was not able to commit suicide, even though she tried. She
reveals that she was found and “pulled…out of the sack” and stuck back together “with
glue”. At this point, the speaker experienced a revelation. She realized that she must re-
create her father. She decided to find and love a man who reminded her of her father.
This is why the speaker says that she finds a “model” of her father who is “a man in black
with a Meinkampf look”. While “Meinkampf” means “my struggle”, the last line of this
stanza most likely means that the man she found to marry looked like her father and like
Hitler.
Mein Kampf (German: [maɪn ˈkampf]; My Struggle or My Fight) is a 1925
autobiographical manifesto by Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler. The work describes the
process by which Hitler became antisemitic and outlines his political ideology and future
plans for Germany.
“I do” sounds like marriage vow. the speaker reveals that the man she married enjoyed
to torture. This is why she describes him as having “a love of the rack and the screw”.
She confesses that she married him when she says, “And I said I do, I do.” Then she
tells her father that she is through. This means that having re-created her father by
marrying a harsh German man, she no longer needed to mourn her father’s death.
18. z
The black telephone’s off at the root,
The voices just can’t worm through.
If I’ve killed one man, I’ve killed two——
The vampire who said he was you
And drank my blood for a year,
Seven years, if you want to know.
Daddy, you can lie back now.
She then describes her relationship with her father as a phone call.
Now she has hung up, and the call is forever ended.
In this stanza of Daddy, the speaker reminds the readers that she has
already claimed to have killed her father. She revealed that he actually
died before she could get to him, but she still claims the responsibility
for his death.
Now she says that if she has killed one man, she’s killed two. This is
most likely in reference to her husband. She refers to her husband as a
vampire, one who was supposed to be just like her father. As it turned
out, he was not just like her father. In fact, he drained the life from her.
This is why she refers to him as a vampire who drank her blood.
A vampire is a creature from folklore that subsists by feeding on the vital
essence (generally in the form of blood) of the living. In European folklore,
vampires are undead creatures that often visited loved ones and caused
mischief or deaths in the neighborhoods they inhabited while they were
alive. They wore shrouds and were often described as bloated and of ruddy
or dark countenance
When the speaker says, “daddy, you can lie back now” she is telling
him that the part of him that has lived on within her can die now, too.
19. z
There’s a stake in your fat black heart
And the villagers never liked you.
They are dancing and stamping on you.
They always knew it was you.
Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through.
In this stanza, the speaker reveals that her father, though dead, has
somehow lived on, like a vampire, to torture her. It is claimed that she
must kill her father the way that a vampire must be killed, with a
stake to the heart. She then goes on to explain to her father that “the
villagers never liked you”. She explains that they dance and stomp
on his grave. The speaker says that the villagers “always knew it was
[him]”. This suggests that the people around them always suspected
that there was something different and mysterious about her father.
With the final line, the speaker tells her father that she is through
with him. While he has been dead for years, it is clear that her
memory of him has caused her great grief and struggle. The speaker
was unable to move on without acknowledging that her father was, in
fact, a brute. Once she was able to come to terms with what he truly
was, she was able to let him stop torturing her from the grave.
https://blog.nationalgeographic.org/2010/02/22/six-ways-to-stop-a-
vampire/
22. z
Task for you
Write a brief note (150 words)
on the use of colour symbolism
in Sylvia Plath’s Daddy.
Don’t use Plagiarism. It’s
stealing, unethical, and
punishable.
