POETRY

[Kalinychta]

“City” by Arthur Rimbaud

 

[Mr. Stevens]

I love Sylvia Plath. Today she’s kind of a joke, dismissed as a depressed feminist, but she’s actually one of the most talented and influential poets in history. She was a marvel.

I always got the impression people dismissed Ted Hughes, her husband, while exalting her. At least, in America that seems common, the past few decades. When did she fall out of favor?

 

[Kalinychta]

I always got the impression people dismissed Ted Hughes, her husband, while exalting her. At least, in America that seems common, the past few decades. When did she fall out of favor?

Really? Ted was Poet Laureate of Britain for fourteen years and won a slew of awards during his lifetime. He seems to have done alright.

Re: Sylvia, whenever I’ve heard her mentioned it’s always been within a feminist context or as a joke. It doesn’t seem like she’s taken seriously as a poet.

 

[Mr. Stevens]

Really? Ted was Poet Laureate of Britain for fourteen years and won a slew of awards during his lifetime. He seems to have done alright.

Re: Sylvia, whenever I’ve heard her mentioned it’s always been within a feminist context or as a joke. It doesn’t seem like she’s taken seriously as a poet.

The people dismissing Ted Hughes tend to blame him for her suicide.

I love both.

 

[Kalinychta]

The people dismissing Ted Hughes tend to blame him for her suicide.

I love both.

I know. Although he certainly contributed to it. I can’t even imagine being a single mother, with a toddler and an infant, alone in a foreign country, in a tiny apartment, in the winter…. I’m sure for that he blamed himself for the rest of his life. Not unjustifiably. I guess we’re supposed to think of him as the persecuted survivor?

But poetry-wise, she was ten times the poet he ever was. For that matter she was, of the confessional poets, by far the best.