4/02/2009

How did Sylvia Plath's work as a visual artist influence her poetry?


The following excerpt is from the BBC's "Woman's Hour" program that was broadcasted on 5th November, 2007:

Last month was the 75th anniversary of Sylvia Plath's birth. Although well-known for her poetry, her turbulent relationship with Ted Hughes and her tragic death, her artistic life is scarcely acknowledged. In fact, Sylvia’s diaries, letters and school notebooks are full of doodles and self-portraits and it was only at the age of twenty that she decided to leave fine art behind as her chosen career and opt for the written word. Jane is joined by Kathleen Connors, who has brought out a new book celebrating Sylvia’s artwork, and by the poet Ruth Fainlight, who was friends with Sylvia in the 1950s.

Listen to this item and write down anything that is of your interest.

3 comments:

Andy said...

From ancient time till now, a large number of artists died by commit suicide. Maybe they have the special personalities so they can create such amazing works. I have seen the movie 梅蘭芳 few month ago and there is line that impress me a lot that is “Everything that 梅 has are from his loneliness. ” I think the famous artists all need the loneliness to make their work immortal, however, some of them can not stand the loneliness and chose to end their lives. The feeling is hard to imagine, but we can find it from their works. After reading their works, we may realize a little bit of their feeling at least. Sometimes, we can only see their splendid lives but can not see the suffering behind the fame.

Ruth said...

Actually, Sylvia's ability to art amazes me. How can a poet write great poems and also paint great works. It makes me wonder why she abandoned fine art and decided to fully indulge in poetry after she was twenty. No matter what choice she had made, she have developed some literary themes in art such as the limited options for women, the marriage of military and commercial cultures during the 1950s. In my opinion, her poem is just like her works. She is destined to be different from others at the same time she was born.

Ilitta said...

Sometimes she saw vivid and colorful things it inspires her writing. She was fond of art, several of her poems were talking about art works; for examples, painting and sculpture. A lot of her poem was about painting took off from a visual image. She studied modern art at the age of twelve, she was totally influenced by visual art. And Sylvia Plath oten started her work visuably, like somthing described heavily wuth the image of women in her diary. A number of her poem which talked about women had outrageous and gorgeous colorful outfits, she wrote that because of her outgoing personality.