Sylvia Plath Exhibitions at Smith College

Currently there are a couple of exhibits on at Smith College.

One is entitled "From Petals to Paper: Poetic Inspiration from Flowers." The exhibit opened on Friday, 1 March and runs until Monday, 3 September 3. The exhibit hours are 8:30 am to 4:00 pm daily and you can see it in the Church Exhibition Gallery, Lyman Plant House, Smith College. This building is located within the dangerous Plathmuda Triangle of Haven House, the Neilson Library (which houses the estimable Sylvia Plath Collection) and Paradise Pond (home of the Hugheness Monster).

"From Petals to Paper" features Plath's poem "Tulips" in which visitors can listen to the recently released rare recording of Plath reading "Tulips" from July 1961. Another Plath poem on a flower is also on display! "Among the Narcissi." The entire creative process is here: manuscript, typescript with editorial instructions, and the printed version. Additional poets of particular and notable interest are David Trinidad's lovely poem "Red Parade" and a couple poems by Louise Glück, among others. Be sure to see more in the brochure.

Below are some images of the exhibit space.

A second exhibit on, also through September, comes courtesy of Amanda Ferrera, who assisted with "The Bell Jar at 50" exhibit that was on this winter at Roger Williams University in Bristol, Rhode Island. "Taking the Archives Public Exhibitions" consists of digital and physical archival exhibits created by students in the Archives Concentration. They are now on view in the Alumnae Gym. Amanda's exhibit "The Bell Jar Revisited," is only partially in the Alumnae Gym. The larger exhibit is on the 3rd floor of the Neilson Library and includes books & periodicals, manuscripts, drafts, photographs, letters, and so much more. Well worth the trip to see if you have an interest either in Sylvia Plath or The Bell Jar and live anywhere on Earth.

Below are some images of the exhibit space.

Famous Quotes of Sylvia Plath

Sylvia Plath inspires us all in various and wonderful ways. She is in many respects a form of comfort to us, which is something that Esther Greenwood expresses in The Bell Jar , about a bath: "There must be quite a few things a hot bath won't cure, but I don't know many of them. Whenever I'm sad I'm going to die, or so nervous I can't sleep, or in love with somebody I won't be seeing for a week, I slump down just so far and then I say: 'I'll go take a hot bath.'" We read and remember Sylvia Plath for many reasons, many of them deeply personal and private. But we commemorate her, too, in very public ways, as Anna of the long-standing Tumblr Loving Sylvia Plath , has been tracking, in the form of tattoos. (Anna's on Instagram with it too, as SylviaPlathInk .) The above bath quote is among Sylvia Plath's most famous. It often appears here and there and it is stripped of its context. But I think most people will know it is from her nove...

Sylvia Plath's Gravestone Vandalized

The following news story appeared online this morning: HEPTONSTALL, ENGLAND (APFS) - The small village of Heptonstall is once again in the news because of the grave site of American poet Sylvia Plath. The headstone controversy rose to a fever pitch in 1989 when Plath's grave was left unmarked for a long period of time after vandals repeatedly chiseled her married surname Hughes off the stone marker. Author Nick Hornby commented, "I like Plath, but the controversy reaching its fever pitch in the 80s had nothing to do with my book title choice." Today, however, it was discovered that the grave was defaced but in quite an unlikely fashion. This time, Plath's headstone has had slashed-off her maiden name "Plath," so the stone now reads "Sylvia Hughes." A statement posted on Twitter from @masculinistsfortedhughes (Masculinists for Ted Hughes) has claimed responsibility saying that, "We did this because as Ted Hughes' first wife, Sylvia de...

Sylvia Plath and McLean Hospital

In August when I was in the final preparations for the tour of Sylvia Plath The Bell Jar sites, I found that I had long been mistaken about a couple of things. This is my coming clean. It was my intention in this blog post to discuss just McLean, but I found myself deeply immersed in other aspects of Plath's recovery. The other thing I was mistaken about will be discussed in a separate blog post. I suppose I need to state from the outset that I am drawing conclusions from Plath's actual experiences from what she wrote in The Bell Jar and vice versa, taking information from the novel that is presently unconfirmed or murky and applying it to Plath's biography. There is enough in The Bell Jar , I think, based on real life to make these decisions. At the same time, I like to think that I know enough to distinguish where things are authentic and where details were clearly made up, slightly fudged, or out of chronological order. McLean Hospital was Plath's third and last...

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