The following is a review of the British Library's recent publication The Spoken Word and is written by Dr. Gail Crowther.
Sylvia Plath Speaks: a review of The Spoken Word
First, there is the packaging.
Slick hues of black and grey with dashes of red and yellow. The disc case sits comfortably in the palm of your hand. Turn it over to see the track listings, all the surviving BBC broadcasts from the years 1960-1963.
Remove the booklet; a flash of yellow on the back page with the distinctive British Library logo. Open the first page and fall straight into Peter K Steinberg’s introduction. Sharp, authoritative and full of energy, he guides us through the contents of the CD, telling us what to listen out for, bringing alive the sound of Plath’s breath, the shuffling of her papers, the background sniggering of her interviewer as she makes another Esther Greenwood-like wisecrack. This introduction also prepares us for the sheer output and involvement that Plath had with the BBC in that three year time span. It was not just her own poems she read over the air but other people’s poems or interviews she gave and, in the final recording, a review of an American anthology by Donald Hall. Steinberg neatly lays out for us the chronology of it all, the developments, not only in Plath’s reading voice, but the way in which her writing style changed to accommodate the oral performance of her poems. ‘I’ve got to say them, I speak them to myself...I say them aloud’ (Orr 1966: 170). Steinberg describes how her 1961 reading of ‘Mushrooms’ ‘pours without blemish into the ear.’ He also offers evidence of Plath’s increasing confidence with the spoken word cataloguing how three different recordings of ‘The Disquieting Muses’ gradually become longer and slower, the final recording lasting almost half a minute longer than the first one made. Steinberg highlights that ‘these lengthening durations suggest not only increasing comfort with the poems, but also a greater patience in the way she sought them to be rendered’.
There is little that can prepare you for the blast of Plath’s voice from the disc, and that, along with Steinberg’s intelligent introduction, is the great delight of The Spoken Word. The past’s ability to suddenly rear into the present as if it had never been away, is one of the most thrilling aspects of listening to these recordings. Although mainly an aural experience, Plath’s presence is also somehow palpable – you hear movement, breathing, sighs and papers. Her chuckle is very immediate. In the staggering live recording of ‘Tulips’ from the Mermaid Theatre in 1961, you hear a slight nervousness in Plath’s voice before she quickly regains composure and enters her stride. The sounds around the theatre are clear, people walking, moving and coughing. Again, there is an immediacy, as though it were live, here and now, as you listen.
‘What Made You Stay’ is another highlight in which Plath describes her experiences of being an American woman in England. This recording is of slightly poorer quality, perhaps as a result of being recorded on a piece of mobile equipment in her living room in Devon. Nevertheless, Plath’s wit and candour leap out. At times if you listen carefully – and Steinberg notes this in his introduction – you can hear the interviewer, Marvin Kane, choking on his laughter. Hardly surprising given her accounts of the British weather, seaside holidays in the rain, butcher’s shops and the bizarre choice of needlepoint in the first home she stayed in. Her bewilderment at certain English customs is the focus of the humour here, a sort of gentle trans-Atlantic culture clash.
There are too many wonderful moments on this disc to list here, but apart from the above, some other highlights for me were the melancholic reading of ‘Berck-Plage’ and the very different sounding Plath of the ‘New Comment’ recording. This was, as Steinberg points out, a different direction for Plath as a critic and reviewer, and one in which she excelled.
This disc is essential for many reasons; for those of us who love Plath’s work, for those who study her texts and, perhaps even, to open a whole new area of scholarship about the audio Plath, started by Kate Moses in Anita Helle’s book The Unraveling Archive.
But most importantly this disc is for those of us who want to listen to Plath and what she had to say. It is the spoken word and Sylvia Plath speaks; clearly and boldly, straight to us.
Gail Crowther 15/04/10
Sylvia Plath Speaks: a review of The Spoken Word
First, there is the packaging.
Slick hues of black and grey with dashes of red and yellow. The disc case sits comfortably in the palm of your hand. Turn it over to see the track listings, all the surviving BBC broadcasts from the years 1960-1963.
Remove the booklet; a flash of yellow on the back page with the distinctive British Library logo. Open the first page and fall straight into Peter K Steinberg’s introduction. Sharp, authoritative and full of energy, he guides us through the contents of the CD, telling us what to listen out for, bringing alive the sound of Plath’s breath, the shuffling of her papers, the background sniggering of her interviewer as she makes another Esther Greenwood-like wisecrack. This introduction also prepares us for the sheer output and involvement that Plath had with the BBC in that three year time span. It was not just her own poems she read over the air but other people’s poems or interviews she gave and, in the final recording, a review of an American anthology by Donald Hall. Steinberg neatly lays out for us the chronology of it all, the developments, not only in Plath’s reading voice, but the way in which her writing style changed to accommodate the oral performance of her poems. ‘I’ve got to say them, I speak them to myself...I say them aloud’ (Orr 1966: 170). Steinberg describes how her 1961 reading of ‘Mushrooms’ ‘pours without blemish into the ear.’ He also offers evidence of Plath’s increasing confidence with the spoken word cataloguing how three different recordings of ‘The Disquieting Muses’ gradually become longer and slower, the final recording lasting almost half a minute longer than the first one made. Steinberg highlights that ‘these lengthening durations suggest not only increasing comfort with the poems, but also a greater patience in the way she sought them to be rendered’.
There is little that can prepare you for the blast of Plath’s voice from the disc, and that, along with Steinberg’s intelligent introduction, is the great delight of The Spoken Word. The past’s ability to suddenly rear into the present as if it had never been away, is one of the most thrilling aspects of listening to these recordings. Although mainly an aural experience, Plath’s presence is also somehow palpable – you hear movement, breathing, sighs and papers. Her chuckle is very immediate. In the staggering live recording of ‘Tulips’ from the Mermaid Theatre in 1961, you hear a slight nervousness in Plath’s voice before she quickly regains composure and enters her stride. The sounds around the theatre are clear, people walking, moving and coughing. Again, there is an immediacy, as though it were live, here and now, as you listen.
‘What Made You Stay’ is another highlight in which Plath describes her experiences of being an American woman in England. This recording is of slightly poorer quality, perhaps as a result of being recorded on a piece of mobile equipment in her living room in Devon. Nevertheless, Plath’s wit and candour leap out. At times if you listen carefully – and Steinberg notes this in his introduction – you can hear the interviewer, Marvin Kane, choking on his laughter. Hardly surprising given her accounts of the British weather, seaside holidays in the rain, butcher’s shops and the bizarre choice of needlepoint in the first home she stayed in. Her bewilderment at certain English customs is the focus of the humour here, a sort of gentle trans-Atlantic culture clash.
There are too many wonderful moments on this disc to list here, but apart from the above, some other highlights for me were the melancholic reading of ‘Berck-Plage’ and the very different sounding Plath of the ‘New Comment’ recording. This was, as Steinberg points out, a different direction for Plath as a critic and reviewer, and one in which she excelled.
This disc is essential for many reasons; for those of us who love Plath’s work, for those who study her texts and, perhaps even, to open a whole new area of scholarship about the audio Plath, started by Kate Moses in Anita Helle’s book The Unraveling Archive.
But most importantly this disc is for those of us who want to listen to Plath and what she had to say. It is the spoken word and Sylvia Plath speaks; clearly and boldly, straight to us.
Gail Crowther 15/04/10
Thank you, Dr Gail Crowther. I'd been intending to pre-order this CD and had not done so. . .but I'll definitely buy it now, my appetite re-whetted by the sense of immediacy you mention that is contained within certain recordings-the shuffling of papers, the odd coughs and hesitations.
ReplyDeleteI get to reflecting, not for the first time, on all the people who died before the invention of voice-recordings. What would Keats have sounded like on the radio ? Shakespeare, even ? Jesus ? I think Chase Twichell the contemporary American poet has a poem concerning this.
Great review. I particularly can't wait to hear her live recording and how it compares to the studio ones.
ReplyDeleteThanks Panther and Sorlil for your comments. I do hope that there isn't a big delay with getting you copies (it is still listed as out of stock).
ReplyDeleteSorlil, thanks for the post on your blog, too. Spreading the word!
I've added a link to the post below this ("The Written Word on The Spoken Word") of a radio interview on Friday with Karen V. Kukil and Marco Werman of Public Radio International. Same clips of Plath, but Karen is spot on as usual!
-Peter
Hi Peter,
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing.
I pre-ordered mine a while ago, and am eagerly awaiting my copy. Very much looking forward to reading your introduction, as well.
Julia (the same contributing to Plath Profiles)
I understand that copies are finally making their way to the US from the UK. I'll have an update next week, I hope, about it's distribution date via University of Chicago Press. The British Library does have plenty of copies on hand if you want to take advantage of the 10% discount...
ReplyDeleteJulia! I hope you enjoy the introduction!
pks
I'm fascinated by the presence of a recording of Plath reading 'Mushrooms'. I'm a rare book dealer and am offering for sale an annotated First Edition of Colossus. The annotations are by a friend of Plath and Hughes - there is a reference to 'Coffee with Ted & Frieda June 13th 1961 at 116 Regent's Park Rd. N.W.1'. Another note in the margin of 'Mushrooms' records 'Read personally, Feb 28th - World of Books - the clipped reading - Ted and she are awfully alike, but she's wildly maniacally original, and obsesses. He's in control...' Does this refer to the BBC reading or something else? You can see the book at http://www.modernfirsteditions.com/product/thecolossusando407324959.html
ReplyDelete