A few of you may have read my paper " 'They Had to Call and Call': The Search for Sylvia Plath " in Plath Profiles 3. For this article, I used microfilm and internet resources to create a bibliography of articles on Plath's first suicide attempt on August 24, 1953 that vastly increases the known publications which ran the news story and builds upon those articles presented in previous bibliographies. Microfilm is presently the best resource we have for searching through older newspapers; and whilst it is not the sexiest technology out there it certainly does serve a good purpose. However, some genius decided to scan obscure & not-so-obscure newspapers from microfilm, run OCR, and make them searchable via Google News Archive . There are other tools for this kind of thing, such as ProQuest Historical Newspapers and others. However, since Google News Archive is largely free and doesn't require a subscription, this is one of my favorite tools and will great...

For those interested, Owen Sheers' A Poet's Guide to Britain is now available on DVD . From the description on Amazon's page, Plath's poem "Hardcastle Crags" is discussed; however, I recall when the program aired on the BBC, it was "Wuthering Heights". But regardless, the Plath program is about Yorkshire. You can read reviews and previous posts on this program here . The DVD came out about a month ago; sorry to be so late in posting about it. It is wonderful that it has been released as American audiences, and those of other countries outside of the UK, were unable to watch until now.

Tickets are on sale for both Robert Shaw’s Three Women by Sylvia Plath and Wish I Had a Sylvia Plath by Edward Anthony performed by Elisabeth Grey. Both shows are on at 59E59 Theaters at 59 East 59th Street, New York, New York 10022. Both shows are on from 5-31 October (see links above for performance times and ticket prices). Obviously the day to go would be Wednesday, 27 October. I’ve got mine; have you yours?

Finally an interesting article in the news that relates to or mentions Sylvia Plath. Not that the Macedonian article reported yesterday isn't interesting. In " The Precious Unprinted Contents of Books ", Sam Jordison at the Guardian Books Blog discusses marginalia. The article mentions Plath's copy of The Great Gatsby , which is written about in " Princess Daisy: A Description of Sylvia Plath's Copy of The Great Gatsby " by Park Bucker. Of course Plath's marginalia is but marginalia in the grand scheme of marginalia, but the subject is nonetheless an interesting one. In fact, it is the subject of a few full length titles, such as Marginalia: Readers Writing in Books by H. J. Jackson . The majority of Plath's books are held by Smith College, Emory University and Indiana University. University of Virginia has eight volumes too. Some are held privately by lucky people.

Two contributors to Plath Profiles 3 successfully defended their doctoral theses this year and deserve a special shout out and applause. Kara Kilfoil, of the University of Calgary, recently successfully defended her thesis, “ Birthday Letters : Annotations and Commentary,” earning a Ph.D.in English with specialization in Modern poetry. Congratulations to Kara; and if you haven’t already, please do read two sample annotations in Plath Profiles 3. You’ll find they open Birthday Letters in a whole new way.Oh, and that’s Kara, Dr. Kilfoil if you’re nasty. Earlier this year, Gail Crowther of Lancaster University, successfully defended her thesis “The Haunted Reader and Sylvia Plath”, earning her Ph.D. in Sociology. Paging Dr. Crowther, Dr. Crowther, you have a call on line 3. “Do you really think she’ll pull through...It’s really serious.” Gail has two pieces in Plath Profiles 3 . The first was written with Plath’s friend Elizabeth Sigmund , and the second co-written with me . The...

Well, I thought I had seen it all. As many of you know, I scour the Interwebs for books, auctions, and other things in which to tempt you into spending your hard earned money. Well, then I stumble on an auction for my own book , the price for which I think has several too many 0's. I mean, I wrote the thing I know it's not worth that much. Earlier this year I re-purchased a signed/inscribed copy of my own book that I had given to a relative. How rude! Just wait till Christmas...

Did you know that 55 years ago today, on 5 August 1955, Sylvia Plath and Peter Davison, by chance, met Irish poet Padraic Colum and his wife Mary at a bar in Woods Hole, Mass? Colum's poem "The Book of Kells" appeared in the July 1955 number of The Atlantic . Plath's "Circus in Three Rings" appeared in the August issue (pictured here).