This is the second post in a series on the Education of Sylvia Plath and it reviews the courses she took during the 1951-1952 academic year. In Sylvia Plath's second year at Smith College, she roomed with Marcia Brown (later Stern), in Room 6 of Haven House. This room was on the middle floor of the house (2nd floor American, 1st floor elsewhere). Plath's room faced the Davis Student Center this year and the room had a bay window, a nice architectural feature. View from bay window of Room 6, toward Library View from bay window of Room 6, toward Elm Street 1950s floor plan of Haven House As with her first year, Plath carried six courses and received 15 credits (Physical Education did not earn her any credit). Using the finding aid to Plath mss II at the Lilly Library , I have added some of the papers that Sylvia Plath submitted for her courses. Her artwork I am unable to attribute at this time, an oversight for which I apologize. Plath's notebooks for Govern...

Sylvia Plath's education was impressive. She attended grade schools in Winthrop and Wellesley, Massachusetts before matriculating with the class of 1954 at Smith College in Northampton. I have always wanted a single easy way to see which courses Plath was taking and when so as such I have made a series of blog posts on the subject of "The Education of Sylvia Plath". This is the first part, for her first year at Smith College, 1950-1951. Perhaps in time I can go a little further and do something like this for Plath's junior high and high school if the record is complete enough to reconstruct something meaningful. Using the Smith College course catalogs both in person and via the Archive.org , I have transcribed the courses from these sources that Plath herself would have read. They give an overview of the subject, but to read her notes and syllabi and papers would require traveling to the Lilly Library, Indiana University at Bloomington which holds the greatest num...