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Footnoting the Letters of Sylvia Plath

One of the things I loved most about my work on The Letters of Sylvia Plath was the footnotes. A friend wrote to me in an email and said that she could "hear" me in them, which was the highest compliment. Periodically, I intend on showing some of the materials I acquired in the research process of annotating Sylvia Plath's experiences. For me, it adds so much contextual information about how Plath lived. What she read and saw and what made an impression on her life.

Today I am showing the article Plath read on Sunday, 23 September 1962, which she wrote about in the letter to her mother the next day. She typed, "I would love to go on a skiing holiday in the Tyrol with them someday. I just read about it in the paper" (836).

The article Plath referred to must have been, I think, published in The Observer, her Sunday paper of choice. The article appeared on page 37 of the Travel section. The quality below is wanting, please accept my apologies.

Full Page

The article on Austria
I cannot think of this letter, or the article, without then thinking about "Daddy" written a couple of weeks later with the lines: "The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna / Are not very pure or true."

What do you think? Is this something you would like to see more of?

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Comments

  1. Carl Rollyson01 November, 2019 09:04

    More, more, ,more.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Kim Kralowec01 November, 2019 12:08

    Yes, please!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Amy Rea02 November, 2019 07:12

    Lots more!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous02 November, 2019 09:59

    Yes, yes, yes, and yes! Absolutely love this. There is also more than a blog or an article in these types of connections...

    ReplyDelete

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