Today, Bonhams Knightsbridge offered for auction nearly twenty lots of Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes materials as part of their Fine Books, Manuscripts, and Photographs sale. This is more property of Frieda Hughes. Below are the results (prices include buyers premium).   Lot 130 :  The Hawk in the Rain , first American edition, AUTHOR'S PRESENTATION COPY TO HIS PARENTS, inscribed "To Mom & Dad/Number one on a long shelf." on the title-page, New York, Harper & Brothers, [1957]: SOLD: £2,167 | $3,031 Lot 131 :  A Winter Ship , FIRST EDITION, ONE OF APPROXIMATELY 60 COPIES, Edinburgh, Tragara Press, 1960: SOLD: £1,402 | $1,961 Lot 132 :  The Bell Jar  by Victoria Lucas, FIRST EDITION, SIGNED BY TED HUGHES on the front free endpaper, Heinemann, [1963]: SOLD: £11,475 | $16,051 Lot 133 :  The Bell Jar  by Victoria Lucas, FIRST EDITION, SIGNED BY TED HUGHES on the front free endpaper, Heinemann, [1963]: SOLD: £12,112 | $16,943 Lot 134 : PLATH (SYL...

Sylvia Plath graduated from the Alice L. Phillips Junior High School in Wellesley in June 1947. She was a regular contributor to the school's magazine The Phillipian , appearing in eleven issues during her years there: 7th Grade November 1944 April 1945 June 1945 8th Grade November 1945 February 1946 April 1946 June 1946 9th Grade November 1946 February 1947 April 1947 June 1947 You can see a listing of all of her publications over on A celebration, this is , my website for Plath. Most of the poems and pieces I have copies of, as I have worked in archives with the original magazines for most of them (or clippings that Plath herself retained). However, the June 1947 issue was partly elusive. Her poem "May", appearing on page 26, was clipped by Plath and now resides in an archive. But her "Class Poem", which was published on page 11 of the same issue, does not seem to exist and I have been looking for it for about twenty years. I have photocopies of, I believe, a...

Thomson Roddick auctioneers offered four Sylvia Plath book lots as part of their sale of books from the collection of The Property of The Late Dr George Kozikowski of Skye out of their Carlisle, Cumbria, location on 16 June 2021.  I watched the auction live and from the start when I joined it my blood pressure was spiking. It always does, even when I have no interest in most of the lots. Prices below are hammer prices, not reflecting buyer's premium. Congratulations to the winners.  Lot 295 : PLATH SYLVIA. Ariel. Orig. red cloth in d.w. 3rd imp., 1966; also Plath, The Colossus, d.w., 1967 & Winter Trees, 1st ed. in d.w's, 1971. (3). Estimate: £60 - £100. Sold for £130 Lot 296 : PLATH SYLVIA. Uncollected Poems. Ltd. ed. 150. Orig. pict. card wrappers, some browning & spotting. Turret Books, 1965; also Plath, A Day in June, ltd. ed. 33/160, orig. marbled wrappers, Ely, 1981. (2). Estimate: £100 - £150. Sold for £170 Lot 297 : PLATH SYLVIA. To Eva Descending the S...

Earlier this spring, which is when I meant to post this, I received an update email from Sarah Quigley, an archivist at Emory. She let me know some of the changes and updates I provided last year to their Rosenstein tapes finding aid (and The Keep, their digital repository) had been made. (I blogged about this information on 9 November and again on 16 November. ) And, also, Sarah wanted to let me know that a tape previously, erroneously skipped from being digitized, was now available.  The tape is v5xt9 (Side A) and v5xs5 (Side B) and is attributed to Suzette Macedo.  Listening to both sides of the tape, each about 32 minutes and change, was rewarding and baffling and disturbing in unequal measures.  Side A features Rosenstein and a man going over how to use the tape recorder. After about 1 minute 25 seconds, it picks up the conversation with Suzette Macedo which that can be found on tape v8ggs. Then, at about 10:40 and for the rest of the side, speaking are two men...

Last Saturday's Sylvia Plath on Zoom event with Donnie Secreast and Jeanne Marie Beaumont is now live on the Sylvia Plath Info YouTube channel .  Thank you again to Donnie and Jeannie for participating and to those who attended.  All links accessed 8 June 2021.

Hey! I recently received a gift from Anna, the mastermind behind the long-standing Tumblr  Loving Sylvia Plath ! She was generous enough to send me two needed editions of The Bell Jar in translation. The first one is A Redoma de Vidro , Portguese edition, from 2015.  The second book is Szklany klosz , a Polish edition printed in 2019. The parcel was accompanied with four selections of vegan German chocolate. I cannot read either Portuguese or Polish, but I can eat chocolate like an Olympic gold medalist.  My current shelf of Bell Jar translations... Note I've included the French Œuvres and Italian Opere as they include the novel. That's 33 total, though some are duplicated. The books looks great up there on the shelf; the chocolate is long gone. Thank you, Anna!

Join me,  Donnie Secreast , a Ph.D. student at Texas A & M, and poet and writer Jeanne Marie Beaumont on Saturday, 5 June 2021 on a Zoom event that starts at 10:30 eastern US time. Unlike previous iterations, there is no registration required (but I do reserve the right not to admit someone or kick someone out...so behave!).  I have temporarily downgraded to a free Zoom account so this event will be less than 40 minutes in total. But I hope, nonetheless, it will be a friendly, interesting, and moving event. This link is the only way to access the event . So, please bookmark (or whatever) this post. See you then. All links accessed 28 May 2021.