I am pleased to promote the Sylvia Plath Symposium at Hunter College in New York City which is to be held at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College on Thursday, 30 March 2023. The address of the venue is 47-49 East 65th Street, New York, NY 10065. The Symposium is organized by Paul Alexander , editor of  Ariel Ascending: Writings about Sylvia Plath  (1985), author of Rough Magic:  A Biography of Sylvia Plath (1991), and author of Edge (2003), a one-woman play about Sylvia Plath. The Keynote speakers are Kathleen Chalfant reading Plath's poems followed by a conversation between Robin Morgan and Gloria Steinem..  Before that, throughout the day, there will be three panels including the following participants, in alphabetical order, is Susan Cheever, Heather Clark, Mark Doty, Amanda Golden, Richard Kaye, Donna Masini, Honor Moore, Eva Salzman, Vijay Seshadri, and Peter K. Steinberg. I will be participating in Panel 1 on Plath's works with A...

On 3 June 1953, sixty-nine years ago today, Sylvia Plath was at work as the Guest Managing Editor at 575 Madison Avenue in New York at the offices of Mademoiselle magazine. Plath's calendar, held by the Lilly Library, indicates that her schedule that day was included taking the "Last word pix" in Central Park. The "Last Word" was some text Plath wrote to accompany the photograph of all 20 guest editors in star-shape. Plath is, famously perhaps, at the top of the formation. Janet Wagner is holding Plath's right hand. Carol LeVarn is the blonde on the far left.  The names captioned below follow the star from Plath's right hand counter-clockwise to Plath's left. Anne Shawber (number 9) is the bottom left young woman with her right leg out, and Dinny Lane (number 13) is the bottom right woman with her left leg out. You do the hokey-pokey and you turn yourself around... The far right is Margaret Affleck (17). This photograph was taken at the Bethesda Terr...

Thanks go to Gregory Stall at the Grand Central branch of the New York Public Library for asking me to come and give a talk about my work on The Letters of Sylvia Plath . I did so Thursday and had a good time talking to the crowd. And it was terrific to see some familiar faces such as Eva S. and Richard L. I appreciate the rapport of the Q & A afterwards, and am grateful to Liz for lugging copies of the Letters from Staten Island. After the talk I retired to my room at the nearby Roosevelt Hotel. I chose it for its Plathian association. On 2 June 1953, her second day as Guest Editor at Mademoiselle magazine, Plath wrote in a letter home: "Yesterday a.m. we saw our first (my first) fashion show at the Roosevelt Hotel" (p631). The hotel is located at 45 E. 45th Street. Her calendar for the day calls it a "College Clinic" that started at 10:15. In a document from Plath's  Mademoiselle papers held by the Lilly Library, we can learn a little more: ...

On Thursday, 17 October 2019, I will be giving a talk on my editorial work on  The Letters of Sylvia Plath  at the Grand Central Branch of the New York Public Library. The library's address is: 135 East 46th Street New York, NY, 10017. The talk will start at 6 PM. It is free, however, you must RSVP . If you have time, please read an interview between me and Gregory Stall of the NYPL Grand Central location. Author photograph by Kathrine Smart, taken inside 3 Chalcot Square, London . Sorry I cropped you out of the photograph, Nick. All links accessed 7 and 14 August, and 10 September 2019.

Last evening was the a wonderful WSJPlus/HarperCollins event on Sylvia Plath's recently published short story Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom  at the showroom of MM.LaFleur on 42nd Street at Bryant Park. Manhattan is always a whirlwind experience--a hullabaloo, as Plath said. It was a terrifically Plathian day all around, receiving interesting emails from people and also getting the proofs of the paperback editions of both volumes of  The Letters of Sylvia Plath . When it rains, it Plaths. My thanks to Carla Zanoni for asking me to participate and for being a wonderful host and conversationalist. The room was full of people and I enjoyed the rapport, the questions and chatting, and in particular just seeing and reading the genuine interest in peoples faces. Here is a clip of Carla reading from the story. Feeling incredibly fortunate to discuss the work of #SylviaPlath with Peter K. Steinberg, aka @sylviaplathinfo , and @wsjplus members. Was full on in my elemen...

On Tuesday 12 March 2019, I will be joining Carla Zanoni, an editor at the  Wall Street Journal, at an event discussing Sylvia Plath's short story "Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom", recently published by HarperCollins . We'll be discussing other Plathian things and themes, too. The event will be at the MM.LaFleur Bryant Park Showroom located at 130 W 42nd Street on the 13th Floor. It starts at 6 with registration and reception. The discussion and Q & A starts at 6:30 and a networking reception starts at 7:30. This is a neat opportunity and I am grateful to Carla Zanoni, Amber Burton, and Alix Milne for organizing the event as asking me to be there. I am terrifically excited to participate in this event. All links accessed 16 and 28 February 2019.

October is American Archives Month in the US, so let us look at the first of a few Sylvia Plath Collections I have been sitting on for years! As with much else at the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York City, their Sylvia Plath holdings are remarkable. As of 14 March 2017, the catalog returns more than 100 records when searching all collections. Certain collections are not applicable, such as Medieval Images Only and Music Manuscripts and Books. But, of those  records there are treasures lurking any reasonable way you sort it. The items discussed in this post were worked with one day in January 2017 and the excessive delay in posting about it was due to the embargo on anything to the with Plath's letters. My reason for the trip was to work with the letters from Plath to the Merwins and to William and Edith Hughes. If you want limited editions and rare books, the Morgan Library has something for you to look at. They have several copies of the rare printing of A Winter Sh...

One month from today, on Sunday, 8 April 2018, Karen V. Kukil and I will be speaking on the Letters of Sylvia Plath in a program titled "On Sylvia Plath's Letters" in the Weill Art Gallery at the 92nd Street Y, located at 1395 Lexington Avenue, New York, New York 10128. The event is part of the Y's Books & Bagels series and is part of the Unterberg Poetry Series. The talk starts at 11 am and will be followed by a Q & A session and then a light brunch. Tickets for the event are $42. Very excited to participate in this event with Karen and at such an historically significant venue. All links accessed 21 February 2018.

The Grolier Club in New York City will host the exhibition "'This is the light of the mind': Selections from the Sylvia Plath collection of Judith G. Raymo" which opens today, 20 September 2017, and runs through 4 November 2017. On Thursday, 12 October, the Grolier will host a Sylvia Plath Symposium from 6:00 PM-8:00 PM. Speakers include Karen Kukil, Associate Director of Special Collections, Smith College; Peter K. Steinberg, co-editor of The Letters of Sylvia Plath ; and Heather Clark, Fellow, Leon Levy Center for Biography, CUNY Graduate Center. Moderator: Judith Raymo. Other details TBA. No charge, but reservations are requested. RSVPs from non-members should go to Grolier Club Administrative Assistant Maev Brennan, tel. (212) 838-6690, or e-mail mbrennan@grolierclub.org. A stunningly produced catalog has been printed and copies will be for sale via Oak Knoll. Looking forward to giving a talk and to meeting who ever shows up! The Grolier Club is lo...

On Wednesday, 9 January 2013, the unequaled and venerable Helen Vendler will present a 3 hour long talk on Sylvia Plath at the Warburg Lounge, Unterberg Poetry Center, part of New York's 92nd Street Y (Lexington Avenue and 92nd Street) in New York City. The event will run from 6 pm to 9 pm and registration starts at $160. Per the website , "We’ll look at some Smith College juvenilia to investigate her early aims and then at some late and posthumously published poems to see what drove her most original imaginative works. The aesthetic criteria for evaluative judgment will be examined in these contexts." So far as I have learned, this is the first event somewhat associated with the 50th anniversary of Plath's death. Helen Vendler is the A. Kingsley Porter Professor of English at Harvard University and the author of Coming of Age as a Poet: Milton, Keats, Eliot, Plath ; Poets Thinking: Pope, Whitman, Dickinson, Yeats ; and Last Looks, Last Books: Stevens, Plath, Lo...

Did you know that in The Bell Jar , Esther Greenwood & her fellow guest editors do not work at/for Ladies’ Day ? The name of the magazine where they did work was never actually named. The most we are told is that, "We had all won a fashion magazine contest...and as prizes they gave us jobs in New York for a month" (1971, 3). And, in the text of the novel, whenever Ladies’ Day is named, it is actually quite clear that the guest editors are visitors there, or that they are visiting a separate location. The first mention of Ladies' Day comes in Chapter Three. From the way Greenwood describes it, Ladies' Day is "the big women's magazine that features lush double-page spreads of Technicolor meals..." (27-28). Then, on page 30, Greenwood says, "None of our magazine editors or the Ladies' Day staff members..." which further illustrates the point. Lastly, when recovering from ptomaine poisoning, "Those dodos on Ladies Day " ...

Last summer I found this interesting website called Book Drum . On it, people more or less bring the books to life through annotations. Naturally when I saw The Bell Jar was included , my interest was piqued. This would have been a dream project for me to do but now that its done, and done well by Siân Cleaver, I can move on to something else I suppose. The Bookmarks section is the meatiest, in which Cleaver explores and illustrates many of the commercial aspects and non-fiction events, people, places, etc. that Plath wove like a tapestry in the novel. The entire site is informative and I hope you enjoy Cleaver's work. My particular favorite is the YouTube video of Art Ford (the inspiration for Lenny Shepherd). I meant all fall to post this link but with "Last Letter" and other posts and the end of the year, this one kept getting bumped. However, with the below information to present to you too, I am almost glad that it did! In addition to this website, I recently found...

The following photographs were sent from Tristine Skyler of Sylvia Plath's induction in to the Poets Corner at the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine. The first is of Karen Kukil with Susan Plath Winston (Warren Plath's daughter). They are standing by the plaque. The second picture is of the plaque with the quote "This is the light of the mind, cold and planetary", which is beautiful first line of "The Moon and the Yew Tree." Update 12:39 pm, 8 November: Jessica Ferri covered the event and has a post on the New Yorker's blog about it. Read "The American Poets’ Corner Inducts Sylvia Plath" here .

Look for “‘The Feeding of Young Women’: Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar , Mademoiselle Magazine, and the Domestic Ideal” by Caroline Smith, Assistant Professor of Writing at George Washington University in College Literature - October, or Fall 2010. If you’re interested in the history of Plath in College Literature , look no further than their 30 year index (link removed due to being broken - pks 9 Nov.): To sum, they have published articles in the following issues. (6.2 means Volume 6, Number 2) 6.2: 121-28; ("On Reading Sylvia Plath" by Margaret Dickie Uroff) 19.2: 60-82; (“‘The Woman is Perfected. Her Dead Body Wears the Smile of Accomplishment’: Sylvia Plath and Mademoiselle Magazine” by Garry M. Leonard) 29.3: 17-34; "Plath, Domesticity, and the Art of Advertising" by Marsha Bryant) 29.3: 35-56 ("Sylvia Plath's Transformations of Modernist Paintings" by Sherry Lutz Zivley) Plath was most recently featured in the article “Mad Girls...

I received the following press release from the good people at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine... Sylvia Plath to be inducted into Cathedral of St. John the Divine American’s Poets’ Corner: The Most Influential American Poet of the Last 50 Years New York, NY: The Cathedral of St. John the Divine is pleased to present an evening of poetry and insight in honor of the induction of Sylvia Plath into the Cathedral’s Poets’ Corner. On Thursday, November 4th at 7:30pm, poets and Plath scholars will take part in the celebration. Participants include Poet in Residence Marilyn Nelson; poet Paul Muldoon; Karen Kukil, Associate Curator, Special Collections & Archivist, Plath Papers, Smith College, speaking on her extensive work with Plath manuscripts, both as archivist and editor of the unabridged journals; poet/scholar Annie Finch speaking on the meter and music of Plath’s poetry; playwright/screenwriter/actress Tristine Skyler; and louderArts Project poets Corrina Bain, Elana Bell, Sean...

Actress Elisabeth Gray and professor Sally Bayley of Oxford University announce "The Sylvia Plath Birthday Bash" to be held this Wednesday, October 27th, 2010 from 12-4pm at the New York University Bookstore, 726 Broadway, New York, New York 10003. The schedule of events is: 12:00-12:30pm : Opening Remarks ‘i who was dead am alive again today’: Celebrating Plath in the 21st Century Dr. Barbara Mossberg, President Emeritus Goddard College 12:30-1:30pm: Panel Discussion Re-visioning Plath for the 21st Century Dr. Helen Decker, CUNY; Dr. Dianne Hunter, Trinity College; and Jessica Ferri, journalist 1:30-3:00pm Plath Open Mic Come along and read your favourite Plath poem, or an extract from The Bell Jar or The Journals. Led by Dr. Saskia Hamilton, Barnard College 3:00-4:00pm: Closing Remarks “Paint me a Plath”: Evolving Representations of Plath in the Past, Present, Future Dr. Sally Bayley

Somehow I missed Alexis Soloski’s write up on the imminent Robert Shaw production of Sylvia Plath's “Three Women” at Manhattan’s 59E59 Theaters on the Sept.21st. While the article has been online for a few days, it just ran in Sunday's (Sept. 26) print edition, see page 7 in the AR section. Read the article here .

Now that fall is here (Hello Fall), let’s take a brief look at what people in New York City have to look forward to this season. Broadway World has a preview of Robert Shaw’s production of Sylvia Plath’s “Three Women” . and Edward Anthony’s “Wish I Had a Sylvia Plath” starring Elisabeth Gray . New York Theater Guide has also written up “ Wish I Had a Sylvia Plath ”. I’ve recently had an email from Robert Shaw stating that rehearsals are underway in Manhattan with the cast starring Francis Benhamou, Angela Church, and Kina Bermudez. I’m told that the set will be slightly redesigned from the performances in Edinburgh (for any repeat attendees). Look for some media coverage around 3 October in the New York Times. You can find more information on “ Three Women here ” and on “Wish I Had a Sylvia Plath” here . And, don’t forget that Plath is being inducted into Poet’s Corner in New York’s own Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. Read about it here . If you happen to live in England, y...

From 5-31 October at New York City's 59E59 Theaters , you can see Three Women by Sylvia Plath, directed by Robert Shaw. Robert recently sent me the cast list with the intention that this blogs readers be amongst the first to know! The full cast is: The Wife - Francis Benhamou The Secretary - Angela Church The Student - Kina Bermudez If anyone out there is planning to attend and feels charitable to assist in bringing Three Women to New York & to an American audience, please consider a donation to Three Women's page on Kickstarter , a fund-raising project started by the director. There is even a short video excerpt of one of the previous performances. Lastly, the event that is Three Women is now on Facebook .

The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine’s Poet in Residence and Electors have chosen Sylvia Plath as the 2010 inductee to their Poets' Corner . Plath will join such poets as Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, W. H. Auden, and Tennessee Williams, last year’s inductee. The Poet’s Corner was established in 1983, and each poet has a stone engraved with a line from her or his work. The Cathedral will present a program celebrating Sylvia Plath on Thursday November 4th at 7:30 p.m.; the formal induction will take place on Sunday the 7th at the 4 p.m. Evensong. At this time, the Cathedral staff are still putting the details of the two events together with Marilyn Nelson , the Cathedral’s Poet in Residence. Confirmed participants in the program include Carol Muske-Dukes ; Annie Finch ; and Karen V. Kukil . Additionally, several young poets connected with the louderARTS Project in lower Manhattan ; former Poets in Residence; the Cathedral’s Electors; and many from the extended poetry communi...