Congratulations to Janet Badia, whose book Sylvia Plath and the Mythology of Women Readers was recently published by University of Massachusetts Press. You can purchase the book from Amazon.com ; UMass Press ; Amazon.co.uk ; and you can like it on Facebook . The book looks most promising and I expect to review it on this blog before too long. Chapters include: Introduction: "There Is No Such Thing as a Death Girl": Literary Bullying and the Plath Reader; "Dissatisfied, Family-Hating Shrews": Women Readers and the Politics of Sylvia Plath's Literary Reception;  "Oh, You Are Dark": The Plath Reader in Popular Culture; "We Did Not Wish to Give the Impression": Plath Fandom and the Question of Representation; "A Fiercely Fought Defense": Ted Hughes and the Plath Reader; and Conclusion: "I Don’t Mean Any Harm": Frieda Hughes, Plath Readers, and the Question of Resistance.

P H Davies recently visited North Tawton and writes about it on his blog. The photographs of Court Green are among the best I've ever seen (and the rest of his blog and website are worthy of reading too, so, go on, treat yourself). You will remember the excellent book reviews he has posted, most recently on Heather Clark's The Grief of Influence and Kathleen Connors and Sally Bayley's Eye Rhymes: Sylvia Plath's Art of the Visual , and evocative poem " Heptonstall " in Plath Profiles 4 . Several weeks ago (wow, in July - I'm behind), on The Telegraph 's website, there appeared the article " Ways With Words: Ted Hughes catches the animal within " by Blake Morrison. Going further back, thanks to Gail Crowther we have "' Could I have done more for Sylvia Plath?' - Poet's doctor John Horder on his role in her final days " from the 11 November 2010 Camden New Journal , in which Dr. John Horder talks a bit about Plath. ...

The Poetry Foundation has announced that in 2012, the US Postal Service will be honoring ten poets with postage stamps . UPDATE: The Observer ran an article, " Sylvia Plath given stamp of approval ", by Vanessa Thorpe on Sunday 18 September.

Hello, the first of some biggish changes was activated today on my website for Sylvia Plath, A celebration, this is . On the homepage (linked just above), I have added a Google custom search tool. This will enable web browsers to search the entire website, which I hope means that you will find your content even faster. When you type in the search box, a new tab or window will appear with the search results (they frequently appear beneath a Google ad or two...sorry, it was not avoidable without paying a fee...). Thanks to three of my great Plath friends for testing this feature out.  Please let me know how you like it (or if you don't). The decision to have results open in a new tab was made because this way your search results are saved in the original tab. If done the other way, where the result is opened in the same/original tab, if you click the back browser your search query is lost and thus you'd have to do it again (one year in every ten, perhaps). The next cha...

Cambridge University Press has published the Cambridge Companion to Ted Hughes , edited by Terry Gifford. Like Jo Gill's Cambridge Companion to Sylvia Plath , the book starts with a chapter titled "The Problem of Biography;" however, Hughes' "Problem of Biography" is written by Joanny Moulin. I am beginning to see a trend here with "biography" and "problems" and these poets... Jo Gill contributes a chapter, "Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath" and Tracy Brain writes on "Ted Hughes and feminism." As Plath was such a major part of Ted Hughes' life and writing, no doubt additional essays in the book will feature or focus on her. The book is available now and will go for $28.99 or (£17.99). Another new article of potential interest is in the inaugural issue of the Ted Hughes Society Journal : "Opened Ground: Discourses of Descent in Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath" by Janne Stigen Drangsholt. Unlike the content...

As Hurricane Irene aims for Massachusetts and much of the east coast of the US, the New Yorker's Book Bench posted some good hurricane reads , including as you might hope, Sylvia Plath's "Ocean 1212-W." Unfortunately for the blogger, Macy Halford, she seems to have relied on the dating of "Ocean 1212-W" to what is printed in Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams ...she should have read through some of the articles I co-wrote with Gail Crowther (in particular, "These Ghostly Archives" | These Ghostly Archives, Redux" ) to get it correct that the prose piece was not written until late January 1963 (sent to the BBC on 28 January 1963). I wish she would have mentioned "The Disquieting Muses," too... "In the hurricane, when father's twelve Study windows bellied in Like bubbles about to break, you fed My brother and me cookies and Ovaltine And helped the two of us to choir: "Thor is angry: boom boom boom! Thor is an...

Fifty years ago today, on August 22, 1961, Sylvia Plath sent her friend Jack Sweeney, then curator of the Woodberry Poetry Room, a letter and enclosed the worksheets/drafts of her poem "Tulips." Did you know that shortly thereafter - about two months - Sweeney put the poem on display at the Woodberry Poetry Room? The first notice of the exhibit appears in the "Metropolitan Boston Calendar: A Guide to This Week's Events" in the Boston Globe on October 29, 1961, on page 74. The notice reads, "A manuscript poem ("Tulips") on display at Lamont Library." Additional notices about the exhibit ran on November 5 (page 67); November 12 (page 65); and December 10 (page 83), of the editions I browsed via microfilm at the Boston Public Library. The worksheets and letter are now held by the Houghton Library (which oversees the Woodberry Poetry Room) and can be requested for research. It is one of only a few of the Ariel poems not held by Smith C...