Lynda K Bundtzen began the day discussing Sylvia Plath’s psychotherapy, use of unconscious in 1958 poems. Making use of Plath's therapy notes with Dr. Ruth Beuscher, Lynda referred at times to Sigmund Freud's "Mourning and Meloncholia", Lacan, and Letters Home , and looking applicably at several poems by Sylvia Plath, among them "The Beekeeper's Daughter," "Man in Black," "Electra on Azalea Path," "The Colossus," "Daddy," and "Purdah." Langdon Hammer spoke on James Merrill’s use of Ouija Board for poetry inspiration. Hammer has been at work on a biography of Merrill for a decade which is most definitely a labor of love. It promises to be thorough and excellent, judging from the essays of his that I have read and the presentations through which I have sat. This was not a paper on Sylvia Plath, but Hammer did refer to Plath's practice of Ouijaing with Ted Hughes. Between this and the 1 o'clock p...

Notes on Catherine Bowman and David Trinidad, Suzie Hannah and Tom Simmons panel on archival-based poetic and research process, animated film and sound design, 24 October 2012, 1:30-2:50 Poetic based research, animated film, and sound design. By Susan McMichael What makes us Plathofiles? Is it a line? Is it a book (eg reading The Bell Jar , or a teacher? What happens when you are lucky enough to be in the Lilly Library with Sylvia Plath's works, boxes, things, and to examine the dresses she made as a child in the 1940s, the paper dolls, the ephemera, her paintings? What is text? Is it the poem? No, not at all. These people cry, it is this, and this, look and listen, see. All four of the presenters in this panel showed is how with colour and sound, what influenced Plath in creating her poetry. As someone fascinated by Sylvia Plath's work and life for more than 30 years, I found the works, separate from the archive, but clearly related to the poetry, more interesting. ...

Are you going to the literary panels at the Sylvia Plath 2012 Symposium?  On 11 October I requested that people attending consider taking notes during the panels sessions and writing up mini reviews to appear on this blog. Happily, I got two such takers immediately. But there are far more panels going on simultaneously for the three of us to faithfully report to this blogs readers. Therefore... So, the panel presentations pages is located here . What I'm proposing is that anyone interested in participating in this to please look for me Thursday, 25 October 2012, at 5:30 PM in the IMU Whittenberger Auditorium. Then, we can discuss what interests us and assign panels and papers to review. It shouldn't take too long, & so maybe we can go grab a drink & some food afterwards in town? Talk Plath? I didn't say this before, but the reviews should be to me as soon as possible after the presentation is given: ideally the same day. Full credit to you will naturally be g...

Today was a continuation of research into Sylvia Plath's pocket book calendars in the Lilly Library. I had to double-back to finish the 1954-1955 calendar and I am still in amazement at the level of recorded detail that is available. The other day I commented about how a visit to the archives to read through everything could mean never having to read a biography of Plath and I think I still stand by that: though obviously the biographer's narrative lends a particular color to her life's story. Which can be interesting; like in a similar fashion to criticism: it's far more interesting to read the original writing than criticism about that writing. Though often it is interesting to see how the critics make connections and bring out hidden elements. I spent a brief time re-looking at the Plath Mss materials that were acquired in 1961 as I needed to do some follow-up things. But I think the real focus of the day was the start of the Sylvia Plath 2012 Symposium. Today...

This morning I continued looking at Sylvia Plath's calendars in Plath mss II, Box 7, Folder 6. The calendar was October 1955 - early October 1956: or, her first year as a Fulbright Scholar at Newnham College, Cambridge University. The majority of the morning was spent comparing undated letters to a former boyfriend, J Mallory Wober, to the minute details Plath recorded in her calendar. The structure of her days at Newnham are meticulously recorded down the hour, including lectures, ADC rehearsals, meetings for tea and sherry, dates, letters written, papers due, food consumed, physical ailments: basically an encyclopedia of autobiography. Mostly likely caught up in the passion of the archive I will say that there is no need to read a biography of Sylvia Plath when one could simply come here (simply is most definitely not the right word since I believe this is one of the harder archives to get to - but it could be worse, no offense Wyoming: but it could be in Wyoming) and spent a we...

What a start to the week. The week of all Sylvia Plath all the time, though saying it like that makes it just like any other week. I met the poet and Plath essayist David Trinidad Sunday evening in Bloomington where we immediately got our Plath on: what a fun, great man and we had some stellar discussions. Today in the Plath archive at the Lilly Library we worked across from one another, like dueling pianists. He was primarily reading Plath's letters, and being less focused, I was all over the place. I began with the Plath mss papers - the ones Plath sold in London to a bookseller who was acquring poets papers for the Lilly Library. These are largely poems written in 1960 and 1961, but mixed in are the odd pages of The Bell Jar and short story ("The Fifteen Dollar Eagle"). Not a lot of beefy drafts the way that her later poems are (the ones held at Smith College). However there are fuller files folders for poems such as "Wuthering Heights", "The Surgeon ...