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American Isis: The Life and Art of Sylvia Plath
On the fiftieth anniversary of her death, a startling new vision of Plath—the first to draw from the recently-opened Ted Hughes archive
The life and work of Sylvia Plath has taken on the proportions of myth. Educated at Smith, she had an epically conflict-filled relationship with her mother, Aurelia. She then married the poet Ted Hughes and plunged into the sturm and drang of married life in the full glare of the world of English and American letters. Her poems were fought over, rejected, accepted and, ultimately, embraced by readers everywhere. Dead at thirty, she committed suicide by putting her head in an oven while her children slept.
Her poetry collection titled Ariel became a modern classic. Her novel The Bell Jar has a fixed place on student reading lists. American Isis will be the first Plath bio benefitting from the new Ted Hughes archive at the British Library which includes forty one letters between Plath and Hughes as well as a host of unpublished papers. The Sylvia Plath Carl Rollyson brings to us in American Isis is no shrinking Violet overshadowed by Ted Hughes, she is a modern day Isis, a powerful force that embraced high and low culture to establish herself in the literary firmament.
The life and work of Sylvia Plath has taken on the proportions of myth. Educated at Smith, she had an epically conflict-filled relationship with her mother, Aurelia. She then married the poet Ted Hughes and plunged into the sturm and drang of married life in the full glare of the world of English and American letters. Her poems were fought over, rejected, accepted and, ultimately, embraced by readers everywhere. Dead at thirty, she committed suicide by putting her head in an oven while her children slept.
Her poetry collection titled Ariel became a modern classic. Her novel The Bell Jar has a fixed place on student reading lists. American Isis will be the first Plath bio benefitting from the new Ted Hughes archive at the British Library which includes forty one letters between Plath and Hughes as well as a host of unpublished papers. The Sylvia Plath Carl Rollyson brings to us in American Isis is no shrinking Violet overshadowed by Ted Hughes, she is a modern day Isis, a powerful force that embraced high and low culture to establish herself in the literary firmament.
336 pages, Hardcover
First published January 29, 2013
About the author
Carl Rollyson
135 books147 followersCarl Rollyson, Professor of Journalism at Baruch College, The City University of New York, has published more than forty books ranging in subject matter from biographies of Marilyn Monroe, Lillian Hellman, Martha Gellhorn, Norman Mailer, Rebecca West, Susan Sontag, and Jill Craigie to studies of American culture, genealogy, children’s biography, film, and literary criticism. He has authored more than 500 articles on American and European literature and history. His work has been reviewed in newspapers such as The New York Times and the London Sunday Telegraph and in journals such as American Literature and the Dictionary of Literary Biography. For four years (2003-2007) he wrote a weekly column, "On Biography," for The New York Sun and was President of the Rebecca West Society (2003-2007). His play, THAT WOMAN: REBECCA WEST REMEMBERS, has been produced at Theatresource in New York City. Rollyson is currently researching a biography of Amy Lowell (awarded a "We the People" NEH grant). "Hollywood Enigma: Dana Andrews, a biography of Dana Andrews is forthcoming in September from University Press of Mississippi. His biography, "American Isis: The Life and Death of Sylvia Plath" will be published in February 2013, the fiftieth anniversary of her death. His reviews of biography appear regularly in The Wall Street Journal, The Minneapolis Star Tribune, The Raleigh News & Observer, The Kansas City Star, and The New Criterion. He is currently advisory editor for the Hollywood Legends series published by the University Press of Mississippi. He welcomes queries from those interested in contributing to the series. Read his column, "Biographology," that appears every two weeks at bibliobuffet.com
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 106 reviews
March 2, 2013
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I found “American Isis” interesting though I became fed up with his multiple comparisons between Sylvia Plath and Marilyn Monroe. He did make a good point that they both loved fame and sought it yet it damaged them. The 1950’s were a time of stereotypes and both of them tried to conform and still express their unique vision. Both committed suicide. Enough said, but Rollyson draws far too many parallels. Their artistic fields were very different. By definition writers need solitude and create out of that. They were both beautiful women and I’m sure that influenced their audiences but in Plath’s case it’s a disservice to her to imply her looks influenced her success as immensely as it did for Monroe. I do have to agree suicide sent both their legends into the stratosphere however.
On the more positive side Rollyson doesn’t harp on Plath’s husband, Ted Hughes, and how damaging he was to her and possibly to her art at least until the last chapter which is largely about Hughes and his sister Olwyn and how they self servingly tried to control the availability of Plath’s personal information. They are said to have burned her last few journals. Rollyson’s exploration of Plath’s individual poems and how each tied into her life events was excellent. For me this was the real value of this book. He also does a good job of exploring Plath’s conflicted relationship with her mother Aurelia. It was a complicated one and mired in the times. Plath wanted to idealize her mother yet Aurelia had faults like everyone else. Rollyson manages to show the many sides of their relationship and the impact that had on Plath and her writing. After reading her novel and poems I was ready to read that her mother was a monster. Not so. She was a loving mother who made some mistakes and missed some major clues. This book renews my sense of the needless tragedy that ended her life but only Plath had the right to make that decision. I can’t help wishing she hadn’t chosen suicide. “American Isis” helped me understand the factors that might have led to such a tragedy. In the end Rollyson’s biography sent me back to Plath’s works which is the true service of a book such as his. I’m glad we have Plath’s literary legacy.
This review is based on an Advanced Reading Copy supplied by the publisher.
(I add this disclaimer as required by the FTC)
I found “American Isis” interesting though I became fed up with his multiple comparisons between Sylvia Plath and Marilyn Monroe. He did make a good point that they both loved fame and sought it yet it damaged them. The 1950’s were a time of stereotypes and both of them tried to conform and still express their unique vision. Both committed suicide. Enough said, but Rollyson draws far too many parallels. Their artistic fields were very different. By definition writers need solitude and create out of that. They were both beautiful women and I’m sure that influenced their audiences but in Plath’s case it’s a disservice to her to imply her looks influenced her success as immensely as it did for Monroe. I do have to agree suicide sent both their legends into the stratosphere however.
On the more positive side Rollyson doesn’t harp on Plath’s husband, Ted Hughes, and how damaging he was to her and possibly to her art at least until the last chapter which is largely about Hughes and his sister Olwyn and how they self servingly tried to control the availability of Plath’s personal information. They are said to have burned her last few journals. Rollyson’s exploration of Plath’s individual poems and how each tied into her life events was excellent. For me this was the real value of this book. He also does a good job of exploring Plath’s conflicted relationship with her mother Aurelia. It was a complicated one and mired in the times. Plath wanted to idealize her mother yet Aurelia had faults like everyone else. Rollyson manages to show the many sides of their relationship and the impact that had on Plath and her writing. After reading her novel and poems I was ready to read that her mother was a monster. Not so. She was a loving mother who made some mistakes and missed some major clues. This book renews my sense of the needless tragedy that ended her life but only Plath had the right to make that decision. I can’t help wishing she hadn’t chosen suicide. “American Isis” helped me understand the factors that might have led to such a tragedy. In the end Rollyson’s biography sent me back to Plath’s works which is the true service of a book such as his. I’m glad we have Plath’s literary legacy.
This review is based on an Advanced Reading Copy supplied by the publisher.
(I add this disclaimer as required by the FTC)
March 11, 2013
Well, having studied Plath for the last 15 years, I came at this book figuring that there wasn't anything new that would be said, and indeed there wasn't. Like the other reviewers, I found the constant comparisons with Marilyn Monroe to be rather offensive as attempting to paint two vastly different women with the same brush--academically, it's a poor argument to get seriously sucked into no matter how interesting the comparison might be, and I thought it a bit of a cheap plug for his books about Sontag and Monroe. When he started in comparing Plath to Sontag, I sighed and kept plowing through. The style is engaging, but had numerous editorial mistakes in it that I found distracting. At the end I laughed outright when he got du Maurier wrong on the name of the house in "Rebecca." Rollyson calls it "Mandalay" instead of Manderley, not just once, but twice in an attempt at a sort of borderline misogynistic sarcasm that I find so unappealing in academia regarding Janet Malcolm's book "The Silent Woman," which I have read. Malcolm may be overly dramatic in some places, but at least she does not make elementary errors in drawing bad metaphorical comparisons to celebrities or other works of literature, and I found her a lot more straightforward than Rollyson. This mistake also reflects rather bad editing that all of the "literary people" who read this manuscript were so unfamiliar with du Maurier's "Rebecca" that nobody caught it.
With that said, Rollyson does have a readable style, and he does try to be fair to both Ted and Sylvia throughout (although he loses control of this equanimity towards the end though and it is clear that he does not care for Hughes overmuch). It's a good solid read, and once one gets past the editorial errors, and Monroe/Plath/Sontag comparisons, I find myself glad that I bought it as an e-book, which is cheaper than the hardcover. I wouldn't recommend paying the higher price for the hardcover edition of this book with all of the errors noted above unless you really feel the need to add it to your Plath/Hughes bookshelf.
With that said, Rollyson does have a readable style, and he does try to be fair to both Ted and Sylvia throughout (although he loses control of this equanimity towards the end though and it is clear that he does not care for Hughes overmuch). It's a good solid read, and once one gets past the editorial errors, and Monroe/Plath/Sontag comparisons, I find myself glad that I bought it as an e-book, which is cheaper than the hardcover. I wouldn't recommend paying the higher price for the hardcover edition of this book with all of the errors noted above unless you really feel the need to add it to your Plath/Hughes bookshelf.
February 2, 2013
Lesenotizen, noch keine Review!
Lange nicht jede Biographie ist die Folge einer Jahrzehnte währenden Passion, die der Autor für den mal glücklich, mal unglücklich Verbiographierten hegt. Auch Sylvia Plath ist vor derartigen Unterfangen nicht gefeit, und nachdem Ronald Hayman sich schon daran versucht hat, legt nun auch der Journalismus-Professor Rollyson eine neue Sylvia Plath-Biographie vor. Was ihn dazu bewogen hat war der 50. Todestag von Sylvia Plath, ein Ereignis, dass man sich auf dem Buchmarkt nicht entgehen lassen darf, wenn der Rubel rollen soll. Biographen wie Rainer Stach hingegen, die Jahrzehnte an der Biographie eines einzigen Mannes schreiben, dürften sich aus Haymans oder Rollysons Sicht als Exponenten ökonomischer Unmündigkeit darstellen.
Nun ist Rollyson kein Mensch, der sich in Zweifeln verliert, und schon im Vorwort macht er deutlich, dass seine Vorgänger in eklatanter Weise Ursachen und Wirkungen verwechselt und so manches am Leben der Sylvia Plath missdeutet haben. Um dem erstaunten Leser zu dokumentieren, wie vertraut er mit seiner Materie ist, heißt Sylvia Plath im ersten Kapitel abwechselnd Syl, Sivvy und Siv.
Und wie hemdsärmelig kommt Rollyson daher und erklärt dem staunenden Leser nun das Leben. Heißa Katreinerle, wir machen uns die Welt, wie sie uns gefällt. Keine Konjunktive, keine Hypothesen, alles erstrahlt im gleißenden Licht der Erklärbarkeit. Klar, da kommen herkömmliche Plathforscher und Biografen nicht mit, wenn so ein Journalist erst einmal loslegt.
Um die große Lyrikern zu verstehen, braucht es dabei gar nicht viel. Schon die permanent insistierende Wiederholung der rollysonschen Vergleichsgrößen Superman, Marilyn Monroe und Susan Sontag sollen die vollkommene Umwälzung des bisher Geglaubten garantieren.
Aber was ist an dieser Biographie, außer ihrer einmaligen Forschheit, wirklich so neu, wie es der Autor verspricht?
Wegen der massiven Ärgernisse habe ich die Bio erst einmal beiseite gelegt, zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt, wenn die Nerven weniger blank liegen, gibt es einen kompletten Lesedruchgang samt ordentlicher Rezi.
Lange nicht jede Biographie ist die Folge einer Jahrzehnte währenden Passion, die der Autor für den mal glücklich, mal unglücklich Verbiographierten hegt. Auch Sylvia Plath ist vor derartigen Unterfangen nicht gefeit, und nachdem Ronald Hayman sich schon daran versucht hat, legt nun auch der Journalismus-Professor Rollyson eine neue Sylvia Plath-Biographie vor. Was ihn dazu bewogen hat war der 50. Todestag von Sylvia Plath, ein Ereignis, dass man sich auf dem Buchmarkt nicht entgehen lassen darf, wenn der Rubel rollen soll. Biographen wie Rainer Stach hingegen, die Jahrzehnte an der Biographie eines einzigen Mannes schreiben, dürften sich aus Haymans oder Rollysons Sicht als Exponenten ökonomischer Unmündigkeit darstellen.
Nun ist Rollyson kein Mensch, der sich in Zweifeln verliert, und schon im Vorwort macht er deutlich, dass seine Vorgänger in eklatanter Weise Ursachen und Wirkungen verwechselt und so manches am Leben der Sylvia Plath missdeutet haben. Um dem erstaunten Leser zu dokumentieren, wie vertraut er mit seiner Materie ist, heißt Sylvia Plath im ersten Kapitel abwechselnd Syl, Sivvy und Siv.
Und wie hemdsärmelig kommt Rollyson daher und erklärt dem staunenden Leser nun das Leben. Heißa Katreinerle, wir machen uns die Welt, wie sie uns gefällt. Keine Konjunktive, keine Hypothesen, alles erstrahlt im gleißenden Licht der Erklärbarkeit. Klar, da kommen herkömmliche Plathforscher und Biografen nicht mit, wenn so ein Journalist erst einmal loslegt.
Um die große Lyrikern zu verstehen, braucht es dabei gar nicht viel. Schon die permanent insistierende Wiederholung der rollysonschen Vergleichsgrößen Superman, Marilyn Monroe und Susan Sontag sollen die vollkommene Umwälzung des bisher Geglaubten garantieren.
Aber was ist an dieser Biographie, außer ihrer einmaligen Forschheit, wirklich so neu, wie es der Autor verspricht?
Wegen der massiven Ärgernisse habe ich die Bio erst einmal beiseite gelegt, zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt, wenn die Nerven weniger blank liegen, gibt es einen kompletten Lesedruchgang samt ordentlicher Rezi.
February 2, 2013
Skip it. Speculative at best There are more comprehensive, factual books on Plath.
August 11, 2021
I've read my fair share of Sylvia Plath biographys and this was not a new favorite of mine. I have the same issues as others reviewers have, that it's isn't anything really new touched in this and that the comparison to Marlyin Monroe feels very off and weird. Same out come but very diffrent people and lives. To write something new about a person that has been dead for such a long time is indeed a hard thing to do. But I had hoped for at least a new way to view or analyse her life and work
February 18, 2013
A New Look at the Plath Legend
As the first biography since the Ted Hughes files were made available, this is an important book for those interested in Plath, the person or the poetess. The book presents a new version of some of the perplexing incidents in the Plath legend. I've read several biographies and the diaries, but this is the first book that made me understand how driven she was. The world of the 1950s is brought to life giving a good backdrop for Plath's struggle for acclaim. The author manages this by giving data on her work and life rather than trying to psychoanalyze her. That said, the book had some things that turned me off.
My major irritation was the author's constant comparison of Plath to Marilyn Monroe. This seemed quite a stretch. The women didn't know each other. The solid data point is a dream Plath had where she conversed with Monroe. I appreciate that the author may have seen the likeness because he had also done a biography of Monroe. However, the reader was left questioning why these facile comparisons made it into the book.
The final chapters were probably the most illuminating. Several biographers have said that Plath met with a man the weekend before she died. Now it turns out that the man was Ted Hughes. This makes perfect sense. It seems to be another place where their understanding of each other wasn't accurate enough for Hughes to know that Plath need medical intervention.
I also enjoyed the appendices by people like Elizabeth Compton who hadn't spoken before. Her interview gave weight to the understanding of what occurred at Green Court.
I recommend this book if you're interested in Plath, particularly if you can overlook the Monroe references. I thought it was a reasonable, balanced approach and did provide new information to the general reader.
I reviewed this book for Net Galley.
As the first biography since the Ted Hughes files were made available, this is an important book for those interested in Plath, the person or the poetess. The book presents a new version of some of the perplexing incidents in the Plath legend. I've read several biographies and the diaries, but this is the first book that made me understand how driven she was. The world of the 1950s is brought to life giving a good backdrop for Plath's struggle for acclaim. The author manages this by giving data on her work and life rather than trying to psychoanalyze her. That said, the book had some things that turned me off.
My major irritation was the author's constant comparison of Plath to Marilyn Monroe. This seemed quite a stretch. The women didn't know each other. The solid data point is a dream Plath had where she conversed with Monroe. I appreciate that the author may have seen the likeness because he had also done a biography of Monroe. However, the reader was left questioning why these facile comparisons made it into the book.
The final chapters were probably the most illuminating. Several biographers have said that Plath met with a man the weekend before she died. Now it turns out that the man was Ted Hughes. This makes perfect sense. It seems to be another place where their understanding of each other wasn't accurate enough for Hughes to know that Plath need medical intervention.
I also enjoyed the appendices by people like Elizabeth Compton who hadn't spoken before. Her interview gave weight to the understanding of what occurred at Green Court.
I recommend this book if you're interested in Plath, particularly if you can overlook the Monroe references. I thought it was a reasonable, balanced approach and did provide new information to the general reader.
I reviewed this book for Net Galley.
February 25, 2013
I can't figure out why author Carl Rollyson felt the need to write this book. There's nothing new here about Sylvia Plath, the writing is stilted, and the editing is awful, with mistakes everywhere (example on page 47 where Mrs. Cantor is spelled Cantor and Canter within two lines). I don't think Rollyson was able to empathize with his subject, though there's a familiar tone that I found creepy. She seems somewhat interchangeable with Marilyn Monroe, to whom he compares Plath numerous times throughout the book, and while they shared some qualities and their timelines are similar, each had her own personal mythology so the comparison seems quite unfair to both women.
I cannot recommend this book. I got halfway through and skimmed the rest when I realized that the style was not improving and there was not much to learn about Plath that hasn't been covered by other biographers.
I cannot recommend this book. I got halfway through and skimmed the rest when I realized that the style was not improving and there was not much to learn about Plath that hasn't been covered by other biographers.
November 4, 2015
I can only imagine why a book with this title was remaindered.
That aside, the tedious comparisons between Sylvia Plath and Marilyn Monroe really just helped pull this biography in a million directions, in addition to a half hearted analysis of all the biographies of Plath after her death. Either make the book about suicide, Plath's struggle to reconcile her poetic talents with the expectation/demands of motherhood, or admit that The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes already covered the territory.
Not a total waste of a book, just not a serious Plath biography reader's best choice.
That aside, the tedious comparisons between Sylvia Plath and Marilyn Monroe really just helped pull this biography in a million directions, in addition to a half hearted analysis of all the biographies of Plath after her death. Either make the book about suicide, Plath's struggle to reconcile her poetic talents with the expectation/demands of motherhood, or admit that The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes already covered the territory.
Not a total waste of a book, just not a serious Plath biography reader's best choice.
March 29, 2021
Gostei bastante!
É uma leitura complementar pra quem já leu os diários da Sylvia. Ele fornece muitas informações interessantes, tiradas do Letters Home, o livro de cartas entre a mãe da Sylvia e ela.
Aumentou ainda mais meu desprezo pelo Ted. E ainda me garantiu um ranço profundo da irmã dele. Agora entendo porque a Sylvia não ia com a cara dela.
É uma leitura complementar pra quem já leu os diários da Sylvia. Ele fornece muitas informações interessantes, tiradas do Letters Home, o livro de cartas entre a mãe da Sylvia e ela.
Aumentou ainda mais meu desprezo pelo Ted. E ainda me garantiu um ranço profundo da irmã dele. Agora entendo porque a Sylvia não ia com a cara dela.
February 11, 2013
Let me get my quibbles out of the way first, because I want to focus on the strengths of this biography.
I disagree strongly with Rollyson's decision to refer to Plath by what were apparently childhood nicknames early on in this biography. Throughout the book, he quietly switches between "Sylvia," "Sylvia Plath," and "Plath," which is fine. And in the first paragraph of the first chapter, there's nothing wrong with his saying that "Sylvia Plath liked to tell the story of her mother setting her infant Sivvy on the beach to see what she would do." But it's unnerving to read the end of a paragraph that compares the young Sylvia Plath to Coriolanus, and then have the next paragraph open, "Siv was six years old when war came to Europe." And the very *next* paragraph begins, "Syl was not alone." At this point, I honestly couldn't tell if we were being told that Plath had a lot of childhood nicknames, or if Rollyson was amusing himself by coming up with every possible nickname for "Sylvia."
Which leads me to a larger weakness of this work. For whatever reason, Rollyson often adopts a tone that is conversational to the point of being slangy. The problem with using current phraseology in a work like this is that it makes your book sound out of date about twenty minutes after it's published.
Rollyson wisely chose to work independently rather than writing an "authorized" biography. Anyone familiar with the thorny history of Plath biographies will understand and sympathize with this decision. It does mean that Rollyson needs to paraphrase a great deal rather than quote directly from letters, diary entries, and poems, which is a lot of work. But that makes it all the more important not to seem to be trying to compete with Plath's own writing and tone, and to aim instead for a certain invisibility as a biographer. I'm not sure that Plath would agree that "A day off from babysitting felt like the lid on her life was blown off."
I'm also old-school enough to believe that italics and exclamation points should be kept to a bare minimum in any book, and in a biography they should be limited to direct quotes. But here is Rollyson, describing the summer Plath lightly fictionalized in "The Bell Jar":
"She would sit, book in hand, but could not read. *Sylvia Plath could not read!*"
Rollyson also insists that the reason Plath wasn't accepted into Frank O'Connor's Harvard writing course was that O'Connor "thought Sylvia too advanced for his class. Given that this rejection was a trigger for her suicide attempt, any information concerning how and why it happened is of vital interest. But Rollyson doesn't give a source for this idea. He also refers to Frank O'Connor as O'Connor, O'Conner, and O'Hara, and mentions Plath "pouring over" an experience. This was all in the first fifty pages. I almost closed the book.
But I'm glad I kept going. Rollyson's writing smooths out after this, and his biography is sympathetic, thoughtful, and fresh.
Rollyson is aware that many (if not most) of his readers will be very familiar with Plath's life already. So, as he puts it:
"I have dispensed with a good deal of the boilerplate most biographers feel compelled to supply. I say little, for example, about the backgrounds of Plath's parents. I don't describe much of Smith College or its history. I do very little scene setting."
If you're not already familiar with Plath's story and work, this is not the biography to start with. If you're a longtime admirer, this is a fast, absorbing read.
I disagree strongly with Rollyson's decision to refer to Plath by what were apparently childhood nicknames early on in this biography. Throughout the book, he quietly switches between "Sylvia," "Sylvia Plath," and "Plath," which is fine. And in the first paragraph of the first chapter, there's nothing wrong with his saying that "Sylvia Plath liked to tell the story of her mother setting her infant Sivvy on the beach to see what she would do." But it's unnerving to read the end of a paragraph that compares the young Sylvia Plath to Coriolanus, and then have the next paragraph open, "Siv was six years old when war came to Europe." And the very *next* paragraph begins, "Syl was not alone." At this point, I honestly couldn't tell if we were being told that Plath had a lot of childhood nicknames, or if Rollyson was amusing himself by coming up with every possible nickname for "Sylvia."
Which leads me to a larger weakness of this work. For whatever reason, Rollyson often adopts a tone that is conversational to the point of being slangy. The problem with using current phraseology in a work like this is that it makes your book sound out of date about twenty minutes after it's published.
Rollyson wisely chose to work independently rather than writing an "authorized" biography. Anyone familiar with the thorny history of Plath biographies will understand and sympathize with this decision. It does mean that Rollyson needs to paraphrase a great deal rather than quote directly from letters, diary entries, and poems, which is a lot of work. But that makes it all the more important not to seem to be trying to compete with Plath's own writing and tone, and to aim instead for a certain invisibility as a biographer. I'm not sure that Plath would agree that "A day off from babysitting felt like the lid on her life was blown off."
I'm also old-school enough to believe that italics and exclamation points should be kept to a bare minimum in any book, and in a biography they should be limited to direct quotes. But here is Rollyson, describing the summer Plath lightly fictionalized in "The Bell Jar":
"She would sit, book in hand, but could not read. *Sylvia Plath could not read!*"
Rollyson also insists that the reason Plath wasn't accepted into Frank O'Connor's Harvard writing course was that O'Connor "thought Sylvia too advanced for his class. Given that this rejection was a trigger for her suicide attempt, any information concerning how and why it happened is of vital interest. But Rollyson doesn't give a source for this idea. He also refers to Frank O'Connor as O'Connor, O'Conner, and O'Hara, and mentions Plath "pouring over" an experience. This was all in the first fifty pages. I almost closed the book.
But I'm glad I kept going. Rollyson's writing smooths out after this, and his biography is sympathetic, thoughtful, and fresh.
Rollyson is aware that many (if not most) of his readers will be very familiar with Plath's life already. So, as he puts it:
"I have dispensed with a good deal of the boilerplate most biographers feel compelled to supply. I say little, for example, about the backgrounds of Plath's parents. I don't describe much of Smith College or its history. I do very little scene setting."
If you're not already familiar with Plath's story and work, this is not the biography to start with. If you're a longtime admirer, this is a fast, absorbing read.
February 2, 2013
I have to preface this review by stating that I am a huge fan of Plath's work and am utterly fascinated by her life. I've read several other biographies, though this is the newest.
For those who aren't fans of Plath or familiar with her work, this could be a difficult read. The tone veers towards being dry at times, and the text features many references to poems. Those unfamiliar with said poems would potentially lose some of the impact of where Rollyson quotes them.
For fans who have read other biographies, there isn't a lot of new factual information in here. Rather, Rollyson looks at the life of Plath (and of Hughes, when he enters the biography) as a deliberate attempt to mythologise herself. It's hard to know if this was indeed something that Plath was attempting (and admittedly, it has been a while since I've read her journals, so I'm unsure how much information there is in them apart from some pieces quoted by Rollyson), but it's absolutely something that has happened in Plath's legacy. By her death, she became something more than her life - perhaps the titular "American Isis".
This biography is competently written, though it is perhaps not the most entertaining and engrossing. Rollyson attempts to draw parallels between Plath and Marilyn Monroe and Susan Sontag continually, which has the potential to be tiring for someone who holds no interest in Monroe or Sontag.
A worthy addition to any Plath fan's collection, though it may not hold much appeal to those not completely fascinated by her.
For those who aren't fans of Plath or familiar with her work, this could be a difficult read. The tone veers towards being dry at times, and the text features many references to poems. Those unfamiliar with said poems would potentially lose some of the impact of where Rollyson quotes them.
For fans who have read other biographies, there isn't a lot of new factual information in here. Rather, Rollyson looks at the life of Plath (and of Hughes, when he enters the biography) as a deliberate attempt to mythologise herself. It's hard to know if this was indeed something that Plath was attempting (and admittedly, it has been a while since I've read her journals, so I'm unsure how much information there is in them apart from some pieces quoted by Rollyson), but it's absolutely something that has happened in Plath's legacy. By her death, she became something more than her life - perhaps the titular "American Isis".
This biography is competently written, though it is perhaps not the most entertaining and engrossing. Rollyson attempts to draw parallels between Plath and Marilyn Monroe and Susan Sontag continually, which has the potential to be tiring for someone who holds no interest in Monroe or Sontag.
A worthy addition to any Plath fan's collection, though it may not hold much appeal to those not completely fascinated by her.
August 4, 2022
PUTA QUE PARIU QUE LIVRO EMBASSADO DEMAIS SYLVIA TE AMO!!!!!
April 16, 2013
The book had a lot of promise. 1) It is one of the first (the first?) to benefit from the files of Ted Hughes. 2) The author had an intriguing thesis. He proposed to show Sylvia Plath's suicide as a premeditated step to establish her place in literature. 3) The title implies that Plath is the ideal wife and mother receiver of the hope and prayers of all. Unfortunately none of this is realized. The benefit of the Hughes papers does not show. The material on Plath is so gossipy and disjointed that no conclusions on much can be drawn and while author Carl Rollyson shows how Plath brings an American perspective to her British husband, there is little to show she is an Isis.
Rollyson says this is not a conventional biography, and it is not. For a serious literary figure it is much too chatty. Squibs of information are tossed about. There are bits of dialog. The most orderly thing about it is that it is chronologically presented.
Like other parts of the book, the beginning on Plath's youth was sketchy with hints of meaning that could (or could not) be derived. For instance, Rollyson makes a lot of Plath's relationship with Eddie Cohen, but it's unclear how many times she actually saw him. Quotes from Plath as a teenager and twenty-something are taken very seriously when at this age many (if not most) are fickle and dream big. The three pages on the Guest Editorship at Mademoiselle do not show what was so stressful about it or why it triggered (or did it?) Plath's first suicide attempt.
While Rollyson is knowledgeable about the 1950's he says little about how gender roles confined Plath. The closest he comes to consideration of this is in reference to efforts of Ted Hughes and his sister to suppress interpretations (of feminists, as well as others) of Ted and his partners.
There are a few general comparisons to Marilyn Monroe. Plath had a dream about Marilyn and Rollyson notes that both the Monroe-Miller and Plath-Hughes marriages had career benefits for both parties.
The most interesting part for me was the end in how Ted Hughes and his sister Olwyn tried to control his image through manipulation of the Plath story and works.
The life and times of Sylvia Plath is a topic crying out for exploration and this book is a letdown. Had I not been on a trip with only this book in hand I would never have finished it.
Rollyson says this is not a conventional biography, and it is not. For a serious literary figure it is much too chatty. Squibs of information are tossed about. There are bits of dialog. The most orderly thing about it is that it is chronologically presented.
Like other parts of the book, the beginning on Plath's youth was sketchy with hints of meaning that could (or could not) be derived. For instance, Rollyson makes a lot of Plath's relationship with Eddie Cohen, but it's unclear how many times she actually saw him. Quotes from Plath as a teenager and twenty-something are taken very seriously when at this age many (if not most) are fickle and dream big. The three pages on the Guest Editorship at Mademoiselle do not show what was so stressful about it or why it triggered (or did it?) Plath's first suicide attempt.
While Rollyson is knowledgeable about the 1950's he says little about how gender roles confined Plath. The closest he comes to consideration of this is in reference to efforts of Ted Hughes and his sister to suppress interpretations (of feminists, as well as others) of Ted and his partners.
There are a few general comparisons to Marilyn Monroe. Plath had a dream about Marilyn and Rollyson notes that both the Monroe-Miller and Plath-Hughes marriages had career benefits for both parties.
The most interesting part for me was the end in how Ted Hughes and his sister Olwyn tried to control his image through manipulation of the Plath story and works.
The life and times of Sylvia Plath is a topic crying out for exploration and this book is a letdown. Had I not been on a trip with only this book in hand I would never have finished it.
October 24, 2012
A fine biography for a superficial view of S.P.--worth the read if you've already read one or two Plath biographies, but definitely not for the first-time reader who's looking for a thorough account of Plath's life. The book did contribute some new details. Chapter 8 is particularly interesting, as are a couple of the short appendices.
I'm a big fan of both Plath and Marilyn Monroe, but I thought the repeated parallels drawn between the two was distracting. Also, having read a few Plath biographies already, I found the author's treatment of some things skimpy or even muddled. One thing that comes to mind is his mention of Plath serving on Smith's Honor Board, which he explained as dealing with "honors students." That made me pause, as even Plath herself in The Bell Jar (I happened to come upon this line in my reading last night) explains the board as dealing with "academic and social offenses and punishments." Hmmm. Of course I can't know this for sure, but I get the feeling that this biography is just another notch, a just-above-perfunctory treatment of a writer who is very important to many people, by a career biographer.
I'm a big fan of both Plath and Marilyn Monroe, but I thought the repeated parallels drawn between the two was distracting. Also, having read a few Plath biographies already, I found the author's treatment of some things skimpy or even muddled. One thing that comes to mind is his mention of Plath serving on Smith's Honor Board, which he explained as dealing with "honors students." That made me pause, as even Plath herself in The Bell Jar (I happened to come upon this line in my reading last night) explains the board as dealing with "academic and social offenses and punishments." Hmmm. Of course I can't know this for sure, but I get the feeling that this biography is just another notch, a just-above-perfunctory treatment of a writer who is very important to many people, by a career biographer.
February 2, 2013
This review refers to the NetGalley edition.
I'm giving this book 3.5 stars, but I am rounding down to 3 on GoodReads because it seemed to drag on forever. See, I adore Sylvia Plath and I was immediately intrigued at the idea of a new biography written after the opening of the Hughes archives, so I jumped at the chance to read and review it. I found it interesting, if slow, and seemingly thorough.
The downside is that while the author writes well, it reads like a college essay for a literature class rather than a biography. I'm sure the author did fantastically well in college writing courses, but failed to create a truly engaging story within these pages. If you don't already love or are fascinated by Sylvia Plath, nothing will ignite for you here. If you are an existing fan, I believe this was worth the read.
I'm giving this book 3.5 stars, but I am rounding down to 3 on GoodReads because it seemed to drag on forever. See, I adore Sylvia Plath and I was immediately intrigued at the idea of a new biography written after the opening of the Hughes archives, so I jumped at the chance to read and review it. I found it interesting, if slow, and seemingly thorough.
The downside is that while the author writes well, it reads like a college essay for a literature class rather than a biography. I'm sure the author did fantastically well in college writing courses, but failed to create a truly engaging story within these pages. If you don't already love or are fascinated by Sylvia Plath, nothing will ignite for you here. If you are an existing fan, I believe this was worth the read.
December 6, 2014
I have read almost everything ever written on Plath. I find the usual biographical imposition on her poetry distressful. I do not like it when critics read her death into everything that proceeded it. With these statements made, I enjoyed most of this book. It is very difficult to write about Plath (serious estate complications) and I think Rollyson does a nice job with the mythology that both Plath and Hughes created. I find his Marilyn Monroe connections/metaphor a bit strained at times. I also think his fire against Hughes is a little excessive (though he is not alone I his opinion). The best part of this biography, for me, is the last chapter which details all the biographers and attempts at telling Plath's story.
February 19, 2013
Some interesting new primary sources. A fast read, if you're familiar with the backstory and the Plath...industry, I guess. But an editor should really, really have caught the egregious du Maurier misquote toward the end: it seems a silly thing to focus on, but it made me wonder what else might have been missed.
November 23, 2020
This book is fascinating in so many ways. As a youngster in that year or two before college, I devoured as much Plath as I could find, including the Bell Jar, Ariel, and Colsosus. It is easy to create a picture of Plath as this idealized saint who was too good for this world. To some extent, this book plays into that. It doesn't really explain her suicide. Why was it she killed herself in that fashion with the kids in the next room, did she really mean to? Signs really point to no. As the book Far From the Tree points out, Plath was a genius, genuis is an aberration and aberrations often comes in threes. Her awful depression obviously took her over, despite and probably because of her sudden creativity which would result in the last book Ariel. Who knows what she might have accomplished.
December 4, 2019
Reading this book has made me look at Sylvia’s work through the lens of mental illness. Her extreme bouts of depression and high moods make me think that she was bipolar. It makes me so sad that such a brilliant and challenging mind took her own life, as she could not cope with the effects of mental illness on her life, marriage and work.
I feel like I got an idea of Sylvia’s personality in this book, and how flawed she was and could be. It made me relate and sympathise with her more, instead of putting her on a pedestal or worshipping her as an icon.
Some other reviews have critiqued the author’s comparison of Sylvia and Marilyn Monroe but I think Sylvia would have appreciated the symmetry between their lives.
I feel like I got an idea of Sylvia’s personality in this book, and how flawed she was and could be. It made me relate and sympathise with her more, instead of putting her on a pedestal or worshipping her as an icon.
Some other reviews have critiqued the author’s comparison of Sylvia and Marilyn Monroe but I think Sylvia would have appreciated the symmetry between their lives.
September 7, 2024
This is definitely a biography for those who are already familiar with most of the biographical details and her most famous works as instead it delves into "side characters" of Plath's life to see their accounts and to see how they coincided or opposed her journals. It recognizes that Plath is not always truthful in her writing, a flaw I find often in Plath re-tellings. Rollyson also made comparisons to Monroe and Sontag which piqued my interest in their life stories, and is also an excellent self-promotion of his other biographies. I'll be putting them on my TBR list!
I also liked how much time was spent on the Plath estate and censorship wars. This is often alluded to but never delved in this much detail, so I do feel as if I have a better understanding of how her work was handled, changed and censored. What a tragedy.
I also liked how much time was spent on the Plath estate and censorship wars. This is often alluded to but never delved in this much detail, so I do feel as if I have a better understanding of how her work was handled, changed and censored. What a tragedy.
May 28, 2022
1. I can sum up Plath’s life in one sentence (or at least what went terribly wrong with it): Sylvia thought life could (or would) be the same as literature. 2. Here are the villains of her life in order: Ted motherf***ing Hughes, Ted’s ridiculous sister, every boyfriend she had before Ted. 3. Here are some fun facts I learned in case you want to save yourself the torment of reading this and trying to figure this woman out: Hughes’s second serious relationship was with a woman who also committed suicide after being with him, killing their child first (she couldn’t leave her with Hughes!); Plath’s son committed suicide in 2009; Hughes’s stupid sister conspired with him to keep the world from her genius and knowing the details of her life.
November 19, 2025
Although American Isis was Carl Rollyson’s first major work on Sylvia Plath, it was the last of his books that I read, and ultimately the one I found least compelling. While the book offers interesting perspectives, it is comparatively less informative and less analytically rich than Rollyson’s later studies. The Last Days of Sylvia Plath and The Making of Sylvia Plath provide more research and deeper analysis of her work, making them more valuable contributions to Plath scholarship
February 7, 2013
I've read several Plath biographies, along with her journals, letters home, and her collected works. If you wants to feel like you have a real sense of Plath's character, you should read her unabridged journals. And if you want a peek into the end of her life, you should be reading the Ariel poems, as Hughes burned her last journals and her book that chronicled his betrayal. That being said, this is probably the best biography of hers that I've read, mostly because it is free of the mauling by the bloody paws of Olwyn Hughes, Ted Hughe's sister. It's common knowledge that Olwyn hated Plath (she says as much to the public), but what's worse is that she used Plath's biographers to consistently tell a warped version of the story in order to exonerate Hughes' blame, consistently making Plath seem difficult and insufferable. (This is even more annoying when you consider that most of Olwyn's wealth comes from royalties from the Plath estate). Anyway, this biography does a great job because it's able to duck Olwyn's edits and still have permission to use Plath's work along with Hughe's letters. The biography interviews people who saw her at the end of her life as panicked, unhinged, and difficult, but it also interviews people who loved her and had many good things to say about her personality (these people have been edited in previous biographies.) There are no new stunning insights to this story, but the book is good for the last chapter alone, which meticulously details the way Ted and Olwyn mishandled and maligned Sylvia's estate in a desperate attempt to recover Ted's name. It's interesting, and also quite immature: no one needs a biography to place blame on Hughes. His philandering is common knowledge and it's clearly a problem that he never honestly addressed in his life. (He cheated on every woman he was with). Is he fully responsible for her demons and her death? No. Is he a scumbag of the highest caliber? Yes. Did he abuse her? You’ll never convince me otherwise.
Anyway, the only annoying thing about this book is the CONSTANT attempt to align Plath with Marilyn Monroe. It starts from the first sentence and it does not stop throughout the book. I found myself cringing every time I read it. First, it's a false analogy logical fallacy: they may share some traits, but they are not the same woman, by any means. Also, it felt kind of sexist: "Look! All beautiful women self destruct and need love! Look, they are all the same!" With the writer's ability to make parallels to Monroe in every small respect, I guess that I am just like Monroe too, and Plath, and Scarlett O'Hara, and Susan Sontag, and any other histrionic woman that the biographer wanted to compare her to. Finally, these comparisons really perpetuate both the Monroe and Plath mythologies, and it seems that a biography should be humanizing rather than continually mythologizing. Plath did enough self mythologizing in her own work, she doesn't need a biographer to do more of it.
Rant aside, it's a good book, and it seems accurate in most respects. A much more whole picture than any others I've read. Especially, Stevenson's horrendous Bitter Fame.
Anyway, the only annoying thing about this book is the CONSTANT attempt to align Plath with Marilyn Monroe. It starts from the first sentence and it does not stop throughout the book. I found myself cringing every time I read it. First, it's a false analogy logical fallacy: they may share some traits, but they are not the same woman, by any means. Also, it felt kind of sexist: "Look! All beautiful women self destruct and need love! Look, they are all the same!" With the writer's ability to make parallels to Monroe in every small respect, I guess that I am just like Monroe too, and Plath, and Scarlett O'Hara, and Susan Sontag, and any other histrionic woman that the biographer wanted to compare her to. Finally, these comparisons really perpetuate both the Monroe and Plath mythologies, and it seems that a biography should be humanizing rather than continually mythologizing. Plath did enough self mythologizing in her own work, she doesn't need a biographer to do more of it.
Rant aside, it's a good book, and it seems accurate in most respects. A much more whole picture than any others I've read. Especially, Stevenson's horrendous Bitter Fame.
March 29, 2013
I don't read a lot of biographies. The reason is because of books like this. It's everything I'd feared biographies would be (even though I've read and loved a number of good ones.)
The author starts out by telling us that he's going to dispense with the formalities. He's not going to do the Sylvia (or Syl or Siv or Sivvy as he likes to call her. I just call her "SP" one syllable - sounds like "psst", but backwards) we know and love. He says "...I have dispensed with a good deal of the boilerplate most biographers feel compelled to supply." Because this is "distracting" and he doesn't want to "contextualize Plath ... as valuable as that can be for the Plath novice" He wants to show instead "the intensity of the person who was Sylvia Plath."
He starts by comparing her to Marilyn Monroe, interpreting a dream she had before most of us were born and illuminating us on her love for Superman. I guess when you dispense with the boilerplate, you scrape the bottom of the barrel?
The writing: Appalling alliteration ambush! "Her emollients eventually evaporated" (wait, there's more) "and he would erupt with thunderous exclamations." "Otto exhorted excellence, and he enjoyed endowing his daughter..." (spoiler alert: Otto Plath liked huge pork roast sandwiches.)
And that was all before page 12.
If all you are going to do is "use quotes" from "other people's work" then I'm not sure why you needed to "write the book." It's "not good." It's all Plath said "this and this" and so she is like this person (most likely Marilyn Monroe) for this reason. (Every time I read Marilyn's name in this book, I rolled my eyes and skipped to the next paragraph. Holy cow. We get it. You wrote a biography on Marilyn.)
Funnily enough, as I read this book I thought one of its greatest flaws was that there was no context. There were just these random bits of information just sort of there. The biggest failing of this book, however, was that it was BORING. I kept reading for two reasons ... 1. I needed to review it, 2. there's new material just released from the Ted Hughes archives. Just because this is the first book to be published with new information, doesn't mean it's the last. My suggestion is WAIT.
The author is indulgent, using obscure words (contumely?) - The Hughes family is vilified, and maybe they should be, I don't know. At the end, rather than showing me the "intensity of SP" as I was promised in the beginning, I got a lot of boring trivia, and then a pretty bleak picture of Hughes and his sister.
Sylvia Plath shouldn't be boring.
The author starts out by telling us that he's going to dispense with the formalities. He's not going to do the Sylvia (or Syl or Siv or Sivvy as he likes to call her. I just call her "SP" one syllable - sounds like "psst", but backwards) we know and love. He says "...I have dispensed with a good deal of the boilerplate most biographers feel compelled to supply." Because this is "distracting" and he doesn't want to "contextualize Plath ... as valuable as that can be for the Plath novice" He wants to show instead "the intensity of the person who was Sylvia Plath."
He starts by comparing her to Marilyn Monroe, interpreting a dream she had before most of us were born and illuminating us on her love for Superman. I guess when you dispense with the boilerplate, you scrape the bottom of the barrel?
The writing: Appalling alliteration ambush! "Her emollients eventually evaporated" (wait, there's more) "and he would erupt with thunderous exclamations." "Otto exhorted excellence, and he enjoyed endowing his daughter..." (spoiler alert: Otto Plath liked huge pork roast sandwiches.)
And that was all before page 12.
If all you are going to do is "use quotes" from "other people's work" then I'm not sure why you needed to "write the book." It's "not good." It's all Plath said "this and this" and so she is like this person (most likely Marilyn Monroe) for this reason. (Every time I read Marilyn's name in this book, I rolled my eyes and skipped to the next paragraph. Holy cow. We get it. You wrote a biography on Marilyn.)
Funnily enough, as I read this book I thought one of its greatest flaws was that there was no context. There were just these random bits of information just sort of there. The biggest failing of this book, however, was that it was BORING. I kept reading for two reasons ... 1. I needed to review it, 2. there's new material just released from the Ted Hughes archives. Just because this is the first book to be published with new information, doesn't mean it's the last. My suggestion is WAIT.
The author is indulgent, using obscure words (contumely?) - The Hughes family is vilified, and maybe they should be, I don't know. At the end, rather than showing me the "intensity of SP" as I was promised in the beginning, I got a lot of boring trivia, and then a pretty bleak picture of Hughes and his sister.
Sylvia Plath shouldn't be boring.
October 18, 2021
A serviceable and sympathetic biography of one of America’s major twentieth century poets. Chronicling Plath’s tragically short life in detail, but deserving of more careful editing, Rollyson’s fair-use work benefits from not being at the mercy of the Plath estate.
April 7, 2013
When I was in school around 1970, we were told that Sylvia Plath committed suicide because her husband, poet Ted Hughes, was an arrogant egotist who used her as a typist and suppressed her creativity and that it was his infidelity that finally drove her to suicide; it was the feminist stand at the time. This new biography, which draws on sources that were unavailable until after Ted Hughes death, shows a very different and far more complex story. Plath was not a woman forced into the shadows; if she was ever in the shadows, she put herself there.
Plath based her life on an idealized image in her head, an image that not only had her cast as an over achieving writer but as perfect wife and mother-even, at age 20, making a suicide attempt when her academic career was not going as she planned. She suffered from (and was treated multiple times for) depression and yet found the energy to take care of a home and children, write as much as Hughes did, and type his work. She was a driven woman, fighting to stay on top of everything including her demons. And she was fragile. That Hughes’ infidelity finally drove her over the edge is probably true, but Hughes was not the monster he’s been made out to be. Nor was Plath the vicious madwoman that Hughes’ sister, Olwyn, has described.
Rollyson drew largely on the Ted Hughes archive at the British Library, which includes many letters between Plath and Hughes and other unpublished papers and on interviews with friends of Plath and Hughes, which has enabled a balanced picture of Plath to emerge from the dust. It’s easily readable and as gripping as any novel. The book is a great addition to the Plath biographies.
Plath based her life on an idealized image in her head, an image that not only had her cast as an over achieving writer but as perfect wife and mother-even, at age 20, making a suicide attempt when her academic career was not going as she planned. She suffered from (and was treated multiple times for) depression and yet found the energy to take care of a home and children, write as much as Hughes did, and type his work. She was a driven woman, fighting to stay on top of everything including her demons. And she was fragile. That Hughes’ infidelity finally drove her over the edge is probably true, but Hughes was not the monster he’s been made out to be. Nor was Plath the vicious madwoman that Hughes’ sister, Olwyn, has described.
Rollyson drew largely on the Ted Hughes archive at the British Library, which includes many letters between Plath and Hughes and other unpublished papers and on interviews with friends of Plath and Hughes, which has enabled a balanced picture of Plath to emerge from the dust. It’s easily readable and as gripping as any novel. The book is a great addition to the Plath biographies.
October 14, 2014
I have read some of Plath's work (poetry, Bell Jar, but not a lot and none of it recently. This book came my way and I thought I'd educate myself on this legendary New England writer.
I was a little taken aback in Rollyson's Author's Note, in which he disparages all Plath biographers that have come before. He also writes that this book is not for the Plath novice - He assumes a familiarity with her works and quotes from them very little. I almost stopped reading right there, thinking I might not be prepared for this text. Still, I thought I could get something out of it, and I did.
Are footnotes unfashionable now? I'm not an academic anymore, but it was weird to see so many quotes and no footnotes. There's an index, and an extensive bibliography in the back, but direct quotes and assertions are not connected to their sources.
Also, Rollyson's style is big, hyperbolic. I often felt like I couldn't quite trust what he was telling his readers. The frequent typos and repetitions of certain themes (comparisons to Sontag and Monroe) and his odd and undeveloped assertion that rape wasn't as big a deal for women in the 1950s than it is now (?!), that women could expect that kind of treatment from their dates, added to this unease. So, I now know a bunch more about Sylvia Plath but I don't know how much of it to believe. I'd be interested to know if other readers have similar thoughts.
I was a little taken aback in Rollyson's Author's Note, in which he disparages all Plath biographers that have come before. He also writes that this book is not for the Plath novice - He assumes a familiarity with her works and quotes from them very little. I almost stopped reading right there, thinking I might not be prepared for this text. Still, I thought I could get something out of it, and I did.
Are footnotes unfashionable now? I'm not an academic anymore, but it was weird to see so many quotes and no footnotes. There's an index, and an extensive bibliography in the back, but direct quotes and assertions are not connected to their sources.
Also, Rollyson's style is big, hyperbolic. I often felt like I couldn't quite trust what he was telling his readers. The frequent typos and repetitions of certain themes (comparisons to Sontag and Monroe) and his odd and undeveloped assertion that rape wasn't as big a deal for women in the 1950s than it is now (?!), that women could expect that kind of treatment from their dates, added to this unease. So, I now know a bunch more about Sylvia Plath but I don't know how much of it to believe. I'd be interested to know if other readers have similar thoughts.
March 4, 2015
I bought this book, in the hopes that with the unsealing of the Ted Hughes archive there would be new information to be learned. I was sorely disappointed. There is nothing new to be found here. While he explains that the book is not geared toward the Plath novice, I'd be hard pressed to figure out why he'd even think a Plath scholar would be the best audience either.
The writing is very stilted, Rollyson attempts to personalize his connection to Plath, speaking very informally about her, referring her to 'Syl'. The comparisons he makes to Marilyn Monroe are laughable. The only common connection between these two women is the fact they were born and lived in the same time frame.
The editing is poor, which is being generous. There are numerous errors, not only in spelling, but the complete revision of well known and documented 'Plath Facts'. This book reads more like Rollyson just needed to get it out of his system and earn a dollar, which if you paid more than a dollar for this book, quite honestly, you're getting ripped off.
The writing is very stilted, Rollyson attempts to personalize his connection to Plath, speaking very informally about her, referring her to 'Syl'. The comparisons he makes to Marilyn Monroe are laughable. The only common connection between these two women is the fact they were born and lived in the same time frame.
The editing is poor, which is being generous. There are numerous errors, not only in spelling, but the complete revision of well known and documented 'Plath Facts'. This book reads more like Rollyson just needed to get it out of his system and earn a dollar, which if you paid more than a dollar for this book, quite honestly, you're getting ripped off.
February 2, 2013
This book is boring and doesn't offer any new insights into SP's life. The author has a nasty habit of comparing Plath to other women (Marilyn Monroe, Susan Sontag) in ways that seem random until you realize he wrote biographies on them, too. Knowing that SP shared superficial similarities to two women I'm not interested in reading about really does nothing to broaden my understanding of her.
Things finally pick up in the last chapter, which covers the Hughes family's (mis)handling of Plath's estate, and I also enjoyed the appendices. I was shocked to see that the author interviewed people who knew Plath since the overview of her life is so dry. If you've read her journals or another biography then you really don't need to sit down with this book.
Things finally pick up in the last chapter, which covers the Hughes family's (mis)handling of Plath's estate, and I also enjoyed the appendices. I was shocked to see that the author interviewed people who knew Plath since the overview of her life is so dry. If you've read her journals or another biography then you really don't need to sit down with this book.
February 5, 2013
The absolute best part of this biography is its last chapter, "In the Temple of Isis." This chapter is an excellent and illuminating overview of the evolution of Plath studies since Sylvia Plath's death in 1963, which is possibly just as, if not more dramatic than the poet's life and could fill a book in itself.
Personally, I think Sylvia Plath's poetry is infinitesimally more interesting and inspiring than her life and suicide, but I quite liked this biography. The Marilyn Monroe references bothered me a bit at first but I got over it by the end. I'm looking forward to seeing Carl Rollyson at the Boulder Book Store in March.
Personally, I think Sylvia Plath's poetry is infinitesimally more interesting and inspiring than her life and suicide, but I quite liked this biography. The Marilyn Monroe references bothered me a bit at first but I got over it by the end. I'm looking forward to seeing Carl Rollyson at the Boulder Book Store in March.
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