Outline Of Sylvia's Essay

In Initiation by Sylvia Plath, the author suggests that conformity and having friends is a wonderful idea, yet the idea of having an individual identity and being an individual is stronger. In the excerpt, Millicent is slowly realizing that conforming and being a part of a sorority is not as exciting as it sounds, and being an individual offers more opportunities to become a unique person.

At the beginning of the story, the author gives us the feeling that a child is narrating this story. She also shows that the child, Sylvia, is at

As she is developing, she is tantalized by the societal norms he represents. She is ready to give up the backwoods (a symbol of herself) for all he (a symbol of society) has to offer. Convinced of that, she sets off to find the secret of the elusive white heron and in order to find the heron, she had to climb to what was literally the top of the world for her, the top of the pine tree. The world from the top was different than the city and it was different from the woods at ground level. From the top her perspective about the world changed, it was vast and awesome, and she understood her place in it more than before. She understood it to mean more than to sacrifice her own self for the gifts this man had to offer that were tantalizing but incapitable with her personality and true self.

Sylvia is a dynamic because she does change throughout the story. At the beginning, she did not want to go with Miss. Moore. She feels that there is something wrong

In the short story “Initiation” by Sylvia Plath, Millicent Arnold is a narcissistic teenager undergoing her initiation into the most prestige social group at Lansing High. Despite being aware of the risk at losing her best friend, Tracy, Millicent eagerly seeks the opportunity to be part of a close-knit group and as a result, she is mistreated and forced to conform to the group’s narrow standards. Plath explains how being part of a social group does not necessarily help one grow individually, but rather assimilates them into what is portrayed as esteemed social status. As Millicent goes through the downgrading initiation process, she discovers the value of friendship and realizes that being associated with a certain group will not help her achieve confidence in her true self.

The main character Esther, in Sylvia Plath's novel experiences a series of internal conflicts and mental challenges, which eventually lead up to her breakdown. Esther initially struggles with the feeling that society expects her to be happy, due to her luxurious life in New York City but in reality, she is very unhappy. Additionally, Esther has lost her grip on life and feels emotionally numb. On top of these emotions, Esther deals with feeling like she is on display, or in the spotlight, which exposes her to societies judgement and adds extra pressure on Esther.

What is the defining feature of the poem, and how does it contribute to the poem’s effect? The defining feature of the poem Daddy by Sylvia Plath is the rhyme scheme. Forty-one out of the eighty lines in the poem rhyme with 'you' and none of the other thirty-nine lines rhyme with each other. In Daddy, 'you' refers to the speaker's father, and the rhyme scheme helps convey the speaker's attitude towards her father and his death.

Sylvia Plath was influenced to write poems early on in her life. One of the biggest influences within her writing include her father, Otto Plath. Otto Plath had died from an illness caused by diabetes in 1940. After this traumatizing event, Plath had written very vivid poems explaining her problematic relationship with her father, and her feelings after he had died. She wrote a poem named Daddy (“Sylvia Plath” Poetry). Daddy is a poem including a characteristic person representing Plath’s father in real life. Her father in the poem is a dark person that Sylvia Plath has to “kill” (Ardagh, Emily). Plath was very upset about this sudden death of her father, so she thought the perfect idea was to write a poem about him. Another important person

‘Morning song’ by Sylvia Plath describes the birth, early stages of childhood and the sentimental value of a child in a very unique way. This poem was wrote from Sylvia Plath’s own experience of child birth, it can also be related to by parents, it could be thought it is aimed mainly at females as this poem is quite feminine. This eighteen line lyrics is structured in 3 line stanzas which are called tersest. It is a tender poem and the overall tone of it is quite mellow.

Sylvia came into the world on October 27, 1932, in Boston, Massachusetts. Sylvia Plath had been writing since she was a child. She started writing by starting a journal. But when she was eight years her father died. Sylvia and her father did not have the best relationship.

Sylvia’s language is important because it allows the reader to better understand the insurmountable economic and educational disadvantages she faces and, as a result, her anger toward her social status. “And we kinda hated her too” (paragraph 1). “I’m really hating this nappy-head bitch and her goddamn college degree” (paragraph 3). While stark, this language helps explain that while her anger is directed toward Miss Moore – probably because there is no other adult she can direct it to – it is manifested by her unfortunate reality. “And then she gets to the part about we all poor and live in the slums, which I don’t feature.” Sylvia is extremely bright and has no false illusions about her place. We would be unable to experience this rage

The 1950s were a time of conformity in the United States, especially for women, who were expected to stay in the domestic sphere of childbearing and housecleaning. Yet, for some younger women, the idea of domesticity and of having their desires coming second to their husbands was not an idea they could get behind. At the age of twenty, Sylvia Plath was one of these women: she had achieved straight A’s throughout her life, was an honors student on the verge of graduation, and had won a once-in-a-lifetime internship in New York. Yet, the only concern her mother and her friends had for her was that she got married as soon as possible. Sylvia soon felt increasingly trapped in a society that expected her to “flatten underneath [her husband’s] feet

Walby Sylvia in investigative and analyzing different theoretical approaches to patriarchy, she offers an outlook on theorizing patriarchy in a manner that represents two separate forms of patriarchy, which she labels “private patriarchy” and “public patriarchy,” that are evident in a number of societal structures. “Private patriarchy” is the subjugation of women by limiting them to unpaid household labor and keeping them from the communal sphere. On the other hand “public patriarchy” gives women access to both private and public spheres, but this entrance is seen as substandard compared with that of their male partners, and women are still jointly dominated by societal structure (Walby Sylvia. 1990).

The Cold War ushered in a period of mass fear and intimidation, which allowed for new understandings into the various “Ways of Thinking”, which helped shape the societal paradigms of the era. These revelations into the new “Ways of Thinking” is evidenced through Sylvia Plath’s poems, “Daddy”, “The Applicant” and “Morning Song”, and John F. Kennedy’s speech, “Ich Bin Ein Berliner” (1963). The composers are effectively able to reflect the “Ways of Thinking” of the period, such as the scientific, religious, philosophical and economic paradigms, in their compositions through various literary techniques.

Sylvia isolates herself in nature, the setting, and identifies herself as a person who prefers to be alone. While wandering and playing around with her cow, she “would look upon the cow’s pranks as an intelligent attempt to play hide and seek, as [she] had no playmates” (Jewett 196). Sylvia does not experience human interaction, besides her grandmother, due to being isolated in the countryside. However, she interacts with her best friend, Mistress Moolly the cow, as a way to fill in the need of communicating with others. Mrs. Tilley, Sylvia’s grandmother, notices how her granddaughter spends more time in nature. She states, “Afraid of folks, they said! I guess [Sylvia] won’t be troubled no great with them up to the old place” (Jewett 196). The “old place” indicates Sylvia’s house in the city. Generally, a city is crowded and there is not enough space for her to freely wander unlike the countryside. Mrs. Tilley suggests that her granddaughter is more comfortable in the countryside, where it is open and peaceful, rather than the congested city. There is a slight hint of transcendentalism in Sylvia. Due to her familiarity with nature, she realizes how much she prefers being alone in the woods. Additionally, the isolation that Sylvia experiences allow her to retain her innocence, a part of her identity, until she meets the hunter.