The Collected Poems (P.S.) [Paperback]

Sylvia Plath (Author)

Book Description

Release date: September 2, 2008 | Series: P.S.

A new edition of Sylvia Plath's Pulitzer Prize-winning Collected Poems, edited and with an introduction by Ted Hughes

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Sylvia Plath was born in 1932 in Massachusetts. Her books include the poetry collections The Colossus, Crossing the Water, Winter Trees, Ariel, and The Collected Poems, which won the Pulitzer Prize. A complete and uncut facsimile edition of Ariel was published in 2004 with her original selection and arrangement of poems. She was married to the poet Ted Hughes, with whom she had a daughter, Frieda, and a son, Nicholas. She died in London in 1963.

Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial Modern Classics; Reprint edition (September 2, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061558893
• ISBN-13: 978-0061558894
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (45 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #38,391 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #94 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Poetry > American

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 33 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Collection details Plath's formidable talent. June 18, 1999

By A Customer

Format:Perfect Paperback

This book is the most complete collection of Sylvia Plath's poetry assembled in one volume. It is for this reason that it belongs almost as required reading, not just in American english programs, but in secondary schools everywhere. It's value lies in it's progression of a female poet and her journey towards finding her true voice. We see the early poems, methodically and skillfully written, shedding style after style of obvious influences through excercises of observation and perserverance. Through these verses, she explores and develops an intricate mythology; by the end, however, she has not lost us in her private world of symbolism and imagery, but enthralls us, heartbreakingly, through the mastery of her words. These last poems, that made up her final manuscript, are undisputedly some of the most moving and beautifully executed compositions of this past century. It is a wonderful book, one that forever changes the way the reader interprets art and the world around him that inspires it.

27 of 32 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Looooooove Sylvia!... October 31, 2002

By "siammuse"

Format:Perfect Paperback

It doesn't matter what you think about Sylvia Plath; her suicides, dependence on Ted Hughes, the relationship she had with her mother, her poems about "Daddy, the very depth of the darkness she held inside. It doesn't matter a damn. What matters is the writing, the beauty of the words, the music in her voice.
"The Collected Poems" won the Pulitzer. Some may disagree with this choice, but what do they know. Sylvia was a genius.
The poems are from 1956-1963...

"Southern Sunrise" 1956
SP uses the imagery of color- lemon,mango, peach, pinapple barked, green crescent of palms, quartz clear, blue drench, red watermelon sun. One can see she was happy when she wrote this poem. (Probably just met Ted)

"Fiesta Melons" 1956
Bright green and thumpable/Laced over With stripes/
Of turtle-dark green/Choose an egg shape/ a world shape/
Bowl one homeward to taste/ in the whitehot noon

I find it interesting how much SP's poems reveal about her state of mind as she wrote them. One can observe the progression of depression, her troubled marriage and lonliness, especially in the later poems 1960-63...

"Tulips" 1961
I am nobody/I have nothing to do with explosions.
I didn't want any flowers/I only wanted/to lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty.

"The Rival" 1961(About Ted??)
I wake to a mausoleum; you are here/Ticking your fingers on the marble table/looking for cigarettes/Spiteful as a woman, but not so nervous/ And dying to say something unanswerable.

The Moon and the Yew Tree" 1961
Separated from my house by a row of headstones/ I simply cannot see where there is to get to.

"A Birthday Present" 1962 (SP's struggle w/depression)
I would have killed myself gladly that time any possible way/Now there are these veils, shimmering like curtains./
The diaphanous satins of a January window/White as babies' bedding and glittering with dead breath. O ivory!

"Lesbos" 1962 (SP's experimentation w/ lesbianism??)
You say your husband is just no good to you/His Jew Mama guards his sweet sex like a pearl/You have one baby, I have two/I should sit on a rock off Cornwall and comb my hair./ I should wear tiger pants, /I should have an affair/ We should meet in another life,/ we should meet in air/ Me and you.

People are fascinated w/ SP, her confessional poetry, giving us a glimse into her world. We feel as if we know her. And even though she appears strong and nasty at times, we see the sweetness behind it all, the lonliness, and somehow, like Marilyn Monroe, we would have liked to be her friend.

1962-63 were Sylvia's darkest days and it shows in her poetry...

"Sheep in Fog"
The hills step off into whiteness/People or stars/
Regard me sadly,/ I disapoint them.
All morning the / Morning has been blackening.

"Daddy"
If I've killed one man, I've killed two/
The vampire who said he was you/ (ted hughes)
Who drank my blood for a seven years,/ if you want to know/ Daddy you can lie back now./
There's a stake in your fat black heart/ And the villagers never liked you/They are dancing and stamping on you/They always knew it was you/ daddy, you bastard,/ I'm through.

Sylvia Plath is somebody we want to know better, this is why we read her poetry. Although much of it is dark, the music of her voice still crys out with such precision and brilliance that we listen, we learn, and we continue reading the words she left behind.
"Death & Co."
I do not stir.
The frost makes a flower,
The dew makes a star,
The dead bell,
The dead bell.

Someboy's done for.

28 of 34 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars There is just something about Sylvia Plath August 25, 2001

By Nicole Alger VINE™ VOICE

Format:Perfect Paperback

Gosh, I love Sylvia Plath's prose and poetry. I could read and reread some of her poems again and again. This is a great collection of her poems. I keep this book loose on my bookshelf when I feel like getting shivers up my spine before I go to sleep. There are some poems that I can just read and reread over and over again that make me feel... oh, mysterious, anxious, happy, perplexed... and Sylvia Plath is one of the poets who has written multiple poems that give me those feelings. Most people who like poetry are familiar with Mirror or Daddy, but there are other poems that people don't know about. I loved the sonnet "To Time" and the poem "Mystic." It is interesting to read her poems knowing what she was going through... reading the poems that coincide with certain events in her life, like her marriage to Ted Hughes, and poems that she wrote about her attempted suicides. I suggest this collection to anyone who is interested in this woman... and I also recommend that you read The Bell Jar as you read her poems, or maybe a few of her journal entries. Sylvia Plath is one of those poets that writes about herself, and knowing background on her life is crucial in understanding these poems. Well, you can decide for yourself.