Product Description

"By far the most intelligent and the only authentically satisfying of the five biographies of Plath."--Janet Malcolm, The New Yorker

In this authoritative and controversial biography, Stevenson charts the ways in which Sylvia Plath created her own legend--one at odds with the posthumous myth that has grown up around her. It is "the most genuinely feminist account of Plath's life yet: one in which Plath herself is held to be responsible for her own life, her own death" (Washington Post Book World).

(A Mariner Reissue)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #299743 in Books
• Published on: 1998-06-16
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 413 pages

From Publishers Weekly
The best critical biography of Plath yet, poet Stevenson's ( The Fiction Makers ) volume offers a convincing reinterpretation of a complex and controversial life. The author's objectivity and her success in assembling new sources pay off richly: bombarded by a superbly orchestrated array of opinions, quotations, details and anecdotes from Plath and those who knew her (Ted Hughes, Plath's husband, provided background information and reviewed the manuscript for factual accuracy), we are enabled, with Stevenson's guidance, to draw fresh conclusions about the late poet's conflicts between her fierce drive to succeed and keen appetite for self-destruction. Of particular significance is Stevenson's effort to present needed balance in portraying the marriage of Hughes and Plath; no longer cast as a victim of her husband's alleged infidelities (largely imagined, the book asserts), Plath emerges as the forger of her own fate leading to her 1963 suicide. Essays written in remembrance of Plath by Lucas Myers, Dido Merwin and Richard Murphy provide striking, invaluable firsthand views. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
In her preface to this new biography of Sylvia Plath, Stevenson states that she intends to create "an objective account of how this exceptionally gifted girl was hurled into poetry by a combination of biographical accident and inflexible ideals and ambitions." Yet how can one be objective when one's aim is to explain "inflexible ideals and ambitions"? It is the very subjectivity that ultimately informs this book that is its weakest aspect. However, several previously unpublished memoirs by people who knew Plath are included as appendixes, and while they are not sufficient to make this a definitive biography (for which we will likely have to wait a number of years), they are interesting and make for a lively, if not altogether trustworthy, account of her life.
- Jessica Grim, NYPL
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
"A major biography, perhaps Ms. Plath's last, best bid for understanding." (Christian Science Monitor )

"By far the most intelligent and the only authentically satisfying of the five biographies of Plath." (The New Yorker )

Customer Reviews

Portrayal packs details; lacks empathy
Why would Stevenson, with her apparent lack of knowledge and compassion regarding mental illness, choose Plath as her subject? Stevenson provides great details of Plath's life and adequate criticism of Plath's work, but loses credibility when she begins to blame Plath for behaviors clearly attributable to Plath's mental illness. Many of these behaviors are certainly offensive (i.e. irrational jealousy and rage). But I find Stevenson's attitude much more offensive, when she chastises Plath for her "sardonic refusal to accept limitation." In her final struggle with mental illness, Plath reached out desperately to all who could have helped: family, friends, physician. To compare her to the "Edge" heroine who "has freely chosen the perfection of death" is irresponsible. No one chooses mental illness, or its often dire consequences.

One-sided Depiction of a Controversial Life
I wish I could give this book two reviews--four stars for the author's perceptive criticism of Plath's poetry, and one star for her depiction of the poet's life. I was stung by her condecending portrayal of Americans in general--one would never guess that the author was an American herself! I was infuriated by the weasel-like way that Ms. Stevenson portrayed Ted Hughes's affair--that he "made contact" with the woman who became his mistress, and that Plath's jealousy essentially "forced" him to be unfaithful. I had always heard that Ted Hughes's sister had a great deal to do with the final book, and I feel that her spectre shadows almost every word. Never have someone who dislikes you write your biography--particularly if she is hiding behind another person! More fuel for the Plath-Hughes controversy, which will rage on into the next century, even though both protagonists are now dead.

Completely unobjective
It is curious that Stevenson claims hers to be the "objective" biography to correct "misunderstandings" about Sylvia Plath held by her followers ... never have I read a less objective piece of writing that attempted to pass as journalism. The book is riddled with negative adjectives for Plath at every turn ("brusque, mocking, scornful, contemptuous, fierce, snapping" - just in the course of half of one page), and every anecdote seems to be presented with the goal of depicting Plath as an emotionally stunted, deliriously ambitious, shallow American. True, all the major facts of her life are presented, given about an obligatory paragraph or so apiece, but given this kind of summary account, it is impossible for the reader to develop a sense of Plath as a whole person, an understanding of the imagery of her writing, in the same way that one does, for example, from reading Plath's unabridged journals or the excellent biography by Paul Alexander, "Rough Magic." In fact, Stevenson admits that she relies on information strictly from Hughes-based sources and certain passages from Plath's journals that reinforce her pereception of Plath as a gushing, phony American with a heart of black rot. Clearly Plath had her difficulties with various people. She had depressive tendencies and was probably not the most pleasant person to be around from time to time. But where Ted Hughes was not the epitome of evil, neither was she, and this biography does nothing to explore her humanity or the power of her poetry.