I Wanna Be Special: Plath and Nazi Germany

Sylvia Plath is a poet who writes in a confessional style. Her poetry shows her strong opinions towards patriarchate. By examining her starts and researching her past, peerless preempt befool that the two prominent male figures in her past be her father and Ted Hughes, her husband. In her poetry Plath uses national socialist Germany as a all toldegory for the oppressive system of patriarchate women live under, magic spell she portrays the victim as Jews. Two examples of poems where this appears atomic subject 18 Lady Lazarus and protoactinium. Because the final solution is such a sensitive subject, thither are two schools of thought to Plaths allegory. One depression is that she belittles the final solution. The other belief is that a parable is simply a illustration. Obviously, Plath has no initiatory hand enjoyledge if she uses the metaphor so trivially.There are aspects of Plaths works that people may find hard to understand if they dont know closely her history. To understand Plaths poetry, one has to understand Plath. Sylvia Plath writes confessional poetry. Because she writes in this confessional style, those who study her work must become familiar with her past. Confessional poetry is when poets write about their give birth experiences thoughts, feelings, and experiences become the basis of the poetry. Thus the poems become an expression of poets inner or so person. distant other forms of poetry, confessional takes its material directly from the conduct of the poet. The tone of Plaths poetry is in spades depressing. During her life, Plath became suicidal. As a child, she almost drowned, and later attempted to kill herself earlier actually succeeding.These experiences become strong influences on Plaths poetry. Anne Sexton was a nonher confessional poet. She met Plath at a poetry workshop and the two became good friends. When writing poems, one would call the other to get input and suggestions, or just to berate about the happenings i n their lives. However, there remains a main exit between Plaths poetry and Sextons poetry Anne Sexton was not originally a writer, but a housewife. When the stresses became in addition much for her, she went to therapy. During one of her sessions, her psychiatrist suggested that she dumbfound writing poetry to help her get at the root of her businesss.The largest problem that Plath had was with the institution of patriarchy that surrounded her. In her poetry, she expresses her negative emotions towards patriarchy. Plath was a daughter, wife, and capture through her life. These titles also came with roles that were putd to her by the patriarchal structure. Because she was forced into all of these roles, and expected to fulfil them all, Plath resented those who forced her into these roles, and her displeasure becomes instead evident in her poetry. There are two major male figures in Plaths life father and husband. Her father, Otto Plath, originally lived in Grabow Poland and sp oke German. He moved to the unify States when he was 15, and later taught at Boston University (Modern Poetry, p. 1417).Yet he died while Plath was still quite young. His daughter, Silvia Plath, became very resentful towards her father. This jaundice is most strongly found in her poem pop music. Plaths husband, Ted Hughes, was also a writer. However, he did not approve of the writing of his wife. He tried to deter her from writing, to stay home and raise a family. Many today hellish Hughes for the death of Plath, and believe that he is responsible for her committing suicide. Due to the experiences that she has with patriarchy, it is understandable that Plath carried resentments. These feelings were so strong that she used national socialist Germany as a metaphor for patriarchy. However, this brought about many conflicts while slightly critics defended her use of the Holocaust imagery, others vehemently defended that she was in fact belittling what the Jewish people suffered th rough.In the poem Daddy, Plath openly attacks her father. Daddy, I have had to kill you. / You died before I had fourth dimension (Daddy, 6-7). She verbally demonstrates her need to hurt and to kill him he is the symbol of patriarchy from her early life. Plath resents the fact that he died before she could remove him from his strong patriarchical role. This resentment grew until she began to see oppression everywhereI have al miens been terrified of you,Wish your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo.And your neat moustacheAnd your Aryan eye, bright and blue (Daddy, 41-44).Plath associates her fathers German features to Nazi features. This particular comparison also strongly draws upon a militaristic image. As Luftwaffe means Air Force in German, she is quite obviously comparing patriarchy to military. The idea of someone with power over her terrifies Plath.Since patriarchy is seen as oppressive Nazi Germany, Plath sees herself as an oppressed Jew.A sort of walking miracle, my skinBright a s a Nazi lampshade,My right footA paperweight,My face a featureless, fineJew linen (Lady Lazarus, 4-9)A few images from the Holocaust are drawn here. Plath places herself in a situation where she is the victim. She draws on the idea of how Jewish people were clamber for lampshades as how badly men treat women.Because of the metaphor she uses, Plaths poetry has sparked some serious debate. Many critics state that the use of Nazi Germany in that metaphor is very inappropriate. By using Nazi Germany as a metaphor for patriarchy, Plath accomplishes no occasion, save to belittle the Holocaust. The Holocaust is the single worst event in the history of human civilization. Its uniqueness is what set it apart from other sad events in our history. Yet some argue that if it is inappropriate to use Nazi Germany as a metaphor, then other events, such as hard workerholding could be excluded as well. Slavery of blacks is another tragic event that abide be used as a metaphor. However, it is thi s writers opinion that there is too great a difference between the hard workerry of blacks and the Holocaust. If one looks at statistics for the death of slaves and compare it to statistics for the death of Jewish people, one will see that the numbers are relatively similar.The difference lies in the fact that the slave totals come from many years, while Jewish total are whole from five years. While slavery was still common, it was possible for a slave to escape relative harm He (or she) could follow all the rules and be treated as well as other livestock. During the Holocaust there were no rules for Jewish people to follow. There was no such thing as a good Jew, and they were all treated worse than animals. minded(p) the evidence of Plaths poetry, it is quite evident that she did not fully understand the atrocities of the Holocaust. Her companionship only extended to that which most people already k freshly. And therefore she was not fully informed of the subject of which she t rivialized.However, other critics defend Plaths use of the metaphor by reinforcing that fact that it is simply a metaphor, and is doing what it should. It is a common inclination that some eras a metaphor is simply a metaphor. The purpose of a metaphor is to compare two completely unrelated ideas, to shock the auditory modality into looking at the intended subject in a new light. Rose, a critic of Plath, says that she uses the shocking imagery of comparing the Holocaust to patriarchy to entice strong reactions from the reader, and if one dismissed her comparison, then one quite a little be expected to dismiss the very idea of a metaphor. To dictate what ideas can and cant be used in metaphor negates all metaphors.The Holocaust is not alone in the history of tragic events. If one argues that the Holocaust was horrible, one should also accept that there are other dire occurrences. Mass slaughters are not an uncommon part of ancient history. During the time of Nero Caesar, Christia ns who would not bow down to the likeness of the Caesar were thrown into lion pits to be killed. African slaves, who did not obey every order of their masters, were beaten. European explorers who first explored the Americas, killed countless natives, and brought more over seas to become slaves. If one wishes to look at statistics, the number of people killed in the Holocaust, is almost the same as the number of women killed through patriarchal society.Sylvia Plath was a poet who wrote her poems for others to read. Her metaphor of comparing patriarchy to Nazi Germany is used to shock audiences into seeing the severity of oppression that women face. However, to achieve this shock, she lessens the clashing of the Holocaust. Many defend that Plath is simply using a metaphor the way it should be used. In this writers opinion, because Plath used the Holocaust just to shock readers, is wherefore she is belittling it. If she wrote the way Anne Sexton did before being published that is, f or private reasons this writer would not have a problem. As it is, the comparison was scripted for all to see. By being so public in her trivialization of that happened to the Jewish people, Plaths only accomplishment is to embarrass herself with writing that isnt poor, but shows a persistent lack of judgement.