Patricia Grisafi

Breaking Down Plath (eBook, ePUB)

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

A practical guide to Sylvia Plath's works for middle and secondary school students One of the most dynamic and admired poets of the 20th century, Sylvia Plath wrote work about war, motherhood, jealousy, rage, grief, death, and mental illness that challenged preconceptions about what poetry should be about. The enduring power of Plath's poetry and prose continues to attract and fascinate a multitude of readers. Best known for her poems "Daddy"and "Lady Lazarus" and the novel The Bell Jar, Plath starkly expressed a sense of alienation closely linked to both her personal experiences and the to the wider situation of women throughout mid-twentieth-century America. With an eye towards demythologizing Plath and focusing on her achievements, Breaking Down Plath aims to contextualize Plath's work in the larger scheme of Cold War-era gender politics, debates about mental health, and anxiety about global conflict. Breaking Down Plath informs readers of essential facts about Sylvia Plath's life and explores the works of the influential and controversial American poet, novelist, and short-story writer. Author Patricia Grisafi contextualizes and clarifies important underlying themes in Plath's works while providing insight into how interest in Plath's work developed, how the story of Plath's life has been told, what we still need to discover about her, and why her life and art matter. Breaking Down Plath: * Presents a critical biography of Plath's life * Offers a thematic tour through Plath's, short fiction, journals, and letters * Explores the recurrent themes in Plath's poetry * Features an overview of the reception of Plath's work * Discusses the role of Plath in contemporary popular culture This book is a primer for younger or new Plath readers and a welcome addition to the toolbox used by educators, parents, and anyone interested in or studying Plath's life and work.

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Wiley-ISTE
• Seitenzahl: 128
• Erscheinungstermin: 4. Februar 2022
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9781119782407
• Artikelnr.: 63445819

Autorenporträt

PATRICIA GRISAFI, PHD, is a freelance writer, editor, and educator based in New York City. Aside from teaching Plath's work, she is the author of numerous essays on Plath and has presented research at academic conferences such as the 75th Annual Sylvia Plath Symposium.

Inhaltsangabe

Foreword ix

Acknowledgments xi

About the Author xiii

Introduction xv

Chapter 1: Who Was Sylvia Plath? 1

Chapter 2: Plath in Her Historical Context 13

Chapter 3: Plath's Poetry 23

Chapter 4: The Bell Jar, Short Fiction, and Essays 63

Chapter 5: Plath's Journals and Letters 83

Chapter 6: Plath's Legacy 93

Bibliography 99

Index 105

Rezensionen

As Patricia Grisafi powerfully argues, Plath's work is necessary for readers and students at all levels. Critically introducing Sylvia Plath to readers, Breaking Down Plath delivers the information and approaches that will prove necessary to student readers, who will discover Plath's contributions to literature and who will be able to reflect upon her relevance and significance to culture, society, history, and the arts more generally. Grisafi foregrounds Plath's brilliant artistry across genres and themes and provides the overviews, analyses, and discussions that guide students and readers in approaching and understanding Plath's work and her life. This book is a much needed one: it enables developing readers of Plath and literature to hone their critical thinking and reflection skills as well as to study a writer whose work positions her as one of the foremost writers of the twentieth century and whose importance has never waned.-- Julie Goodspeed-Chadwick, Ph.D., IUPUI Chancellor's Professor and IU Bicentennial Professor of English, affiliate faculty in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, and Director of the Office of Student Research at Indiana University-Purdue University Columbus

"A dynamic guide through Sylvia Plath's life, fiction, and poetry. Grisafi's fresh take on Plathian themes like politics, mental health, and sexual violence prove time and time again that Sylvia Plath is not only relevant, but necessary." -- Elizabeth Winder, author of Pain, Parties, Work: Sylvia Plath in New York, Summer 1953

"Breaking Down Plath is a concise, effective, and highly accessible introduction to the work of Sylvia Plath. Skilfully drawing across Plath's complete body of work, Grisafi places this important twentieth-century writer in her social and cultural context, but equally shows why she is still relevant today. Readers of this book will take away a strong flavor of Plath's brilliance and undoubtedly want to read more." -- Dr. Gail Crowther, author of Three-Martini Afternoons at The Ritz: The Rebellion of Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton.

"Breaking Down Sylvia Plath does for young fans of Plath what Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You has done for young people looking for a complex explanation of another distinctly American phenomenon. It's the kind of book I would have read and reread in junior high, grateful for a sympathetic depiction of someone who was already one of my heroes. Grisafi's savvy selection of Plath's poems gives us a rich context for a woman whose work has too-often been pathologized and misread, two trends Grisafi not only avoids, but reevaluates in whip-smart prose. I was amazed at the ground she covered in barely 100 pages. I loved this book." -- Emily Van Duyne