Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Daddy
Sylvia Plath's "Daddy" is written directly toward her father. In order to properly understand this piece, though, it's important to first gain some insights into its background. When Plath was very young her father died, an occurrence that many attribute to her problematic life and suicidal tendencies. In indication of this, Plath describes her father as a Nazi in this poem and herself like one of the Jews that the Nazis persecuted. In describing her father as a Nazi, she uses many soft allusions to the idea. For example, in the poem Plath lightly alludes to her father as Hitler by referencing his "neat mustache" and also his "Aryan eye, bright blue". Also, Plath describes herself by saying, "I began to talk like a Jew. I think I may well be a Jew". In doing this, Plath is paralleling her life story to that of the Jews in the Holocaust. In this sense, Plath is reaffirming the belief that her father's death during her childhood was a primary cause of her suicidal tendencies later in life.
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I would like to grow this point even further and question whether the relationship between the father and daughter was one of direct influence or one of indirect influence. Plath's father died when she was a child and therefore his action were not what negatively affected his life but rather his lack of actions. I see a discrepancy in Plath's metaphor mainly because the Nazi's and Hitler directly attacked the Jews during WWII, however Plath was merely neglected. This difference leads to a variety of questions on Plath's purpose in constructing such a comment. Was it for mere shock-value, or was she actually attempting to make a solid comparison?
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