“After Plath’s 1963 suicide many critics examined the writer’s different facets, contrasting her put-together, polite, and dexterous self with her raging, explosively-creative inner self” (“Sylvia”, Poems). Plath’s career in writing is explained in all of her poems from her life experiences. She was a very successful writer and attended great colleges. The collection of poems and novel she had written throughout her life were very personal. She wrote one of her most interesting poems, “Mirror”, in 1961; two years before her death. Sylvia Plath expresses her intense thoughts and feelings in her famous poem, “Mirror”.
1. Personal Life Sylvia Plath lived a very unhappy, short life. She was born on October 30th, 1932 in Boston Massachusetts (Koelsch, …show more content…
In “Mirror” she describes the mirror of having a personified character. There are paralleling death images among her literary works, including her novel (“Sylvia”, Biography). This quote, “The mirror captures the desperation of a young woman trying to unsuccessfully to discern in her own slippery reflection the stable image of a valued, integrated person” describes the poem’s meaning and message (“Sylvia”, Biography). The mirror is explained as only truthful, not harsh. This poem starts out by saying the mirror as “silver and exact” which means that it takes in what it sees and reflects back an image without any judgement or correction (“Sylvia”, Poems). “In this poem, a mirror describes its existence and its owner, who grows older as mirror watches” (“Sylvia”, Poems). It identifies loss of beauty by aging. In her poem, the mirror sees everything for what it is referred to as. That’s what she means when she says, “four-cornered eye of a god” (“Sylvia”, Poems). The mirror looks and stares across a room of emptiness and focuses on the pink speckled wall in the poem (“Sylvia”, Poems). The wall becomes part of the mirror’s heart from not moving its place. People who stand in front of the mirror are interrupting the image of the wall and the darkness referred to is night. The woman revisits the mirror every morning that she is turning into an old woman, growing …show more content…
She explains all of the emotions of the mirror as her own feelings. The tone of the poem is described as dismal and despair. A statement made in her poem, “Faces and darkness separate us over and over”, express her true feelings of sadness. Literary devices such as similes, metaphors, and personification are used in this poem. A simile in this poem is described when she compares herself to a “terrible fish” (Koelsch, Nelson, and Berliner 1002). Metaphors in the poem include “I am silver and exact” and “Now I am a lake” (Koelsch, Nelson, and Berliner 1002). The mirror is directly showing personification as the main subject of her poem in the bedroom of a woman. These literary devices are used to add detail and description. Symbolism also plays a role in Plath’s poem. The mirror symbolizes water of the lake. In this article, it is explained, “Only the mirror existing here as the lake gives her a faithful representation of herself” (“Sylvia”, Poems). It says a woman who is looking into it is trying to recognize and understand who she is by looking into her own reflection of the lake (“Sylvia”, Poems). In the beginning of the poem it is stated that the mirror is “unmisted” and “swallows everything” (Koelsch, Nelson, and Berliner 1002). In the end the girl is drowning and a fish is rising. The water is both described as a reflecting surface and a lake itself. The young girl is drowning and old woman is rising. The water is most
1. Personal Life Sylvia Plath lived a very unhappy, short life. She was born on October 30th, 1932 in Boston Massachusetts (Koelsch, …show more content…
In “Mirror” she describes the mirror of having a personified character. There are paralleling death images among her literary works, including her novel (“Sylvia”, Biography). This quote, “The mirror captures the desperation of a young woman trying to unsuccessfully to discern in her own slippery reflection the stable image of a valued, integrated person” describes the poem’s meaning and message (“Sylvia”, Biography). The mirror is explained as only truthful, not harsh. This poem starts out by saying the mirror as “silver and exact” which means that it takes in what it sees and reflects back an image without any judgement or correction (“Sylvia”, Poems). “In this poem, a mirror describes its existence and its owner, who grows older as mirror watches” (“Sylvia”, Poems). It identifies loss of beauty by aging. In her poem, the mirror sees everything for what it is referred to as. That’s what she means when she says, “four-cornered eye of a god” (“Sylvia”, Poems). The mirror looks and stares across a room of emptiness and focuses on the pink speckled wall in the poem (“Sylvia”, Poems). The wall becomes part of the mirror’s heart from not moving its place. People who stand in front of the mirror are interrupting the image of the wall and the darkness referred to is night. The woman revisits the mirror every morning that she is turning into an old woman, growing …show more content…
She explains all of the emotions of the mirror as her own feelings. The tone of the poem is described as dismal and despair. A statement made in her poem, “Faces and darkness separate us over and over”, express her true feelings of sadness. Literary devices such as similes, metaphors, and personification are used in this poem. A simile in this poem is described when she compares herself to a “terrible fish” (Koelsch, Nelson, and Berliner 1002). Metaphors in the poem include “I am silver and exact” and “Now I am a lake” (Koelsch, Nelson, and Berliner 1002). The mirror is directly showing personification as the main subject of her poem in the bedroom of a woman. These literary devices are used to add detail and description. Symbolism also plays a role in Plath’s poem. The mirror symbolizes water of the lake. In this article, it is explained, “Only the mirror existing here as the lake gives her a faithful representation of herself” (“Sylvia”, Poems). It says a woman who is looking into it is trying to recognize and understand who she is by looking into her own reflection of the lake (“Sylvia”, Poems). In the beginning of the poem it is stated that the mirror is “unmisted” and “swallows everything” (Koelsch, Nelson, and Berliner 1002). In the end the girl is drowning and a fish is rising. The water is both described as a reflecting surface and a lake itself. The young girl is drowning and old woman is rising. The water is most