Sylvia Plath's Clinical Depression

“Perhaps when we find ourselves wanting everything, it is because we are dangerously close to wanting nothing“(Plath). These are the words of the young writer Sylvia Plath. Plath was a sensitive, intelligent young girl compelled towards perfection at everything she attempted. She was a model daughter and student, earning straight A’s and always winning the best prizes. She had an impressive list of publications ranging from famous novel The Bell Jar to the world-renowned poem “Daddy.” However, you have to dig much deeper than the surface to discover who Sylvia Plath truly was. She was not solely a consummate human, but a girl struggling with extensive personal discontinuities. Sylvia Plath was a clinically depressed woman who struggled with suppression by society’s standards, and suffered from PTSD as a result of her father’s death. …show more content…
Depression differs in seriousness from “mild, temporary sadness to severe persistent depression”(Hall-Flavin). Clinical depression is the more severe form. It is not the sadness one feels after the loss of a loved one, but a serious medical condition that affects the everyday lives of those diagnosed. Plath’s depression consumes her life; she describes it as “a dark thing that sleeps in [her]; all day [she] feels its feathery turnings, its malignity”(Plath). It is not a temporary feeling of anguish for her, but a constant burden that is eating her from the inside