#sylvia plath calendar

The “Sylvia Plath Calendar” - 62 years ago today:

Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes’ daughter, Frieda Rebecca Hughes was born on 1 April 1960 at 5:45 a.m. at 3 Chalcot Square, near Primrose Hill, North London, UK

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“Finally, on the night of March 31 [1960], after she and Ted had taken a walk along Primrose Hill and Regent’s Park that had tired her enough so she fell asleep immediately, Sylvia awoke to labor pains. Then everything happened quickly. By two o’clock when Ted called the midwife, Sylvia’s contractions were violent. By five, she was fully dilated. By five-thirty, when the nurse called the doctor, Sylvia believed the baby would come any minute. And it did—at five-forty-five. A girl, she weighed seven pounds and four ounces and measured twenty-one inches in length. Sylvia called her Frieda Rebecca, and the source of the name was clear. It was Otto’s [Sylvia’s father] sister Frieda, Sylvia’s aunt whom she had described as “resembl[ing] daddy—the same … blue eyes and shape of face.”

During labor and the actual birth, Ted remained at Sylvia’s side; he often held her hand and rubbed her back. As he had hypnotized her over the past few weeks, Ted had offered a posthypnotic suggestion that she have a quick and painless delivery. Though by no means painless, it was—at four and a half hours—relative quick.”

In a letter, Plath stated that “[t]he whole experience of birth and baby seem[s] much deeper, much closer to the bone, than love and marriage.”

–Excerpt from Rough Magic: A Biography of Sylvia Plath by Paul Alexander, 1991

Picture: Sylvia Plath with Ted Hughes and their daughter Frieda at Knole, UK in May 1960

Today marks the 59th anniversary of Sylvia Plath’s death! RIP!

27 October 1932 Jamaica Plain, Boston, Massachusetts, USA -
11 February 1963, Primrose Hill, London, England, United Kingdom

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“I can’t deceive myself out of the bare stark realization that no matter how enthusiastic you are, no matter how sure that character is fate, nothing is real, past or future, when you are alone in your room with the clock ticking loudly into the false cheerful brilliance of the electric light. And if you have no past or future which, after all, is all that the present is made of, why then you may as well dispose of the empty shell of present and commit suicide. But the cold reasoning mass of gray entrail in my cranium which parrots “I think, therefore I am,” whispers that there is always the turning, the upgrade, the new slant. And so I wait.”

-–The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath, diary entry no. 36, 1950

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59 years ago today:

Sylvia Plath commited suicide on Monday, 11 February 1963 at approximately 4:30 a.m. in her appartment at 23 Fitzroy Road, near Primrose Hill, London, where she moved in with her two children in December 1962 after separating from Ted Hughes; a house William Butler Yeats used to live in from 1867 till 1873.

She was 30 years, 3 months, 2 weeks and 1 day old. Her death certificate states that the cause of her death was “Carbon Monoxide Poisoning (domestic gas) whilst suffering from depression. Did kill herself”.

She left some bread and milk in her children’s (Frieda, almost 3 and Nicholas, 1 year old) room, opened their window and sealed their door off with tape to prevent the gas from entering. She also sealed the kitchen door with wet towels.Sylvia Plath’s dead body was discovered less than five hours later. Her children were unharmed.

Jillian Becker wrote in her memoir Giving Up: The Last Days of Sylvia Plaththat “According to Mr. Goodchild, a police officer attached to the coroner’s office … [Plath] had thrust her head far into the gas oven… [and] had really meant to die.”Sylvia Plath is buried in Heptonstall’s parish churchyard of St Thomas the Apostle, the new St Thomas á Becket’s churchyard; near Ted Hughes’ birthplace Mytholmroyd in  West Yorkshire, England.

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Photo info: Studio portrait of Sylvia Plath holding with a glass ball, 1945-55

Photo source: Peter K. Steiberg’s Twitter @sylviaplathinfo

The “Sylvia Plath Calendar” - 90 years ago today: Otto Emil Plath married Aurelia Frances Schober on Monday, 4 January 1932 at the Ormsby County courthouse in a civil ceremony in Carson City, Nevada. From ‘Rough Magic: A Biography of Sylvia Plath’ (1991) by Paul Alexander: “Drawn closer together by the letters they had exchanged that summer, Otto and Aurelia began dating when Aurelia returned to Boston in September to assume the Brookline High School faculty post she had been offered. Almost immediately, weekend hiking trips, afternoon strolls through the Arnold Arboretum, and nights at the theatre launched the couple into a serious romance. Before long, they openly discussed marriage. Finally, just after Christmas 1931, they left Boston by car and, chaperoned by Aurelia’s mother, drove cross-country to Carson City, Nevada, where on Monday, January 4, 1932, Otto filed for and received a divorce from Lydia Bartz, the woman he had not seen in over a decade. Later that same day, Otto Plath and Aurelia Schober, each of whom swore in writing to be a current resident of Reno, Nevada, were married in a civil ceremony in Carson City, at Ormsby County’s courthouse. Following a honeymoon in Nevada, the Plaths, still accompanied by Aurelia’s mother, drove back to Boston to begin their married life. Aurelia moved into Otto’s apartment, a six-room first-floor rental in a house at 24 Prince Street in Jamaica Plain. Before she could resume her teaching job at Brookline High, Otto insisted that she resign, which she did even though she was a successful teacher and probable future chairman of the German Department. Otto wanted Aurelia to become a full-time housewife, and he wished to start a family as soon as possible. In fact, they would become parents much sooner than even Otto had hoped: only weeks into the marriage Aurelia became pregnant (with Sylvia).” . If you want to learn more about Otto’s and Aurelia’s family histories, I can definitely recommend Alexander’s ‘Rough Magic’, as it provides many details. . . Photo: Sylvia Plath (9 months old) with her parents in July 1933 at the Arnold Arboretum, Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts (Mortimer Rare Book Room, Smith College, Northampton, MA, USA) #sylviaplath #onthisday https://www.instagram.com/p/CYUmECVL2tD/?utm_medium=tumblr