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Sylvia Plath and her work from the perspective of psychobiography
Zachová, Jana ; Kučera, Miloš (advisor) ; Viktorová, Ida (referee)
The goal of my bachelor's thesis is to analyse the relationship between Sylvia Plath's biography and her work, focusing on the so-called confidence poems, especially in the question of her relationship with her father, using the principles of psychobiography. The first part of the thesis focuses on the concepts of psychobiography as conceived by William T. Schultz and the psychology of artistic literature. The thesis also includes a brief biography of Sylvia Plath, an introduction of confessional poetry, and a short survey of the author's work. The primary sources I work with in this thesis are Plath's artwork and her journals. In this thesis I also present three different studies that have previously focused on Sylvia Plath's work and life. For the purpose of this thesis, I have chosen the poem Daddy, one of Sylvia Plath's most famous poems, which I discuss and analyse in detail in the thesis. I will interpret the findings psychologically, primarily using a psychoanalytic perspective. Finally, I compare my findings with the biography of the subject under study. KEYWORDS psychobiography; psychoanalysis; suicide; Sylvia Plath; relationship with father; poetry
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Coming-of-Age in American Fiction
ŠOJDELOVÁ, Jana
The Master's Thesis deals with the theme of coming-of-age in American literature. The aim of the theoretical part is to provide theoretical framework and the subsequent examination of common narrative strategies and themes characteristic of this specific genre. We will focus more closely on the three key themes of identity, sexuality and death. In the practical part of this thesis these main themes and their use will be examined in selected novels of American literature; Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar and Jeffrey Eugenides The Virgin Suicides.
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Unbinding the Female Prometheus: L'Écriture féminine in Selected Poetry of Sylvia Plath
Piňosová, Michaela ; Veselá, Pavla (advisor) ; Ulmanová, Hana (referee)
The definition of one's femininity and its reflection in poetic language are two recurring issues examined by contemporary feminist critics. In their works, they consistently challenge the opinion that true poetry is essentially masculine, and that a woman poet is inevitably an inferior poet. Sylvia Plath, whose poetry represents the central subject of this thesis, could hardly be considered an inferior poet. Despite her early death, Plath's poetry continues to be immensely influential, and it tends to be adopted as an example by feminist critics who attempt to define the branch American women's poetry, reaching back to poets such as Anne Bradstreet and Emily Dickinson. From their point of view, Plath's works illustrate the fact that women's poetry has not only its history, but also its language. One may thus discover interesting parallels between the French-based concept of l'écriture féminine and Plath's poetic language. For the representatives of the l'écriture féminine movement Hélène Cixous, Luce Irigaray and Julia Kristeva, Western discourse is phallogocentric, i.e. based on the centrality of the phallus as a primary signifier. To disrupt the traditional (masculine) discourse, they neither propose a total split between the "male" and the "female" signifiers nor do they encourage women to...
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The poetic form of Sylvia Plath's early poems
Arutyunyan, Veronika ; Quinn, Justin (advisor) ; Armand, Louis (referee)
This thesis is concerned with an analysis of selected early poetry of Sylvia Plath on the basis of the apprentice period, in which she often relied on traditional verse forms and was inspired by poetic influences. Plath's poetry is marked by a progress from experimental phase to mature, powerful poetry of controlled rhythm. In the introductory chapter, we are concerned with an elucidation of the major verse forms Plath employed repeatedly exemplified by several poems Plath wrote in her early twenties including the poems of The Colossus. The later poems discussed display an effort for a freer structure and flexibility. The second chapter focuses on the analysis of various poetic influences. Plath was immensely inspired by both her predecessors and contemporaries, which can be seen in her employment of poetic devices, diction and even themes. Plath's apparent meticulous practice and learning of the diverse traditional verse forms - for example the alliterative meter of Old English poetry - shall be examined in order to demonstrate the importance of this practice which later led to the poetry of high technical achievement. The third chapter provides a survey on elegy and its major function in the course of development and analysis of Plath's early elegies with reference to Peter Sacks' study The...
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