Among our earliest reading this semester, I was particularly
drawn to Sylvia Plath’s poem “Metaphors.” What attracted me to the piece, which
is about pregnancy, was its ambivalence toward the event. To me, Plath was courageous
and honest about her feelings. Ordinarily, women are supposed to feel happy and
joyous about carrying a child. But Plath, noting that she had lost her identity
as a woman and an artist, asserts: “I’m a means, a stage, a cow in calf” (line 7). Plath’s
creativity is no longer recognized by society, and she laments her loss in
verse. In other words, the writer has been reduced to a seed carrying vessel,
like a melon. She is dehumanized, of secondary importance to the embryo growing
inside her, objectified into a “fat purse”(6). Plath recognized that pregnancy
had permanently altered the trajectory of her life. I note, too, that she
committed suicide. One senses resentment about the thing growing inside her. “Metaphors”
is a short but powerful poem that is pregnant with meaning (pun intentional).
LOLOL! I love this Charles! You are always so insightful and I agree wholeheartedly. How sad that a woman who so didn't want to be a wife and mom felt forced to fulfill both rolls and ultimately ended her life because of them.
ReplyDeleteIt really is quite ironic, like you and Leah have both pointed out, that a woman, whose role as a woman is to want to be a mother and wife, wants to be neither. I think it also shows us exactly how life is not always as simple as it should be, and it really never goes as planned.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Plath was courageous to write this poem, because, as you said, women were supposed to want to have children. Her poem is powerful.
ReplyDeleteAs everyone has noted, I do agree that Plath seems to resent motherhood. I wonder if, when she was writing "Metaphors," she thought about her children reading the poem.
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