“Spider”: Caught in Willie’s Winning Web
Ted Hughes positioned “Spider” as a 1956 poem, but the evidence suggests it may have been written in 1958. In the poem, Plath references the African folklore tale of Anansi, the trickster spider. Hughes noted in The Collected Poems that by the end of the year 1956 she had become greatly interested in African folklore, […]
“Street Song”: Double Jeopardy
Pictured: Emmett Till in the 1956 newspaper headlines Judging from poems such as “Street Song,” Plath seemed to view herself as very blessed, coming from madness intact and in love, but never forgetting her past. This is the most obvious interpretation of “Street Song.” A closer look at the poem, written on October 4, 1956, […]