by Linda Ann Nickerson

Created on: July 20, 2008

BRIGHT RED BLOOMS OF AFFLICTION

American poetess Sylvia Plath is perhaps best known for The Bell Jar, a perennial must-read for high school English classes. Plath's poetry is poignantly confessional, often focusing on dark psychological themes. Biographers agree, across the board, that Plath was probably schizophrenic or bipolar.

"Tulips" is no exception. Most literary analysts contend that Plath wrote this poem about her miscarriage, which she experienced in February 1961. Others maintain that she penned the poem while hospitalized after attempting suicide.

Almost exactly two years after her miscarriage, as a mother with a toddler, Plath committed suicide by ingesting an overdose of sleeping pills and inhaling fumes from her gas oven.

Whether the poem arose from the loss of her unborn child or from an unsuccessful attempt to take her own life, "Tulips" certainly explores the poet's own deep, emotional turbulence and personal stress.

Following is a brief analysis of Plath's poem, "Tulips."

POETIC FORMAT:

"Tulips" includes nine stanzas, with seven unrhymed lines in each one. The meter and rhythm varies in each verse, as Plath's writing displays the uneven sensations and psychological instability with which she certainly struggled.

LITERARY ANALYSIS

Bright red tulips are the primary image in the poem. These striking, but somewhat fragile, flowers, which emerge at the end of winter each year, seem to offer stark contrast to the bleak, dark frigid days.

As Plath remains confined to a hospital bed, attempting to recuperate, she meditates upon the blood-red blooms. By the sixth stanza, it becomes clear that a well-wisher has brought the blossoms to Plath's hospital room.

Tulips grow tall and bold in the early months of the year, often before warm weather arrives. A harsh wind may tear the petals away, leaving bare stems standing. Perhaps this is how Plath feels, after the life has been stripped from her body, either by miscarriage or the personal struggles leading to her a suicide attempt.

Relinquishing her clothing, her personal history and her privacy to the hospital staff ("I have given my name and my day-clothes up to the nurses and my history to the anesthetist and my body to surgeons."), the patient attempts to remain passive for her recovery.

Plath uses similes and metaphors to describe the scene. She says her head is propped on the pillows "like an eye between two white lids." The nurses are portrayed as seagulls, flitting around her bed. She likens her own body to a

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