Sylvia Plath Fact File

● Sylvia Plath was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on October 27, 1932● Plath met and married British poet Ted Hughes, although two years later they

split. The depressive Plath committed suicide in 1963● Plath published her first poem ‘Poem’ in the Boston Herald in 1941 at just 9 years

old● At 12, her IQ was recorded at around 160, a certified genius● In 1944 at only 12, Plath had more work published work in her local newspaper

The Townsman. On average she was writing a poem a day at school.● In 1947, Plath began what would be a 5 year pen pal relationship with a German teenager, Hans-Joachim

Neupert. Though growing up during WWII, she was eager to learn and not be restricted by her sheltered, suburban childhood.

● During her teens, Plath was a passionate pacifist - against the Korean War as seen in her 1950’s open letter to Neupert she calls the atomic bomb a sin

● Worked through Smith College even after being accepted to Wellesley for free● Worked on a farm doing, manual labor. This influenced a later poem ‘Bitter Strawberries’● Her mother encouraged her to keep a journal of her daily life, something which would influence her later

writing and poetry● In 1982, Plath became the first person to win a posthumous Pulitzer Prize (The Pulitzer Prize is an award

for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature, and musical composition in the United States.)

● Plath was a gifted and troubled poet, known for the confessional style of her work. ● Her interest in writing emerged at an early age, and she started out by keeping a journal. After publishing

a number of works, Plath won a scholarship to Smith College in 1950.● As a student, Sylvia Plath spent time in New York City during the summer of 1953 working for

Mademoiselle magazine as a guest editor. Soon after, Plath tried to kill herself by taking sleeping pills. She eventually recovered, having received treatment during a stay in a mental health facility. Plath returned to Smith and finished her degree in 1955.

● A Fulbright Fellowship (a program of highly competitive, merit-based grants for international educational exchange for students, scholars etc) brought Plath to Cambridge University. While studying at the university's Newnham College, she met the poet Ted Hughes. The two married in 1956 and had a stormy relationship.

● In 1957, Plath spent time in Massachusetts to study with poet Robert Lowell and met fellow poet and student Ann Sexton. She also taught English at Smith College around that same time.

● Plath returned to England in 1959.● Plath had her first collection of poetry, The Colossus, published in England in 1960. That same year, she

gave birth to her first child, a daughter named Freida. Two years later, Plath and Hughes welcomed a second child, a son named Nicholas. Unfortunately, the couple's marriage was falling apart.

● After Hughes left her for another woman in 1962, Sylvia Plath fell into a deep depression. ● Struggling with her mental illness, she wrote The Bell Jar (1963), her only novel, which was based on her

life and deals with one young woman's mental breakdown.● She also created the poems that would make up the collection Ariel (1965), which was released after her

death. ● Sylvia Plath committed suicide on February 11, 1963 by gassing herself in an oven.

● Ted Hughes became her literary executor after her death. While there has been some speculation about how he handled her papers and her image, he did edit what is considered by many to her greatest work, Ariel.