Hello and welcome to the Discourse. ‘Metaphors’ is a short poem by Sylvia Plath published in her poetry collection The Colossus and Other Poems first published by Heinemann, in 1960. Plath is credited with advancing the genre of confessional poetry and is best known for two of her published collections, The Colossus and Other Poems and Ariel, and The Bell Jar, a semi-autobiographical novel published shortly before her death. The Colossus and Other Poems is the only volume of poetry by Plath that was published before her death in 1963. In 1981, all her previously unpublished poems were published under the title ‘The Collected Poems’ for which she won a posthumous Pulitzer Prize in 1982.
Plath was clinically depressed for most of her adult life and was treated multiple times with electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). She committed suicide in 1963. She was a confirmed patient of Bipolar Disorder and that appears in her works which are often marked with distinct ambiguity.
Sylvia Plath wrote Metaphors in 1959. Abortion was totally illegal in the US until 1973. The FDA didn’t approve the first oral contraceptive for women until 1960. There were no controlling measures for women to avoid pregnancy in that period. Sylvia Plath expresses the lack of control in this poem. The speaker is a pregnant woman who is going through significant physical changes due to her pregnancy. She expresses her deep anxiety about motherhood and her fears of losing her own body through a series of metaphors in this poem. It should be noted that women often suffer mood swings during pregnancy and Sylvia Plath was a patient of Bipolar Disorder. The metaphors illustrate the often disorienting nature of pregnancy, which seems to make a "house" or a "stage" out of the speaker's body and threatens to render the speaker herself insignificant.
Structure of Metaphors:
The poem consists of a single nine-line stanza and each line consists of nine syllables, which suggests a planned and intentional structure because pregnancy is also nine months long. The poem is written in Free Verse with no specific rhyme scheme or metrical order. However, Plath predominantly used iambs in the poem. The speaker of the poem is a first-time pregnant woman. Plath was pregnant with her first child, Frieda, at the time of the poem's composition. Though most critics concur that Plath's healthiest relationships were with her two children, the poem suggests a deep ambivalence about motherhood. The basic conflict in the poem is that of duty vs. individuality. The narrator feels that by subsuming herself into the duty of motherhood her own individuality is being stifled.
The poet used metaphors, personification, allusion, asyndeton, imagery, consonance, assonance, alliteration, and parallelism in the poem.
Summary of Metaphors:
Lines 1-9
“I'm a riddle in nine syllables,
An elephant, a ponderous house,
A melon strolling on two tendrils.
O red fruit, ivory, fine timbers!
This loaf's big with its yeasty rising.
Money's new-minted in this fat purse.
I'm a means, a stage, a cow in calf.
I've eaten a bag of green apples,
Boarded the train there's no getting off.”
The poem begins with the first metaphor and the speaker playfully declares that she is a riddle in nine syllables. The tone appears playful as the speaker encourages the readers to solve the puzzle and guess the correct answer by the end of the ninth line. Obviously, the speaker will keep offering clues throughout the poem and the first clue is that the poem has nine lines, the first line contains nine syllables, and human pregnancy is also nine months.
In the second line, the speaker offers two more metaphors. The first one is ‘elephant’. Elephants are special animals showcasing a strong bond between mothers and newborns. They live in herds of mothers and children, led by an older matron. Male elephants are driven away at adulthood and live a largely solitary existence, save for mating. The speaker is describing the changes that are visible as her pregnancy grows. The other metaphor in the same line directly refers to her physical form. Her womb is bulging, as ‘a ponderous house’ for the new inmate. While both metaphors suggest that her size has grown, the second metaphor also indicates that her body is no longer her own, the other one shares it.
In the third line, the speaker describes her belly as a melon and suggests the unproportionate growth of her body. While her belly appears like a melon, her legs haven't changed, they are still slim, and vine-like (two tendrils), a comical image. The speaker offers imagery of her strolling around her room on her two thin legs with a swollen huge belly.
In the fourth line, the speaker looks down at herself and sees a ‘red fruit’, the watermelon she just expressed, and ‘ivory,’ her beautiful white skin. ‘Ivory’ is related to the elephant she mentioned in line 2. It should be noted that one can attain ivory only when the elephant is dead. Her own individual self is dying, which she used to be before her pregnancy, and she is becoming something else, a mother while creating a new one. The third metaphor in this line is ‘fine timbers,’ relating to her thin legs, carrying, guarding, and protecting the womb. The poet ends the line with an exclamatory mark as she is in disbelief while observing the change she is going through.
In the fifth line, the speaker explains her pregnancy with another close metaphor. She compares herself to a loaf of bread that is bulging because ‘yeast is rising.’ Yeast is a living thing that grows inside the loaf while eating it. In this line, the speaker suggests that not only her, but the the child in her womb is also changing.
In the sixth line, the speaker mentions herself as a ‘fat purse’ in which new money is being minted and is taking shape. She describes her child as money, or currency of life, something precious that needs to be protected. The purse is fat or full, there is sufficient wealth to be guarded. However, the purse never uses the money. It is owned by someone else. The speaker reflects on her relationship with her husband (Ted Hughes) here, suggesting she has been used.
In the seventh line, the speaker says she is a ‘means’, and a "stage" for another. Everything happening to her is for someone else, not for herself. She indicates how her individuality is being taken away. She expresses no joy with her increasing size. Instead, she is too well aware of how she has lost control of her body. The line suggests that pregnancy was not her idea, as if she was forced to go through it. Another metaphor being used is ‘cow in calf.’ The speaker compares herself with another animal, a huge cow, often used for milk and meat. The calves are often used to milk the cows and then are sold.
In line eight, the speaker says that she feels her belly is full of unripe fruits, 'green apples'. It is common for pregnant women to experience food aversions or loss of appetite. Hormonal changes cause a heightened sense of smell and nausea. Often they feel their belly is already full and any strong smell may cause vomiting. “A bag of green apples” is a metaphor for her unborn child. As the child is still developing in her womb, she mentions it as unripe fruit. The poet also alludes to the story of Genesis in which Eve ate a fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and it caused the fall. The speaker feels she has eaten a bag full of green apples.
In the last line (ninth), in fact, in the last three lines, the speaker suggests that it might be the case that she was unwilling to get pregnant, but anyhow, she is pregnant now and determined to take care of it. In the last line, she compares pregnancy to an unstoppable train she has boarded. She is bound for an unknown destination and unable to stop. She and her baby are heading off into the future, the wheels are turning and both will have to wait until the train reaches the terminus.
So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the history of American English literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards!
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