LADY LAZARUS - SYLVIA PLATH
LADY LAZARUS
-
SYLVIA PLATH
Summary
‘Lady Lazarus’ by Sylvia Plath is an exceptional piece describing a speaker who bears the burden of failed suicidal trials
and discovers her new self at the last attempt.
The poem begins
directly with the main theme of this piece that is suicidal thoughts and death.
According to the speaker, she has tried to kill herself once every ten years.
The first time, when she was only ten, was not an attempt at all. It was just
an accident. But, the second time she was determined to accomplish her goal of
self-destruction. However, that attempt also bore no fruit.
It gave rise to bitter emotions in her heart concerning those who were around. She reveals her biggest enemy between her and the goal, is the doctor who saved her. So, before the last attempt, she bluntly says no matter what happens in this attempt. If she gets saved, she will rise like a phoenix and devour men like air.
Meaning
Sylvia Plath titles the poem ‘Lady Lazarus’ to let her readers know that there will be references to death. Lazarus, the well-known bible character who was brought back to life after three days in the tomb, will set the tone for the rest of Plath’s poem. Since Lazarus was brought to life again, this poem will be one of victory over death, just like the biblical story. However, Plath intends to identify with the Lazarus decaying in the tomb rather than the Lazarus who had been brought back to life.
Structure and Form
Plath’s ‘Lady
Lazarus’ is a free verse lyric. The poetic persona describes
her experiences from a subject perspective. That’s why
it is a lyric poem. Apart from that, it is a confessional poem.
Plath’s style of
confessionalism deals with the subjects of suicide, mental trauma, and
individual experience. Events like the Holocaust and its impact are described
in this poem.
The poem is composed of tercets or stanzas containing three lines. There is not any specific rhyme scheme. However, in some instances, readers can find some rhyming or slant rhymes. For example, the first two lines rhyme together. Likewise, the last two lines form a rhyming couplet. Plath composed this poem in an alternative iambic-trochaic rhyme
Literary Devices
The title of the
poem ‘Lady Lazarus’ is an allusion to the
biblical character, “Lazarus of Bethany”. Through the title, the poet
implicitly compares the character with herself, not in a subjective manner but
from the perspective of rebirth and decomposition. That’s why it’s also a metaphor.
Another important
device of this piece is enjambment. This device
is used throughout the piece. For example, the last line of the second stanza
is enjambed with the first line of the next stanza. Plath uses this poetic
device for maintaining the flow.
Some other literary
devices used in this poem are simile, irony and paradox. Readers can
find a simile in “Bright as a Nazi lampshade”. The rhetorical questions,
“Do I terrify?” contains irony as well. Apart from that, the last two lines are
paradoxical in sense.
Plath also uses
palilogy, alliteration, and anaphora. For example,
“Soon, soon the flesh” contains a palilogy. “Face a featureless” has an
alliteration of the “f” sound. In the sixteenth stanza, readers can find
anaphora.
Detailed
Analysis
Lines 1–3
I have
done it again.
One
year in every ten
I manage it-
The first stanza
of ‘Lady Lazarus’ cannot be properly understood until the
entire poem has been read. At first glance, this doesn’t have much meaning, but
after reading the entirety of ‘Lady Lazarus,’ readers can
gather that Plath is referring to suicide. She admits right off the bat that
she has tried to die once every decade of her life.
Plath then begins to
explain to readers why she has tried to die so many times. She uses vivid imagery to compare
her own suffering to that of the Jewish people. In other Sylvia Plath
poems, readers can find such haunting and dark imagery.
Lines 4–9
A sort
of walking miracle, my skin
(…)
Jew linen.
In the second stanza,
she compares her skin to a “Nazi lampshade”. This is significant because of the
idea that the Nazi people used the skin of the Jews to make lampshades. Plath
uses this horrifying metaphor to compare her own suffering to those in Nazi
concentration camps.
Plath’s speaker
conveys the heaviness of her pain by comparing her right foot to a
“paperweight”. This metaphor helps the reader to understand that Plath’s pain
was so real that it felt like a physical weight. The “paperweight” conveys the
nature of her emotional pain.
The imagery of a
featureless face reveals that she doesn’t feel any identity. Such an expression
is set apart for any specific or important purpose. She feels like a face lost
in the crowd, one that no one would remember.
Furthermore, she
describes her face as a “fine Jew linen”. Jew linens were used to wrap the body
of Lazarus before they laid him in the tomb. Those were also used to wrap
Jesus’ body before he was laid in the tomb.
Plath’s reference to
the “fine Jew linen” reaffirms that she already feels dead. Or rather, she
feels nothing just as the dead feel nothing and this inability to feel is
precisely what causes her to suffer. Plath continues to use imagery of death to
reveal her deepest feelings in the following stanzas.
Lines 10–15
Peel off the napkin
(…)
Will
vanish in a day.
When she asks the reader to “peel off the napkin” she
is challenging the audience to look
at her for who she really is. She doesn’t believe that anyone would want to
really know her, to peer into her soul, and really know how she is.
She believes that if
people were to do that, they would be terrified. The reason she thinks this way
is because she is afraid that people will become aware that although she is
alive in flesh, her soul is dead. This is why she continues to use imagery of
death and decomposition to describe herself.
This is the point
in ‘Lady Lazarus’ at which the reader can become aware that
Plath identifies not with the risen Lazarus, but with the Lazarus who is dead
and has already begun the decomposition process. For this reason, she describes
herself as having a prominent nose cavity, eye pits, and teeth. These features
would be most prominent in a decaying body. Moreover, Plath
explains that the
sour breath, the putrid smell of death, will soon vanish.
Lines
16–21
Soon, soon the flesh
(…)
And like the cat I have nine times to die.
In the sixth stanza,
she continues to explain the effect of death. Plath uses this imagery to
explain the emptiness and numbness that tortured her soul. She uses the
description of physical decomposition to convey the way she feels that her soul
is decomposing.
Plath then
transitions from speaking of herself as an already dead woman to revealing that
she is actually alive. However, the tone of ‘Lady Lazarus’ reveals
that she is disappointed at being alive. It becomes obvious that she identifies
with death far more than with life. She thinks of herself as a rotting corpse,
not the “smiling woman” of only thirty that she sees when she looks in the
mirror. She reveals an obvious disappointment that she has not been able to die
when she compares herself to a cat, concluding that it will probably take many
more attempts to reach death.
Lines
22–27
This is Number Three.
(…)
Shoves
in to see
Plath then
reveals that each decade, she has come very close to death. When she says,
“this is number three” she reveals that she has tried to die a number of times.
Plath then focuses on herself and her own misery and begins to criticize the
people around her.
She calls them the
“peanut crunching crowd” suggesting that they are only in her life to scoff at
her and make a spectacle of her. This same view of people is conveyed when she
compares herself, yet again, to Lazarus in the following lines.
Lines
28–33
Them unwrap me hand and foot——
(…)
I may
be skin and bone,
This time, she doesn’t compare herself to Lazarus who
is dead in the tomb. She compares herself to the one who has risen and is
coming out of the tomb still wrapped in burial cloth. Only Plath’s tone is not
triumphant, but rather skeptical.
She calls her exit
from the tomb, “a big strip tease” revealing that when she came close to death
but was brought back to life, the people around her were there not to rejoice
with her or comfort her, but to be entertained by her. Her sarcastic tone
reveals her frustration with the spectators and her disappointment that she was
unable to stay dead.
At this point, she
realizes that she is alive, though she wishes she were still in the tomb. This
gives the reader the imagery of Plath looking at her hands, her knees, her
flesh, and realizing she is still alive, at least physically. She realizes that
she is just the same as she was before experiencing death.
Lines 34–39
Nevertheless, I am the same, identical
woman.
(…)
I rocked shut
This stanza explains that she is the same woman she
was before her near-death experience. Plath then begins to give the reader some
history on her experiences with death, explaining that the first time was an
accident, and she was only ten years old. After reading the lines, it becomes
clear that the first accidental near-death experience was traumatizing to Plath
but somehow left her wanting another taste of death.
She does not reveal
the age of her second encounter with her own death, which was her first suicide
attempt. However, since she says she has tried once every decade, we can assume
she was around 20 years old.
The thirteenth stanza
of ‘Lady Lazarus’ reveals that Plath came so close to death,
that she believed she had actually experienced death. She also “meant to last
it out” which reveals that she truly does not wish to live any longer.
Lines
40–42
As a seashell.
(…)
And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.
Plath identifies with death more than life or
anything in life. She says during her second encounter with death she kept herself
coffined like a seashell. The “seashell” is a symbolic reference to the body
which kept her soul caged. She somehow tried to break through the shell and
release her soul from her decaying self. At that time, those who found her had
called her out of that suffocating chamber. She imagines if she would have died
they would pick worms off her like “sticky pearls”. The reference to the
“seashell” was far better than this comparison Here, she
in exasperation compares the worms to “pearls”.
Lines
43–45
Dying
Is an art, like everything else.
I do it exceptionally well.
It is one of the most important stanzas of the poem ‘Lady Lazarus’. In this section, she explains her own interest and “talent” in this “art” of dying. As she has tried to die a number of times, she has become an artist in this artform. She performs it better than others who die only once and forever. Like an artist tries throughout her life to creating an everlasting masterpiece. Plath is trying to complete her magnum opus in this art form. In an inflated and confident tone, she says she does it exceptionally well. It makes clear that she has tried her best to die. But the circumstances were not favorable in each of her previous encounters with death
.Lines 46–51
I do it so it feels like hell.
(…)
It’s the theatrical
Each line of this stanza begins with the word “I”.
The sound scheme of this line seems as if the speaker is making her point
strongly and confidently. This scheme is followed in the next stanza too.
In the first few
lines, she claims she is always working with the art of dying. It means that
the thoughts of dying are always rampaging in her head. According to her, it
turns her mind into hell. So she can claim that the concept of hell is real. It
exists, not in an imaginary place but in her mind.
When she claims that
death is her “call”, it reveals that she feels no purpose in life other than to
die. She reveals that her only relief from suffering, emptiness, and numbness
was what she experienced in her encounters with her own death. But every time
she gets a taste of death, she ends up surviving, only to resume her former
suffering.
The next stanza
reveals her thoughts about her return to her life of suffering. She reveals
that she thinks it should be easy enough to end her life in an isolated cell
and stay put. The last line of this stanza is enjambed with the following
stanza.
Lines
52–57
Comeback in broad day
(…)
There is a charge
She reveals that the hard part is coming back and
facing the crowd. It seems to her as a theatrical process. That is rather
performed than felt. When she returns to her normal life again, everything
seems theatrical to her. It seems as if she already knows what is going to
happen after her comeback. If she is unsuccessful in her attempt, she has to
return to the same place. The same, brute faces will be starting at her in
disdain and amusedly shout at her.
She feels she is
being put on stage when people call her life “a miracle”. The sound of these
two words just knocks her mind out. That’s why Plath takes on a tone of sarcasm
when she suggests that there should be a charge for looking at her or touching
her.
Lines 58–63
For the eyeing of my scars, there is a charge
(…)
Or a bit of blood
She feels so agitated that she welcomes them to look
at her wounds and how she is feeling. But, they have to pay a charge for it. In
this way, she compares herself to an object that is displayed as an
example. As she masters the art of dying, people may gather around her and
study the artist in her. They can find her scars. To hear the beating of her
heart, there is a charge too. This line makes it clear that she is really
alive, only physically. Her kind has already died a thousand times.
In the following
section, Plath clarifies that there is a “very large charge” to hear a word
from her or for touch. The last line is shocking as her she talks about
“blood”. It is a symbol of her
anger. If they want to see it they have to bear a significant “charge”. In this
way, she depicts her body as a material that is displayed in return of
something else.
Lines
64–66
Or a piece of my hair or my
clothes.
So, so, Herr Doctor.
So, Herr Enemy.
For the first time in ‘Lady Lazarus,’ Plath
makes her readers aware of the source of her suffering. She writes, “So, so,
Herr Doctor./ So, Herr Enemy.” “Herr” is the German word for Mr. The use of the
German word “Doctor” refers to the Nazi doctors who brought the Jewish victims
back to health, only to resume their suffering. By putting an emphasis on the
word “Herr” twice in this stanza, Plath reveals that men are the enemy and the
cause of her suffering.
Lines
67–72
I am your opus,
(…)
Do not think I underestimate your great concern.
Plath then begins to explain why men are the enemy
when she writes the quoted lines. This reveals her belief that she is valuable
to men only as an object, beautiful, but hard and lifeless. She does not deny
that she is valuable to some people, particularly men, but only as a cold, hard
object of beauty, not as a human being.
Plath feels that her
death would be nothing more than watching a beautiful piece of jewelry burn to
the people around her. She uses heavy sarcasm when she says, “Do not think I
underestimate your great concern.” Here, she feels that her death would be
nothing more than watching a beautiful piece of jewelry melt to the people
around her.
Lines
73–78
Ash, ash—
(…)
A gold filling.
Plath continues to imply that the people in her life,
particularly men, value her only as an object. This is revealed when she
writes, “Ash, ash…there is nothing there”. They only pike and stir the ashes of
her mind and try to trigger her bodily emotions. But, their hard work will be
worthless as she says, “Flesh, bone, there is nothing there”. It means she has
already detached herself from her body. What remains, is only her mind that is
also traumatized.
The Nazis were known to use the remains of the burned Jewish bodies to make soap. They also rummaged around heaps of human ashes to find jewelry and gold fillings. This is how Plath views her value to other people in the following stanza.
Lines 79–81
Herr God, Herr Lucifer
Beware
Beware.
In the next stanza of ‘Lady Lazarus,’ Plath
turns to a tone of revenge. She continues to blame men, God, and the Devil,
specifically pointing out that both God and Lucifer (the Devil) are men. This
also reveals that she feels powerless under men. She refers to the “Doktor”,
God, and the Devil all as men who hold some kind of power over her. That’s why
she tells other women to keep a safe distance from them. “Beware” she harks to
all those who are going through similar mental turmoil.
Lines 82–84
Out of the ash
I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air.
It is difficult to tell whether Plath is referring to
herself when she “rises from the ashes” as a physically alive woman who has
failed yet again at trying to end her life, or as one who has died and will
return as an immortal. She may plan to stop attempting suicide and take her
revenge on men instead of herself. Or she plans to come back as an immortal after
she has died to take her revenge on men.
The “red hair”
suggests that it could symbolize the mythical creature, phoenix, who can burst
into flames and then be reborn from its ashes. Either way, Plath warns men
everywhere, that she is no longer a powerless victim under them, but that she
is ready to take her revenge.
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