The other Sylvia Plath

In this new study, Tracy Brain moves away from the endlessly retold story of Sylvia Plath's life to argue that there is another Sylvia Plath: a writer who was much more interested in a world beyond her own skin than critics have allowed.

Teachers, students and general readers should appreciate these new close readings of poems and stories that have seldom been talked about, or have been discussed mainly in biographical terms.Tracy Brain discovers the environmentalism in Plath's work, looks at Plath's treatment of American and English culture, and uncovers the relationship between Plath's work and the work of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf.

She examines Plath's unpublished letters, hand-written drafts of poems, typescripts of "The Bell Jar" and annotated copies of the books that most influenced her.

She explores the ways in which Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath drafted their poems together and wrote poems in answer to each other.

This book also looks at Plath's home-made art scrapbooks and to analyze the significance of the cover designs and marketing of Plath's work.

The Other Sylvia Plath reveals what has always been present in Plath's work, but until now has scarcely been recognized.