MirrorSylvia Plath

MRINAL DWIVEDI

Sylvia Life

• Sylvia was born on October 27, 1932 in Newton, Massachusetts.• She married Hughes on

June 16, 1956

Sylvia Life• Sylvia and Ted had two

children Frieda and Nicholas (1960, 1962)• 1962 She learned of Ted’s

infidelity and they separated.• Committed suicide on

February 11, 1963.

SummaryStanza I Addressed by an

inanimate object– Sets out to define itself and

its function– Has no preconceptions

because it is without memory or ability to reason.

– It is omnivorous – swallows everything it confronts without making judgments that might blur, mist, or distort.

It is god-like in its objectivity and incapability of emotional response.Most of the time it meditates on the opposite wall, faithfully reproducing its colors and design until darkness intrudes or intervenes

Summary Stanza II

The mirror becomes a perfectly reflecting lake, unruffled by any disturbanceA Woman bends over the lake like the mythical Narcissus.– No matter how deeply she

searches, she sees only her actuality or surface truth.

– Unlike Narcissus, the speaker cannot fall in love with what she sees.

• The candles and moon to which the woman turns are liars capable of lending untruthful shadows and romantic highlights – unlike the lake surface/mirror, which renders only faithful images.

Unhappy by what she sees, she weeps and wrings her hands.– The youth and

beauty once reflected during her morning visits are drowned in the metaphorical depths of the lake.

– What slowly emerges from those depths is the terrifying fact that she is aging.