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ARIEL’S GIFT

TED HUGHES, SYLVIA PLATH AND THE STORY OF BIRTHDAY LETTERS

Wagner—knowledgeable, perceptive, and wise—guides us gracefully through Hughes’s poems so that we see with a new clarity his...

The literary editor of the Times (of London) revisits the oft-told lives of Hughes and Plath, focusing on Hughes’s Birthday Letters (1998), the volume he addressed to Plath shortly before his death.

Wagner argues that the principal poetic difference between Plath and Hughes was that she was confessional while he was intensely private. After a lengthy introduction (consuming one-fifth of the text), the author establishes a pattern she maintains the rest of the way: short chapters that relate the significant events in the lives of the two writers (often in their own words—or in the words of family and acquaintances), followed by a close reading of the Birthday Letters poems that deal with those same events. (Each chapter is introduced by an old-fashioned, single-paragraph argument—a device of questionable necessity in a work this brief.) Wagner does not suggest that literature and life are one: “Poems,” she says, “may be linked to events, but they are not those events; they are themselves.” Still, she strives mightily to connect images in Hughes’s work to moments in their actual lives—and to similar images in Plath’s writing. And so, once again, we follow the dark arc of Plath’s short life: the untimely death of her father, her first suicide attempt (a deadly serious one) in 1953, her treatment at McLean Hospital, her time at Cambridge, her fiery, erotic meeting with Hughes, their marriage on Bloomsday in 1956, their joint struggle to succeed as writers (Hughes’s early successes, Wagner suggests, contributed to Plath's depression), their travels and tribulations and eventual separation in the summer of 1962 (Hughes’s infidelity the foremost cause), her suicide on February 11, 1963, her transfiguration into feminist icon. Wagner explores, as well, Hughes’s near-absolute silence about Plath until the startling publication of Birthday Letters.

Wagner—knowledgeable, perceptive, and wise—guides us gracefully through Hughes’s poems so that we see with a new clarity his responses to his life with Plath, and to her lamentable death. (8 pages b&w photos, not seen)

Pub Date: April 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-393-02009-6

Page Count: 256

Publisher: Norton

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2001

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NUTCRACKER

This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.

Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955

ISBN: 0670717797

Page Count: -

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955

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