The Courage of Shutting Up by Sylvia Plath
Stoicism as Defiance in Sylvia Plath's often overlooked poem.
Hello and welcome to Words that Burn, a podcast about poetry. Each episode I choose a poem and show you what makes it tick. This week’s poem is The Courage of Shutting Up by Sylvia Plath. I’d like to issue a quick warning at the top of this episode; This poem deals with topic of suicide. If you’d prefer to avoid that, you might enjoy one of the older episodes of the podcast.
With that being said, let’s continue.
It’s hard to find a figure so mythically tragic as Sylvia Plath in all of western poetry. In fact it would not be unfair to say that her death often dwarfs the skill and mastery underlying her poetry. It has become incredibly fashionable to think of her as some kind of grimly elegant titan of poetry. A vision of her that was popularised with the posthumous publishing of Ariel, the collection from which this poem is taken. This publishing happened in 1965, two years after Plath took her own life. It contains a foreword by poet Robert Lowell, someone greatly admired by Plath. In his introduction he creates an almost god-like depiction of the poet. Here is an excerpt:
It is a bold statement to say that she became something imaginary, newly wildly and subtly created. His choice of words alone are hinting at this created element. In actual fact it is very difficult to know the truth of that early edition. It was her husband, Ted Hughes, who arranged the edition after her death. This may seem an unusual choice as Plath herself had a fully completed manuscript ready to go to publishing.2 In assuming control of the editing, Ted Huges actually made some huge alterations. In the first place he omitted a number of poems that he felt were too filled with vitriol and were said to paint him in a rather poor light. These poems, this episode’s one among them, were left out and in doing so directly went against Plath’s wishes. Alongside that the order of the poems was altered, as well as other, unfinished works being included.3 In changing the order, Hughes created an artificial sequence to the material, making it seem much more a collection that spiralled from the joy of motherhood, to the absurd and finally an obsession with death. In actuality, Plath wanted the book to end on the hopeful ‘’bee’’ sequence. This manipulation of the order of her work painted a false, but powerful portrait of a woman obsessed with death, one who was dogged by depression at every turn. This near mythic image of her is one recognised around the world by fans of her work. Initially when attempting to write this episode I wanted to focus on The Hanging Man only to find out that it was one of those included by Hughes, with that in mind I set about reading the restored edition of Ariel, one with an introduction by the couple's daughter. That introduction is a wonderful source of clarification. There are so many theories on the final days of Sylvia Plath and her relationship to Ted Hughes in that closing time. Mythmaking surrounds the pair, speculation and hearsay galore but in this intro there are the words of a daughter:4
‘’It appeared to me that my father’s editing of Ariel was seen to ‘interfere’ with the sanctity of my mother’s suicide, as if, like some deity, everything associated with her must be enshrined and preserved as miraculous. For me, as her daughter, everything associated with her was miraculous, but that was because my father made it appear so, even playing me a record of my mother reading her poetry so I could hear her voice again.’’
There is a very human side to the marriage put across by the daughter and one that takes away much of the bitterness and cruelty that has crept its way into depictions of the pair. With all that being said we cannot deny that the final year of Plath’s marriage to Hughes was not a tense one. In 1962,Hughes had been carrying on an affair and Plath had decided that it was high time to end the marriage.5 This decision was a moment of supreme agency on Plath’s part and could be looked upon as the poet finding her voice. In light of this information it is easy to see that the two parties in this poem: the speaker and the aggressor are Plath and Hughes respectively and I will refer to them in that way from now on.
In sharp contrast to its title, the courage of shutting up, the poem is actually all about asserting strength in the face of belittlement and abuse. From the first stanza we can see just what an act of defiance it is:
The courage of the shut mouth, in spite of artillery!
The line pink and quiet, a worm, basking.
There are black discs behind it, the discs of outrage,
And the outrage of a sky, the lined brain of it.
The discs revolve, they ask to be heard,
Straight away Plath’s talent for blazing imagery is made crystal clear. The reader is met with a barrage of strong imagery one after another, mimicking the artillery mentioned in the first line. That word, artillery, hints at the level of verbal abuse currently being experienced by Plath, and in the face of that they do not falter. We can picture the clenched jaw and cold thin line of her mouth, which is compared to a worm, basking. There is a dichotomy to this image of the worm. In one sense it could be interpreted as something pathetic, impotent in the face of such harassment. Yet, in another sense, there is a quiet detachment and defiance in the word basking. These lips are unflinching and unfazed, this has all happened before.
Following that a central image of the poem is introduced: the black discs of outrage. So similar to a void or abyss. They are an ominous symbol of all the repressed rage and fury Plath feels. Plath’s imagery becomes mercurial here as one bleeds into another. The outrage becomes a sky brimming with tension, the clouds of which become reminiscent of the brain in turn. Throughout the stanza, we are presented with a kind of xray of the head of Plath. The disks revolve grinding like the cogs of thought, the final words heighten the looming doom They ask to be heard.
In the second stanza, Plath’s imagery begins to weave together, layering itself on itself:
Loaded, as they are, with accounts of bastardies.
Bastardies, usages, desertions and doubleness,
The needle journeying in its groove,
Silver beast between two dark canyons,
A great surgeon, now a tattooist,
It leads directly on from the first stanza. The discs take on the military aspect of the artillery from the first with the line loaded, as they are, with accounts of bastardies. We can assume this to be all the unsaid knowledge of Ted Hughes misdeeds. Plath was keenly aware of these things6, and keeps them now like ammunition. Plath expands on them, fleshes them out so that the reader can truly understand the length and breath of the hurt caused; usages, desertions and doubleness. The discs shift in meaning once more, becoming vinyl records that once again ask to be heard this time as the needle of the player gives them voice. The danger of that repression in these unheard sounds is made clear in the transformation of the needle into a silver beast and the two canyons a brooding atmosphere. The needle takes on the precession of a surgeon, inflicting damage to bring about healing, then the repetition returns in the tattoo needle, invoking again the artillery from stanza one.
That tattooing bleeds directly into the next stanza:
Tattooing over and over the same blue grievances,
The snakes, the babies, the tits
On mermaids and two-legged dreamgirls.
The surgeon is quiet, he does not speak.
He has seen too much death, his hands are full of it.
The blue grievances could be a reference to Plath’s veins, as Plath was fascinated by the intricacies of the human body, especially her own.7 A host of grievances are listed by the opponent each one, pricking at an insecurity. This tattooing over, seems to indicate that Plath never gets the chance to return fire to respond. There are the snakes and babie, temptations and motherhood, often referenced in Ariel. Then the tits on mermaids and two legged dreamgirls, Plath's jealousy of the other women who occupy Hughes' attention.
The surgeon seems to become a standin for Ted Hughes, the quiet calculating man that can cut her to the quick. For many years, Plath suffered both physical and mental abuse at the hands of Hughes, but this was only revealed in a series of previously-unpublished letters in 20178. The figure of the surgeon then is quiet as we are left unsure as to whether Plath has responded. Shaming them to silence. Or is the figure referencing herself as the surgeon, calm and collected in the face of the barrage? Does she know full well that any attempt to rebuke or respond will not be tolerated? After all; He has seen too much death, his hands are full of it.
This seems the more logical reading as, moving into the fourth stanza, Plath reasserts her quiet stoicism:
So the discs of the brain revolve, like the muzzles of cannon.
Then there is that antique billhook, the tongue,
Indefatigable, purple. Must it be cut out?
It has nine tails, it is dangerous.
And the noise it flays from the air, once it gets going.
The imagery of war returns as Plath's brain whirs, the discs taking on the destructive force of cannons searching for a target. More weapons are introduced. Gone are the delicate instruments of scalpels and needles. The tongue is now a billhook, an ancient tool for felling trees and often used in war. 9 The billhook is a blunt tool meant for destruction and so is fitting for what is occurring . It is relentless and so Plath considers the most drastic of actions; simply cutting it out. Then from blunt to searing and sharp with the cat on nine tails whip ensuring that the reader knows how even the air suffers under this assault.
At the end of this stanza there can be no mistaking the damage being done and just how much willpower is required to stay silent through it all.
In the fifth stanza there is a sudden shift in tone and setting:
No, the tongue, too, has been put by
Hung up in the library with the engravings of Rangoon
And the fox heads, the otter heads, the heads of dead rabbits.
It is a marvellous object
The things it has pierced in its time!
We are transported to a Victorian trophy room, a staple of colonial masculinity.10 Here the tongue, that weapon Plath has felt so often, has been retired, placed in pride of place. It is surrounded by fox heads, the otter heads, the heads of dead rabbits. This is only reinforced by the mention of Rangoon, a former British Colony. Hughes himself was British and so there is definite symbolism to these references.
There is a sour note as Plath sarcastically declares; it is a marvellous object. This statement clearly stands very much at odds with the rest of the poem. It echoes the kind of bizarre admiration that is expressed toward particularly dangerous weapons, a kind of obsessive respect.11 The notion of the tongue having been put aside has answered the question of the previous stanza; must it be cut out? So has the opponent learned new ways to harm our speaker, or in a much grimmer fashion, are hurting words not enough for them anymore?
There is a shift in anatomy of the sixth verse begins:
But how about the eyes, the eyes, the eyes?
Mirrors can kill and talk, they are terrible rooms
In which a torture goes on one can only watch.
The face that lived in this mirror is the face of a dead man.
Do not worry about the eyes
The tongue is left behind and a focus on the eyes begins. They are a key focus as it is repeated three times. We move away from the hidden violence of words to the overt violence of the visual. They become mirrors through which Plath must observe her own abuse. The way in which they can kill and talk is a reference to how we can sometimes communicate through eye contact alone. When they kill we observe betrayal in the eyes of another, when they talk they showcase our inner world. They are terrible rooms and we get the sense that Plath sees her own reflection in the eyes of her abuser. This is the most psychologically harrowing of the stanzas. Plath goes on to state that the face that lived in this mirror, Plath's own eyes , is a dead man. This is a possible allusion to the fact that the man in this poem is someone Plath no longer recognises, he is changed so completely. The memory of that kinder man is dead now, and Plath compels herself to move on and not worry about the eyes. She seems worried about how much her own eyes give away but the final stanza makes it clear that there is no cause to fret:
They may be white and shy, they are no stool pigeons,
Their death rays folded like flags
Of a country no longer heard of,
An obstinate independency
Insolvent among the mountains.
That line, they are no stool pigeons, show us that they will show no fear now. It compounds the notion of courage found in the title of this poem. Plath has found bravery in her passivity, her stoic refusal to engage. This is driven home as she begins to compare herself to a foreign state, a far cry from the younger self she once was. Where once she might have stared at Hughes with utter malice and fury, now she has neither the energy nor the want to engage him; Their death rays folded like flags. That younger self and all it’s confrontational energy, it’s aggressive hatred, is a faded thing so much so that it is a country no longer heard of . There are two ways of interpreting these ending lines. The first way is as a kind of act of mourning on Plath’s for the energetice, fierce woman that used to combat Hughes, a woman who has been worn away by constant abuse over the years. This reading strips all agency from Plath and so I don’t think it fits. In keeping with the title The Courage of Shutting Up I believe that Plath has found a new way to engage with her abuser, that is to say not engaging with him at all. A refusal to fuel his own rage by responding, a denial of satisfaction for any sadistic impulse he may possess. As the poem draws to its close the reason that Hughes chose to exclude the poem. It paints him in a hideous light and shows just how much Sylvia Plath had moved beyond him.
So why this poem? It is interesting to note that this poem went through multiple versions, particularly the title. In the first four versions the title was "The Courage of Quietness" a much more conservative title.12 That kind of language is very reminiscent of Plath’s earlier works from The Colossus where a much more conservative speaker is utilised. A cautious voice is used to explore the things that preoccupy her. Ariel, though, lives up to its namesake, a great spirit freed from long imprisonment. The speaker of all the poems within the collection is a powerful one, filled with the fury of repressed rage. They are fearless and abrasive and make no apology as they cover a wide range of topics from motherhood to femininity. This poem is the grasping of agency personified, the courage of shutting up is a combative title and its content is damning. It shows Plath’s prowess as a poet without reducing her to a death obsessed tragic waif. It is a poem that truly does justice to her work and identity and honours the spirit of a human who found their voice and, if only for a short while, lived unafraid.
Lowell, Robert, and Sylvia Plath. Introduction. In Ariel. London, London: Faber and Faber, 1965
Kilkenny, Katie. “The Ending Sylvia Plath Wanted.” Google. Google, 2014. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/381946/.
PERLOFF, MARJORIE. “The Two Ariels: The (Re)Making Of The Sylvia Plath Canon.” The American Poetry Review 13, no. 6 (1984): 10–18. http://www.jstor.org/stable/27777491.
Plath, Sylvia, and Frieda Plath. Foreword. In Ariel: The Restored Edition. Faber And Faber, 2007.
Plath, Sylvia, and Frieda Plath. Foreword. In Ariel: The Restored Edition. Faber And Faber, 2007.
Clark, Heather. Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath. New York: Random House US, 2021.
Brain, Tracy, and Anita Helle. “Electroshock Therapy and Plath’s Convulsive Poetics.” Essay. In Sylvia Plath in Context, 264–74. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2019.
The Irish Times. “Sylvia Plath Letters Reveal Abuse by Ted Hughes.” The Irish Times. The Irish Times, April 20, 2017. https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/sylvia-plath-letters-reveal-abuse-by-ted-hughes-1.3045595.
Hunter, William Wilson (1891). A School History and Geography of Northern India. S. K. Lahiri & Company.
Reeser, Todd W. Masculinities in Theory: An Introduction. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010.
Yamane, David. “The Sociology of U.S. Gun Culture.” Sociology Compass 11, no. 7 (2011). https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1111/soc4.12497.
Kalfopoulou, Adrianne. “The Courage of Not Shutting Up.” Essay. In Plath Profiles, 233–39. Indiana University, Indiana: IUScholarWorks Journals, n.d.
https://scholarworks.iu.edu/journals/index.php/plath