“Analysis The Feminist Points In Sylvia Plath’s Poem – Daddy”

Sylvia Plath's poem Daddy remains one of the most controversial modern poems ever
written. It is a dark, surreal and at times painful allegory which uses metaphor and other devices
to carry the idea of a girl victim finally freeing herself from her father. The poem Daddy was
written on October 12th 1962, the month after she had moved to London from Devon with her
two small children. A year later Sylvia Plath was dead, having written some of her best poems
during this turbulent period. "Daddy" is not only an exploration of the speaker's relationship with
her father and husband, but of women's relationships with men in general. It was written in the
1960s, a time when feminists fought for women's rights and made big progress in the way that
gender was viewed in society. Though this poem does not address feminism blatantly, it is a
powerful statement from a female against males. It's not limited to addressing one male, but any
male who has suppressed, betrayed, or, perhaps worst of all, died and left behind their daughters
and wives. According to the background of the poem, we would try to analysis the feminist point
which contained in the poem. Before we start the analysis, please read the poem bellow :

Daddy
You do not do, you do not do
Any more, black shoe
In which I have lived like a foot
For thirty years, poor and white,
Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.
It stuck in a barb wire snare.
Ich, ich, ich, ich,
I could hardly speak.
I thought every German was you.
And the language obscene

Daddy, I have had to kill you. An engine, an engine

You died before I had time—— Chuffing me off like a Jew.
Marble-heavy, a bag full of God, A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.
Ghastly statue with one gray toe I began to talk like a Jew.
Big as a Frisco seal I think I may well be a Jew.

And a head in the freakish Atlantic
Where it pours bean green over blue
In the waters off beautiful Nauset.
I used to pray to recover you.
Ach, du.
The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna
Are not very pure or true.
With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck
And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack
I may be a bit of a Jew.

In the German tongue, in the Polish town
Scraped flat by the roller
Of wars, wars, wars.
But the name of the town is common.
My Polack friend
I have always been scared of you,
With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo.
And your neat mustache
And your Aryan eye, bright blue.
Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You

Says there are a dozen or two. Not God but a swastika

So I never could tell where you So black no sky could squeak through.
Put your foot, your root, Every woman adores a Fascist,
I never could talk to you. The boot in the face, the brute
The tongue stuck in my jaw Brute heart of a brute like you
1 2
You stand at the blackboard, daddy,
In the picture I have of you,
A cleft in your chin instead of your foot
But no less a devil for that, no not
Any less the black man who
And a love of the rack and the screw.
And I said I do, I do.
So daddy, I’m finally through.
The black telephone’s off at the root,
The voices just can’t worm through.

Bit my pretty red heart in two.
I was ten when they buried you.
At twenty I tried to die
And get back, back, back to you.
I thought even the bones would do.
If I’ve killed one man, I’ve killed two——
The vampire who said he was you
And drank my blood for a year,
Seven years, if you want to know.
Daddy, you can lie back now.

But they pulled me out of the sack, There’s a stake in your fat black heart
And they stuck me together with glue. And the villagers never liked you.
And then I knew what to do. They are dancing and stamping on you.
I made a model of you, They always knew it was you.
A man in black with a Meinkampf look Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through
3 4

A first line repeated, “You do not do, you do not do”. It’s seems like a declaration of intent.
The speaker declaring that she will no longer put up with the black shoe she has lived in, poor
and scared for thirty years. The black shoe is a metaphor for the father. In the first stanza we
could know that she has been living very unhappy and controlled by her father but she’s going to
put up with him anymore.

In the second stanza, the speaker tell her father that she has had to kill him, as if she has
already murdered him, but he died before she “had time”. Here she means to say that “ before I
had time to get to know him,” or before I could make him proud.”. Either way, it is shocking that
the speaker claims she had to kill her father. After hearing this violent sentiment, we can assume
that she’s sad that he died and she’s angry as well. In the next line, the speaker describing her
father death with the phrase, “Marble heavy,” we assume that is a marble gravestone. The
speaker also said, “ bag full of God ” refers that the speaker is saying that the skin around our
bodies is nothing but a bag.

Sylvia Plath's innate emptiness and emotional constraint comes , we believe, from her
lack of male encouragement and her according need for domination. This streams from the
untimely death of her father at 9. In this poem Plath alludes to her relationship to her father with
an emphasis on his German background and identity. In this way she comments on him in
contradicting terms, firstly, as a divine figure: "..A bag full of God", towering over her in a
seemingly totalitarian way. She then transforms her implication with " No God, but a swatztika"
a completely ironic comment in comparison to the first as Nazism is essentially pagan in its
nature.

The extended reference to the confusion of her father as Hitler is shown through
indications of his "Mein Kampf look" and "neat moustache." Similarly, Plath confuses herself
with the role of a Jew, symbolising the insecurity which lies within her subconsciousness, and
the recognition which she has of her victimisation from men.
 "Daddy" is perhaps Sylvia Plath's best-known poem. It has elicited a variety of distinct
reactions, from feminist praise of its unadulterated rage towards male dominance, to wariness at
its usage of Holocaust imagery. It has been reviewed and criticized by hundreds and hundreds of
scholars, and is upheld as one of the best examples of confessional poetry.

It is certainly a difficult poem for some: its violent imagery, invocation of Jewish
suffering, and vitriolic tone can make it a decidedly uncomfortable reading experience. Overall,
the poem relates Plath's journey of coming to terms with her father's looming figure; he died
when she was eight. She casts herself as a victim and him as several figures, including a Nazi,
vampire, devil, and finally, as a resurrected figure her husband, whom she has also had to kill. In
other words, contradiction is at the heart of the poem's meaning. Neither its triumph nor its
horror is to be taken as the sum total of her intention. Instead, each element is contradicted by its
opposite, which explains how it shoulders so many distinct interpretations.

This sense of contradiction is also apparent in the poem's rhyme scheme and
organization. It uses a sort of nursery rhyme, singsong way of speaking. There are hard sounds,
short lines, and repeated rhymes (as in "Jew," "through," "do," and "you"). This establishes and
reinforces her status as a childish figure in relation to her authoritative father. This relationship is
also clear in the name she uses for him - "Daddy"- and in her use of "oo" sounds and a childish
cadence. However, this childish rhythm also has an ironic, sinister feel, since the chant-like,
primitive quality can feel almost like a curse. One critic wrote that the poem's "simplistic,
insistent rhythm is one form of control, the obsessive rhyming and repeated short phrases are
others, means by which she attempts to charm and hold off evil spirits." In other words, the
childish aspects have a crucial, protective quality, rather than an innocent one.

This poem consist of feminist issues, like we can see in the first part of the poem. Sylvia
Plath wanted us to know about women position in that time. The women still beneath the man.
She also use so many imagery in that poem that show her feeling about women position. Perhaps
her background could make him to write this poem.
REFFERENCES

https://www.gradesaver.com/sylvia-plath-poems/study-guide/summary-daddy

http://www.123helpme.com/view.asp?id=7468

https://owlcation.com/humanities/Analysis-of-Poem-Daddy-by-Sylvia-Plath

https://prezi.com/a8r3tiv5ocoz/feminism-in-the-poem-daddy/