Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I Quotes

“If I lived by the sea I would never be really sad. I get an immense sense of eternity and peace from the ocean. I can lose myself in staring at it hour after hour.

--from a letter to Aurelia Plath, written c. July 1951”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“I am but one more drop in the great sea of matter, defined, with the ability to realize my existence.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“Well, I tried drowning, but that didn't work; somehow the urge to life, mere physical life, is damn strong, and I felt that I could swim forever straight out into the sea and sun and never be able to swallow more than a gulp or two of water and swim on. The body is amazingly stubborn when it comes to sacrificing itself to the annihilating directions of the mind.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“My biggest trouble is that people look at me and think that no serious trouble has ever troubled my little head. They seldom realize the chaos that seethes behind my exterior. As for the who Am I, what am I angle...that will preoccupy me till the day I die.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“Waiting for the right wonderful person is so much more important than getting the outer comforts of marriage at an early age.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“I am sitting in my room, looking out at a scene of snow pouring down with ice and sleet and thinking of how sometimes people are really wonderful after all.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“Even in the days I feel the worst, I feel glad to be alive. To be a part of this journey called life. To be one of the lucky 7 billion. Why was I chosen to be here? I must have a meaning, right? There's a big picture already painted of my life, my legacy, my happiness. I just have to trust in it.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“I know I’ll always think of you with something like hurt and nostalgia—

— from a letter to Ann Davdiow-Goodman, written 1951”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“I do think that it is hard for me to share myself with everyone. My introspection and queer thoughts always make me feel no one will understand – except someone I love. When I love someone, I make myself increasingly vulnerable to them – and give them the power to hurt me by letting them know my sensitive spots”
― Sylvia Plath, The Awakening

“But perhaps the most overlooked feature of her life was that she was human, and therefore fallible.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“Oh, Ed, don’t laugh at me...I’m so pathetically intense. I just can’t be any other way. […]Don’t stop talking to me, please. It’s as important as if we were the only people alive....[…]”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“I am as happy here as I have ever been in my life: Ted and I take a long walk each day up to the moors (It’s generally rainy, or at least overcast) and never have I loved country so! All you can see us dark hills of heather stretching toward the horizon, as if you were striding on top of the world; last night at sunset the horizontal light turned us both luminous pink as we hiked in waterproof boots in the wuthering free wind, starting up rabbits that flicked away with a white flag of tail, staring back at the black-faced, gray furred moor sheep that graze, apparently wild, and with their curling horns looking like primeval yellow-eyed druid monsters. I never thought I could like any country as well as the ocean, but these moors are really even better, with the great luminous emerald lights changing always, and the animals and wildness. Read “Wuthering Heights” again here, and really felt it this time more than ever.

--from a letter to her mother Aurelia Schober Plath, written on 11 September 1956”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“And get this, I’m with you. Don’t stop talking to me, please. It’s as important as if we were the only people alive . . . .”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“after my first sinus cold last week, I have become acquainted at one fell swoop with the byways of socialized medecine. the hard way. they persuaded me to try our college “hospital” here, and I went obediently, thinking with relief of the smith college routine of penicillin and cocaine. here it was aspirin therapy, total neglect, and pasty white meals (potato, fish, bread, custard and dough). when I asked for kleenex, the nurse offered to tear up an old sheet; probably a winding sheet.”
― Sylvia Plath, The Letters of Sylvia Plath Volume 1: 1940-1956 – The Comprehensive Collection of an Influential Poet's Intimate Correspondence

“It all flowed over me with a screaming ache of pain . . . remember, remember, this is now, and now and now. Live it, feel it, cling to it. I don’t want to blot the fear out, and blur the edges of living now. I want to become acutely aware of all that I’ve taken for granted. When you feel that this is the good bye, the last time, it hits you harder.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“The body is amazingly stubborn when it comes to sacrificing itself to the annihilating directions of the mind.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956

“I know I'll always think of you with something like hurt and nostalgia - and a great deal of love.”
― Sylvia Plath, Letters of Sylvia Plath, Volume I: 1940-1956