Daddy Good Country People and Shiloh Essay

Relationships between fathers and daughters are generally close and trustful. When power and intimidation are present, a deep hatred rises up and nothing is peaceful. In Sylvia Plath's poem “Daddy”, a complicated relationship between a father and daughter is displayed. Plath’s poem describes the strained nature of the relationship between the speaker and her father due to the overpowering personality of her parent. The speaker goes into detail about her affection, yet ever present hatred, for her father. Sylvia Plath uses various examples of figurative language, tone, and diction to showcase the theme of no relationship is truly perfect, there will always be problems that come to the surface.

The themes that evolve throughout the poem ‘Dad’ are those of grief for the father she has lost, love and great sorrow. “Every day I grieve”, demonstrates the degree of loss the author feels towards her father’s death. Fond memories of her father caring sacks of potatoes, fresh eggs and flowers show the great love she feels towards her father. She feels sorrow for all the childhood

Compare the ways in which poets reflect on parental relationships – Daddy by Sylvia Plath and Mother Who Gave Me Life by Gwen Harwood

“Good Country People” is a short story written by Flannery O’Connor in the mid 50’s. The story takes place on farm in Georgia that Mrs. Hopewell owns. Flannery O’Connor uses the characters names and personalities to symbolize that they aren’t really who they think they are. The protagonist Joy-Hulga has a heart condition which and a peg leg. Her heat condition and disability reflects that she is a broken and weak person on the inside. Mrs. Hopewell is Joy-Hulga’s mother, she is very hopeful that her daughter would be something in life but Joy has other visions for herself. Mrs. Freeman works on the farm and her name symbolizes that she is more of a free spirit she tends to live in reality and she is able to see exactly who Joy-Hulga and

Her time period is easily reflected in the poem with the severity in her reference to Nazis, swastikas, barbed wire, fascists, brutes, devils, and vampires. In “Daddy”, Plath refers to herself as a Jew multiple times,

It is crucial to understand the significance of gender roles from a young age and Plath’s ‘Daddy’ “fits perfectly into the Freudian concept of the Electra complex” . This is evident in the repetitive structure of the words, short and structured lines and the continuous use of the rhyme (/u/) throughout the poem which forms an almost bleak nursery-rhyme. The speaker 's obsession with her father is revealed by the imago , an individual’s fixation on the childhood image of their father with various dark and heavy adjectives such as “black”, “marble-heavy”, and “grey” symbolising the unresolved anxiety within an abandoned child. The speaker remains in the fearful state of

She found a man who would treat her the same way and married him. Her relationship with this man is essentially the same as the relationship she had with her father. Her husband is described as a “vampire” who “drank blood for seven years”. The word “vampire” is really important because it refers to both her father and her husband. She says that her husband and father sucked the life out of her just as a vampire would suck the blood out of its victims in old myths . The speaker allows herself to be controlled by a man who shares many of her father’s characteristics. In a way, she has married her father. When the speaker finally leaves her husband after seven years, she is at the same time leaving her father behind, because she had recreated her father in the image of her husband. The speaker tells her dead father that he “can lie back now there’s a stake in your fat black heart”. Again, she compares her father to a vampire (Daddy Analysis). One who has tormented and haunted her even after his death. When the speaker leaves her husband, she is also leaving her father behind, breaking free of the oppression that he has caused for her entire life.

Upon hearing the word daddy, pleasant thoughts such as love, support, and dependence usually come to mind. Daddy is the person that little girls relate to, and count on to fix anything from boo-boos to a broken heart. In Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” one would expect to read about the love and comfort that a daddy can bring to a child, but after reading the first stanza it becomes clear that “Daddy” is far from anything lovely and beautiful. The speaker in “Daddy” is a girl who is emotionally torn. She has mixed emotions towards her father— deep love and strong hate.

The poem “Daddy” by Sylvia Path is a very dark poem. The poem is about both the narrator’s father and her husband. The narrator must have relationship problems because she is very conflicted in this poem. Both of these seem to have a struggling relationship with her. She compares her dad to a number of things: vampire, devil, and a fascist. Throughout the poem, she only speaks of her “daddy” and suddenly turns the table and starts talking about how she’s killed two men. These two men were both killed by the narrator. In the beginning, when talking about her father’s death, the narrator makes it sound like her just died of natural causes. But by the end it sounds like she killed him and her husband. In this poem, the narrator had a struggling relationship with her father.

Although everyone has a father, the relationship that each person has with his or her father is different. Some are close to their fathers, while some are distant; some children adore their fathers, while other children despise them. For example, in Robert Hayden’s poem “Those Winter Sundays” Hayden writes about his regret that he did not show his love for his hardworking father sooner. In Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy,” she writes about her hatred for her brute father. Despite both authors writing on the same topic, the two pieces are remarkably different. Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” and Robert Hayden’s “Those Winter Sundays” have different themes that are assembled when the authors put their different uses of imagery, tone, and characterization together.

The dominant image of a father figure that we are left with after reading this poem is far from a loving or pleasant one. In fact, it is rather the opposite. The “Daddy” whom the speaker is addressing in this poem ends up being portrayed as a vampire, who “the villagers” (77) — perhaps the people surrounding the speaker— never seemed to be fond of. This strengthens the image of a highly dysfunctional relationship, rather than a “normal,” loving one. As readers, we have to ask ourselves about the reliability of Plath’s character; however, seeing as she is clearly emotionally unstable. We learn about at least one suicide attempt in the lines

Being born of a German immigrant, Sylvia Plath shares an eye-opening poem right before she ended her life in 1963. On October 12th, 1962, Plath wrote a poem called “Daddy.” In this poem, she portrays a speaker that expresses numerous feelings of hate and fear. Though most might think this word actually means father, in German “daddy” means “oh you”. Nevertheless, this poem relates to a person or father.

Daddy by Sylvia Plath is a confessional poem about a daughter's hatred and anger because she felt oppressed by her father for thirty years. Confessional poetry focuses on the inner expressions of conflict and emotion through the use of detail in the poet's life. Plath was nine when her father passed away and she was too young to get to know her father. Her father passed away because of a wound he received on his toe and since he was diabetic the wound eventually got infected and killed him. The young daughter prays for her father in the hopes of getting him back, however when he passes away she feels angered that her daddy is gone.

“Daddy” written by Sylvia Plath an American poet best known for her dark, and confessional poems, and novels. Sylvia Plath lets you understand her thoughts through her writing, for example poems like “Daddy” and her novel The Bell Jar. More and more people learn about her work by reading her poetry or novels today. For one reason, this poem gives many emotions to the reader. By reading “Daddy” you can sense sadness, hopefulness, a broken child, while others may argue it is a cry for help. Secondly, Sylvia Plath casts herself as a victim by sharing all the negative feelings she experienced after her father’s dead. Lastly, Plath expresses how she portraits her father as a powerful figure, especially when Plath refer him as a Nazi, German, Frisco, and vampire. I feel this poem is very powerful because you can feel the writer’s emotions towards her father and including herself worth. In the poem “Daddy” it projects the emotions Sylvia Plath was trying to share with the reader. Poems like these can help other people deal with their negative feelings, by realizing they are not the only ones dealing with negative thoughts, and searching for the help they may need in case of a crisis.