Literary Explication: Sylvia Plath's "Daddy"

Conflicting Emotions of Sylvia Plath The speaker in the poem “Daddy” is someone who both fiercely hates her father but also passionately loves him. When she was younger, she compared her father to a god-like entity—always looking up to him and constantly seeking his approval. Her fierce hate towards her father stems from the deep rooted fear of him. The speaker is torn between these two polar emotions that have been constantly tormenting her and blames them on her unresolved emotions toward her father. In the first few lines of the poem, the speaker becomes aware that the memory of her father has presented an immense weight on her. Throughout the poem, the speaker makes multiple attempts to rid herself of the thoughts of father and tries to convince herself that she no longer needs him. She even goes as far as murdering him in the poem. She does this metaphorically, of course, symbolizing the extinguishment of her father’s memory. Sylvia Plath uses an array of detailed imagery and passionate emotions to create a poem that helps us observe the resolution of her father’s death and the freedom she obtained from finding this closure. A very important component of this poem is the Plath’s use of imagery as a way to express the victimization that she had endured “for thirty years, poor and white”. There are several distinct images throughout the poem that depict her father in certain ways. She begins with her fathers, “Black shoe”, beginning the journey of her poem by describing her sense of entrapment that her father caused. She continues on by portraying him as a “bag full of god” which implies that she viewed her father as someone superior to her and implies that he was someone that she looked up to. As the poem moves along, the words used to describe her father shift from awe-filled to spiteful, leading to a climatic finish when the speaker finally breaks through her oppression (On Daddy).
When the speaker is older, she begins to see her father in a

Cited: "Daddy Analysis." Shmoop. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Sept. 2013. "On "Daddy"" On "Daddy" N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Sept. 2013. Plath, Sylvia. "Daddy." Poets.org. Academy of American Poets, n.d. Web. 20 Sept. 2013.