Now feeling heartened enough to think about Plath, I wonder what were Sylvia's real first words after her three-day coma in her family's basement?
The Bell Jar's Esther Greenwood in Chapter 14 says that in the "thick, warm, furry dark" of unconsciousness, she heard a voice call "Mother!" I buy that, chiefly because when Mrs. Greenwood first visits her daughter in the hospital she tells Esther, "They said you asked for me."
Aurelia Plath in Letters Home claims Sylvia's very first words were "Oh, no!" and that in the hospital Sylvia "said weakly, 'It was my last act of love.'" But that sounds like something Aurelia made up and put in Sylvia's mouth as a noble excuse for trying to kill herself and as proof of daughterly devotion. (For the telltale markers of Aurelia's fictional "ideal scenes," see this recent post, "It's Aurelia's Story and She's Sticking To It.")
Gordon Lameyer in his unpublished memoir Dear Sylvia wrote that Sylvia's first words were, "Do we still own the house?" Lameyer, then Sylvia's current boyfriend, hadn't been present, so he heard about this secondhand. I can't imagine that during her own medical emergency the house was Sylvia's overriding concern, but she might have said it a day or two into hospitalization.
Sylvia in her journals and letters did not specify what her first words were. I am betting that as she was first dragged from her hiding place, she said "Oh, no!" I am also betting that as helpless and semiconscious she cried out "Mother!" when a "man with a chisel" forced open one of her eyes and tried to make her see.
6 comments:
"Mother" is what my sister and I called our mom when we were mad at her or trying to be annoying. I can see that being Sylvia's first utterance, but it still strikes me funny.
The comment about losing the house--was that a constant worry? Some kind of fever dream?
Upon awakening from an attempted overdose, as I staggered to the bathroom, my mother slurred, “I saved the dinner dishes for you.”
It's muddied in my memory how I came to think this, but I thought Warren had discovered Sylvia and so it's always been my impression that it was Warren who shouted up to Aurelia (who was in the kitchen at the time maybe?), "Mother!" in an effort to get her attention and to call her down to the basement. (BTW I love your blog and am thrilled you're "back"!)
The best real-life sources say Warren discovered Sylvia in the basement, interrupting the family's lunch with his yell, "Call the ambulance!" The next Bell Jar scenes (Chapter 14) describe what sounds like a high-speed transport to the hospital, where Esther hears a rumble of voices "protesting and disagreeing." Then she says, "A chisel cracked down on my eye," not once but twice, and shying from the light yet held down by many hands, Esther calls out "Mother!" In the next scene Esther fears she is blind and "a cheery voice" -- later identified as "the nurse" -- reassures her. Then "The man with the chisel" returns and although Esther tells him, "It's no use," he probes and pronounces Esther's sight intact. In the next scene Esther's mother visits, saying, "They said you wanted to see me . . . They said you called for me."
OMG.
i am so glad you are back. your blog is a safe corner for me.
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