I loved her- I’ve loved her ever since. If her suicide was the trap she used to catch me, to swallow me, to absorb me, to become one body, she succeeded.
I believe the first time I was drawn into the Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath dynamic was when I read Yehuda Koren’s Lover of Unreason. I wasn’t one of those girls who grew up reading Plath, I became for more interested in her as an adult. I didn’t romanticize her depression and suicide, I felt the weight of her death as a mother with young children does, thinking it couldn’t possibly have been an act of revenge over her broken heart. Certainly, there was more going on with her mind than the devastation of infidelity, something physiological. In fact, it was while reading Anaïs Nin’s journals that I even picked up Koren’s book by chance because the bookstore didn’t have Nin’s volume and I was hungry for something good to read. Curiosity bit me, I knew very little about Assia Wevill, Plath’s rival for Ted’s affections. Since then, I have been fascinated by Ted Hughes and Plath’s entire relationship. How much can any of us really know about a couple’s love life? Do I think he is free of blame? Of course not, but neither is she a helpless victim of cruelty, though he could be cruel. Plath had her dark days, her depressions and Ted’s betrayal left her in turmoil, caring for their small children, struggling to find her feet again, humiliated. No one will ever know what was going through her mind, her very soul, when she took her life. I put a lot of weight in words, but I don’t think there are enough sentences to explain such all consuming pain, to express the ache of the mind. Certainly her final act went on to haunt Ted’s new lover but more, Ted himself and paint him as villain long after. Do I feel that was her scheme? No… maybe she hoped someone would finally rescue her from herself. Maybe she just wanted to silence the grip of suffering.
This is a fictional account of Ted’s side of the story, which won’t be popular with many hardcore Plath fans. No one wants to forgive the philanderer, there is nothing more repulsive than a loving, faithful, devoted wife and caring mother discarded for another woman, worse by someone who befriended her. It’s an old story, it’s become all too common, infidelity certainly doesn’t shock people today. It was a different time then, Sylvia was wounded, somehow both strong as steel and fragile as glass. A brilliant woman, who maybe put too much faith in her beloved. Instability and public humiliation, having your nose rubbed in your raw, festering pain and a husband who comes and goes lighting the torch of hope for reconciliation… well, it’s no wonder he made it so easy for women hate him, fans of Plath or not. She truly became the saint and he, the sinful monster.
Nature is a funny thing, in this beautifully written story, the very intensity of the fire that burned within Plath becomes for Ted the thing he later fears, one he can’t contain. The love too much for him, this man who thrived on his freedom. She scared him and seduced him at the same time, his ‘resurrected goddess’. Ted Hughes was not the cause of Sylvia’s mental health struggles, for she had attempted suicide long before he came along anymore than he could take credit for her talent, her poetry but his actions surely were a catalyst. Knowing the facts, everything that followed after Plath’s suicide, how new lover Assia followed in Plath’s footsteps… well, it makes it that much harder to think of Ted as a victim, yet wasn’t he? Weren’t they all? They were victims of passions, selfishness, and mental instability. With the carelessness of a lover’s hands upon your heart, it’s hard to not label it criminal.
How can you explain the horror of your own choices, the recklessness of your desires? I don’t think this is about excusing shameless behavior, it’s a man trying to make sense of the ruin of his betrayal. He paid for it, he pays even in death, a marked man, ever the bad guy in the story. Weren’t both he and Sylvia reacting to events true to their own natures? One just seemed to hold all the cards… we will never know what was waiting in the blind corners of their relationship. Not their biggest fan nor closest friend can speak the truth about the spoils of their fiery love, everything is just speculation. We demand nothing more than facts and attempt to make sense of the world by classifying things, and people, as good or bad- love doesn’t quite work that way. We can only play what ifs, and wonder, would Sylvia have taken her life if they reconciled? If he didn’t leave and humiliate her, abandon her in such a fragile state of mind? Who can say?
Their love was a knot, and this book serves to tighten it further, giving Hughes a voice. The end of their relationship was incomprehensible and so it will forever remain. Gorgeously written, loved it!
Publication Date: January 1, 2021
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