“Unheard-of-Songs” of the Body: Metamorphoses of the Self and Zombie Identity in the Poetry of Sylvia Plath

Abstract

The aim of this article is to read Sylvia Plath’s poetry through the lens of metamorphosis of the self and zombie identity. Implementing the observations of Marina Warner concerning “fantastic metamorphoses” (specifically “splitting”) and the figure of the zombie, understood as soulless body that is subject to another’s will, I divide the article into five sections which focus on different aspects of Plath’s poems to demonstrate how the zombie identity manifests itself and how it is repressed in patriarchy, and suppressed but expressed by the author of Ariel. Cerebral as Plath’s poetry seems to be by the poet’s conscious choice, underneath the surface it is profoundly corporeal, as it (desperately) attempts to express femininity and its concealed strengths, becoming an expression of what Hélène Cixous pinpointed as the “unheard-of songs” of the body. As a result of a close reading of Plath’s verse, it is revealed that these poems communicate profoundly feminist messages, where the angry confrontations with patriarchal culture are constant, and where the border between private and public spheres is erased or at least challenged. Apparently, the unconscious purpose of Plath’s writing is to transform the body defined as an instrument of another’s will into a body that is owned by the woman/poet.