by Sylvia Plath
Yesterday, Joanie and I stopped at the Bookmobile that stops once a week in Chatham to sell books. I got talking to the most fascinating little sallow cynical brilliant woman who runs it. When she asked where I went to college, she said “Oh, Smith. That’s a great handle. Snob appeal, you’ll be using it all your life. It does things for you.” Seems she whizzed through the University of Chicago (lucky thing) with three majors: English, History, and Anthropology. She got a job in new York, and now free lance writes for a living. I was at her feet with questions pouring out. She has written western pulps, western love stories, and will have a “dowager story” in the Ladies’ Home Journal this fall.* She also writes juveniles, and had a blurb up on the wall advertising her latest for 12-14 year old boys. Her name is Val(erie) Gendron,* and she lives in a little ramshackle house in South Dennis. I plan to haunt her every Friday if I get a minute. Boy, would I like to bike over to her house on some day off and talk with her for hours! She really has been through the mill, I guess. (Hero worship, you know).
Dick is coming over for a visit tonight while I “baby-sit”. I think I am doing quite well juggling him and Art at the same time. It does wonders in stimulating my ingenuity. I’ve written to Marion,* The Warden, and Mrs. Williams.* Seems I’m always writing letters whenever I get a minute, which isn’t much time. Usually I go to bed shortly after I get through work, or do my ironing. Science has been temporarily shelved until I get a little more energy and can stay up later. But, darn it, I’m determined to get it done if I have to work ten hours a day for two weeks when I get home.
I got my poems back from the Monitor . . . the ones that I sent to the Home Forum. But they put, as Mrs. Freeman would say, an “encouraging note” on the rejection, saying that they were keeping two of them for future reference. Most of those are little nature things, charming bits of observation about slightly gold twilights or orange groves in Timbuctoo, so I should be able to write a few Cape-y things to send in this fall . . . both to the Youth page and Home Forum.
Did I tell you that I am typing four carbons of all Kathy’s letters from Holland so they can be sent to friends? I really enjoy my “secretarial” work no end, and thus am getting a whack at the type-writer now to send a letter your way.
So glad to hear that the great Brauner called. You were wrong after all. Even the Cliff-dwelling plutocrats can’t keep away from your enchantingly insane poverty-stricken daughter for longer than three weeks! Hah!
Don’t worry about hearing from me. I will write as often as possible, but time is short. Love your letters.
xxx
Sivvy
TO Enid Mark
Saturday 2 August 1952
TLS with envelope, Smith College
August 2, 1952
Dear Enid . . .
Right about now I am wondering how your job canvassing in New York worked out, and if you are now piling up story material at some Publishing House or other. As for me, in spite of the August dateline, I still feel extremely far from the campus life the Springfield Daily News and the Smith Review. You know that peculiar feeling when your time-sense gets thrown off and you can’t imagine ever having done anything but what your present job entails? Well, that’s the way I’ve felt twice this summer.
My first venture was at the gigantic suave hotel, the Belmont, in West Harwich on Cape Cod. I had a lovely hectic three weeks, learning to balance trays stacked with dishes precariously shoulder height on my left hand, to wear long-sleeved black cotton uniforms and stockings (ugh!) three times a day without screaming, and to getting along with all types of peculiar professional people who follow the trade up from Florida to the Cape and back again all their lives long. All kinds of grotesque character types who would seem artificial in a story because of their almost mechanical functional lives . . . they were even known by their occupational names alone, like Ray-the-Coffeeman (a paunchy old bulldog of a man with a predatory leer who slouched grumpily over the coffee tanks all day, making hundreds of gallons over and over again) or Dave-the-Roast-Cook, or Bill-the-Bar-Boy. All very interesting hotel lingo.
Unfortunately my experience was cut short by my coming down with a sinus infection as a result of my rather continuous night life. Social life among the help, a group of about seventy college boys and girls, began about 10:30 at night, after everybody was off work, and lasted, in the form of dances or beachparties, till almost dawn. Daytimes were spent with three short two-hour work shifts at mealtime, and beaching or sleeping in between.
The whole deal was like college with the lid off, only a lot more strenuous. I had one final fling before the doctor sent me home to recuperate away from the noisy smoke-filled furor of the girls’ dorm. Fortunately I was supposed to have a tennis date with a boy from Wellesley that afternoon, so I greeted him with a little black suitcase instead of a tennis racket and wangled a ride home. He thought the whole thing about being sick was a big joke, and that I just wanted a short vacation, because I was very bright-eyed and gay, having at the time both a very good tan and an even better fever. I had a terrible time keeping up a sprightly conversation on the long drive home, as my voice was leaving me octave by octave, so I just pretended it was very low and husky anyway. I spent about a week at home in bed in a voiceless coma, and meanwhile mother called the Belmont and told them I wouldn’t be coming back (she thought I’d been slaving too hard for a mere pittance), so there I was out of a job.
Reading want adds was a lot of fun, and I considered all sorts of unique and peculiar things, like painting parchment lampshades for a company in Boston, or being a Real Estate agent’s assistant . . . but my burning desire to be back at the cool Cape, with the ocean nearby, and the clean windswept beaches, and all the young people won out. I answered an add for a mother’s helper (in spite of my vow Never to be one again after the fiasco last summer) for a family of Jewish Christian Scientists in Chatham, and here I am. I really am much more at home here than I thought I’d be, and the people are lovely and warm and intelligent. My day is a long one, lasting from 7 a.m. till after the two youngest (Bill, 3½ and Sue, 5½) are in bed, but I get to take them to the beach daily in the beautiful shiny Chevvy station wagon (a new toy for me) and there is plenty of sun, good food (Mrs. Cantor makes all sorts of delectable things with sour cream, buttermilk, garlic, etc.) and merriment. I’ve been dating Dick about once or twice a week (He’s waiting with his brother 12 miles away in Brewster). We’ve been to the Cape Playhouse in Dennis (run by Richard Aldrich, the husband of Gertrude Lawrence*) twice, to see Dana Andrews in “Glass Menagerie” and the Ballet Variante. Both excellent in their own unique way. Tennis and swimming on days off have been the order of the occasion.
An item of interest. I met a brilliant ugly Yale Law student while working at the Belmont, and as far as I’m concerned, he holds the job of the summer. Get this: He gets paid $100 a week for being the night attendant to a millionaire down here . . . and he sits up all night reading fascinating books, sleeps all morning, gets driven to the beach or tennis court in the afternoon by the chauffeur, and has all sorts of good food in the bargain. I had a chance to visit him on my day off last week, previous to our going out for a lobster dinner on some old atmospheric wharf overlooking the ocean, and actually met this amazing old couple. Mr. B. is a senile crochety old man, and Mrs. B. (who entertained us from her bed where she is confined with heart trouble) is the wittiest old lady of 81 you could imagine. I had to admire her emerald, a large lovely hunk of green stone, and listen to her tales of all the celebrities she had known intimately in her time. All very unusual and intrigueing.
So the summer isn’t too deadly after all. In spite of the fact I don’t have any time to write or pore through all the intellectual tomes of literature that I have on my cobwebbed reading list. I do look terribly forward, actually, to being academic again. What a relief to be working for my own improvement, and not someone elses’!!
I look very forward to seeing you in the fall and hearing in detail about your summer; also, t
o reading anything you’ve written recently.
Write if you get a chance.
Yours,
Sylvia
TO Aurelia Schober Plath
Monday 4 August 1952
ALS with envelope,
Indiana University
monday night
august 4
9 p.m.
Dear mother . . .
I am sitting on the edge of my bed, weary, grubby, and waiting for Joanie to get through with the bathroom so I can wash my hair. We have had a most wonderful and packed day. Honestly, I’m glad I have my little calendar to jot down what happens, because otherwise I would lose track of time completely. The days, so long and varied they seem weeks in themselves, tumble almost immediately into a great dark abyss in my memory, and it is almost impossible to recall, for instance, what happened yesterday, or whether yesterday was Sunday – already it seems so far back.
Today I got up at 7:30 and went down to get Billy’s breakfast, set the table, put water on, etc. Then we all had breakfast. Together: Warren would love this menu: cantalope, scrambled eggs, bacon, kippered herring, several Bisquick muffins, bread and strawberry jam, topped off by good scalding coffee. Wow!
After dishes, we all did the big laundry – 12 sheets plus clothes. Lunch was good borscht and toasted rye bread & cheese. Then Mr. & Mrs. Cantor left for an afternoon, dinner & evening at the Southward Inn (Rotary Club).
Joanie and I cleaned up the kitchen & packed a huge picnic supper & got the kids up. We stopped in town to buy peaches, grapes & tomatoes. Then to Brewster to pick up Dick & Perry (all approved of by the Cantors.) Boy, did I feel capable and proud driving the load of them, picnic & all, in the great cruisy green station wagon. We picked up Star, their golden retriever, at the Kennels, and Edna Kelly at her house, and went to a wonderful beach in Dennis. By this time it was after four. All of us played on the wonderful hard flat sand, running, jumping, building dikes & moats. The children fell in love with Dick, and we ran around carrying them piggyback, etc. We all fell hungrily on the picnic, devouring sandwiches, milk and fruit with gusto. I dropped milky baby-talking fragile Edna, then the boys, and got home by 8 in a heavy fog.
It is now a little after 10, and I have finished drying my hair under the dryer. Tomorrow we get up at 6:30 as Mr. Cantor leaves then and it is cleaning day. The Cantors just got in and heard about our Afternoon. Dick & Perry (Dick’s & my idea) plan to take Joanie & me to the theatre next week, or movies. We thought it would be a treat for Joan, and the Cantor’s seem very pleased.
Oh, yesterday I went to Xian Science Sunday School with Joan. I asked so many questions & answered just the way I thought I should that the teacher, a bleached plump rather dumb blonde woman who glibly extols “our beloved leader M. B. E.”* – thought I was an old veteran! I plan to go every Sunday I’m here. Luckily, out of our queer mixed class of 5, there is a boy almost my age who is very cute and precocious. He took an immediate liking to me (I read “Science & Health”* aloud beautifully in class! Without choking or being struck by a bolt of lightning for hypocracy!*) and came up afterwards to ask me to go to a double header baseball game that afternoon. I was really sorry to refuse – it would be fun to try to proselytize him subtly out of Xian Science! The Cantors know his family, so I hope to see him every week at church, maybe get acquainted.
Last night I added to my role as Joan’s companion by driving her to a handwriting analysis session at the Chatham Bars Inn. It was sort of fun, and we went up afterwards & had ours analyzed. I was really surprised. She said I was the most intuitive person she’d had that night – also that I was very artistic – had a flair for color, pattern & line. Not bad, for a starter.
So far there’s hardly been a day Art or Dick hasn’t called or visited – six calls in all from Dick, and six visits or times together – seven calls from Art, and two dates. So life is far from lonely –
Love to you all –
Sylvia
TO Warren Plath
Sunday 10 August 1952*
ALS (photocopy),
Indiana University
Sunday – 3:30 p.m.
Dear Fellow-Spirit . . .
Well, after a hectic day your sister is taking a well-deserved 5 minutes rest off her little flat feet. We have 3 weekend guests – Mr. and Mrs. Rock (you know, granulated and his wife Igneous) an elderly couple – he fat and bald and crustily humorous – she sort of nondescript. Also Cousin Marvin Cantor* who is 22, about 5'11", and very nice looking with brown wavy hair and blue eyes. (As you may imagine, it lightens the work considerably to have someone flirting with you in the kitchen.) Yesterday we spent running around getting the house and food ready, and had a huge lobster and chicken dinner last night with twelve people. Dishes took Joanie and me almost 2 hours, but we put on records and danced in the kitchen – I actually getting a whirl with the worldly Marvy. Then the whole gang of them left to go dancing at the Chatham Bars Inn. I was too sleepy to do anything but type a few letters. and iron some things. Dick drove over about quarter of 11 and stayed and talked till 12 – and had a very nice time sitting out on the front steps in the fog that was blowing in wet and dark from the sea. All the Cantors like Dick very much, and he them.
Today I went to Sunday School again and had an even better time. During the service I could hardly help bursting out in chortling laughter as I thought how my meek and sweetly pious face covered a wicked wicked belief in the matter and how satan himself was curled up in my left ventricle chuckling at them. In Sunday School class I answered questions, nodded fervently, smilingly told one girl that of course since God was the only reality, that all else was a mere figment of man’s imagination – and matter was a mere false myth. I am getting better at this than they are themselves. The poor teacher, a simple-minded bleached spiritual blonde, thinks I am just wonderful – and complimented me on my heartfelt reading of the “Science & Health” text in class. Oh, it’s all very amusing. Especially since the tall young boy – Bob* – I spoke of last time, asked if he could come see me (I had told him I would like to discuss Science with him sometime.) and I demurely said yes-some-evening-next-week-he-could-visit. He must be about 17 or 18, but I shall be interested to get to know him better – a very precocious character, I think. So after all our discussion in class of how matter is a mere false illusion – we both drove off proudly waving to each other – he in his light blue convert and me in my green stationwagon. Oh, the false gorgeous beauty of matter! Ho ho.
Friday, as Mrs. Cantor was in Boston all day, I had charge of the house. The morning was nice enough for me to drive the infants to their swimming lesson, and after that I drove to the egg farm for 4 doz. eggs, and then over to Harwichport to get several armloads of zinnias to arrange for company. All afternoon, thank God, it poured rain, so there was no Band Concert that night (meaning the children were in bed at 8 instead of 10 – making life much easier.)
I took advantage of Joan’s presence to drive downtown in the rain to the Bookmobile under pretense of getting a book for Marcia’s birthday (which I did) but really to pay homage to Val Gendron. She actually remembered me and wants me to bring over Mlle next week so she can read it. By dint of much skill on my part, I got what I have been aiming for all along – an actual invitation to a bull session at her shack in South Dennis some evening when she’s off!!! She gave me a tremendous system about writing which is too long to explain here, but I’m going to do it all this year. She actually said if I was serious and had stuff to show her in a year or so, she’d look it over, or introduce me to her agent in New York, no less! So I am going to get to work this year. If I maneuver it right, and get a night off a week from Monday (cross your fingers) Art said he’d drive me over (my company on the drive is enough inducement!) and drop me at her house. And she said she’d drive me back. So I hope it works out. Trust me to wind up discussing how-to-get-published in a red-painted chicken coop with a cynical sallow authoress!
I am really getting to know the town of Chatham ba
ckwards and forwards – with all the cruising around I’ve done – driving in a square from here to Orleans to Brewster to Harwich, as I do. Love the Cape – licenses from everywhere – Ontario to South America, and every state in the union. One N.Y. license plate at the Inn is simply –
Life is: juggling people and activities all the time – most stimulating. I am far from lonely, as you can see. And am getting in all the things I want to in the dizzy colored spiral of whirling spheroids – including several male heads – also atoms and molecules. Have read 30 pages. If I get 200 done now down here (10 per day) I could do all reading & papers in 2 solid weeks at home. I am going to do it, I feel it in my matter!
I was glad to get my acceptance from 17!* That Nat Gittelson* is sure a good judge of excellent stuff! She’s quicker on accepting poems than Margot* was. (I only hope this wasn’t just a softening of the blow of rejecting all my 3 stories. I’m ’spicious!)
Well, keep fighting the female situation – as my Sunday School teacher said with a humble giggle – pointing to “Science & Health” – “we have all the ansahs to everything right heah, aftah all!” I’ll take on neurotic M. B. Eddy any day! You’ve got to be healthy and sane to appreciate matter. N’est-ce pas? Also himmel.
“Life is incorrigably plural and more of it than we think . . . ”*
Love to you & mum . . .
Sivvy
TO Aurelia Schober Plath
Friday 15 August 1952*
ALS with envelope,
Indiana University
Friday
Dear Mum . . .
I took Thursday for my day-off this week instead of Wednesday, as Mrs. C was having a big luncheon Wed. and needed my help badly. As if in reward for my accommodation, the weather yesterday was flawless and we had the best “day-off” ever.