The Letters of Sylvia Plath Volume 1

by Sylvia Plath

  Afternoon – working in Abels office.

  This week has no night activities, but affairs scheduled afterwards include Fashion tours (e.g. John Frederics hats*), UN* & Herald Trib* tours, movie preview,* City Center ballet,* “Misalliance,”* TV show* – Dance at St. Regis Roof* & dinner – sounds exotic, what?

  Oh, yesterday p.m. – went to Richard Hudnut* – got shampoo (very convenient as I just started my period) and little trim – refused drastic cutting, still look like me. Alas.

  glad about $75 from Harvard. Every little bit helps.

  please sign enclosed form – face cloth or two would be nice. Be good to yourself – Warren’s paper sounds fine –

  love – your managing ed

  syrilly

  TO Aurelia Schober Plath

  Monday 8 June 1953

  TLS on Mademoiselle letterhead,

  Indiana University

  June 8, 1953

  Dearest mother . . .

  Life passes so fast and furiously that there is hardly time to assimilate it. I’m going to bed early tonight, as the rest of the week is pretty fully scheduled. Tomorrow night I’m going to attend the Herb Shriner television show with 3 other guest eds . . . we have guest tickets. Wednesday is the big dinner and formal dance at the St. Regis for all the guest eds and sundry men . . . don’t know whom. Just hope I meet some interesting guys so I can go out without paying for it myself and see New York. Thursday is the City Center Ballet.

  Work is continuous . . . I’m reading manuscripts all day in Miss Abels office, learning countless lots by hearing her phone conversations, etc. Reading manuscripts by Elizabeth Bowen, Rumer Godden,* Noel Coward,* Dylan Thomas, et al. Commenting on all. Getting tremendous education. Also writing and typing rejections, signed with my own name! Sent one to a man on the New Yorker staff today with a perverse sense of poetic justice.

  Saturday, slept, toured Museum of modern art . . . loved it. Shopped for minor necessities in Bloomingdales . . . got my black patent leathers . . . they have everything at good prices. A relief. Spent Saturday evening in Greenwich Village with Laurie Totten* seeing annual outdoor art exhibit in Washington Square . . . fascinatingly diverse . . . paintings and portrait artists all over the place. Then home. Sunday afternoon we wandered all about Central Park, in the zoo, to the carousel, and sat on benches for hours just watching the phenomenal people go by . . . didn’t hear a word of English spoken all day!

  Business: have written Perry and Rit and Bev little congratulatory notes. Nice letter from Prouty,* whom I’d like to drop in on before starting summer school. Have a horrible feeling I probably won’t get into O’Connor’s course. Send “Mintons” clipped from old review (in little Warren’s ole bureau) AND the first section from one of my creative writing assignments this year called “The Birthday”. Should be in my green file under “Themes”. Be sure it’s just the first part about the birthday party and Irish Helen, not the other episodes . . . all unrelated. Erase comments if possible, or better still, retype, and send. That incident might help me. I’m dubious about getting in, as all people in U.S. will no doubt try to.

  Also, could you send you’re lovely navy blue umbrella as soon as possible? It would help no end when it rains. Won’t bother about modern Picasso painting. Miss you all. Life happens so hard and fast I sometimes wonder who is me. I must get to bed. Time is at a premium. Love hearing from you. Letters mean much. So much to do, and a month is such an infinitesimal amount of time.

  August issue will be full of us all . . . several pictures, also last word*. . . introduction to whole issue which I just got finished writing in my capacity as managing editor. Poet feature all done. Looks great.

  Wearily, still amazedly that there are so many people and animals in the big huge world . . . .

  your citystruck,

  sivvy

  love specially to Warren, whom Mrs. Prouty also thinks is wonderful and would like to meet. How is he? I miss him more than anybody and am learning a lot about the world that I will tell him.

  Saw a yak at the zoo, and a soft-nosed infinitely patient eland, and a sleepy polar bear and several civet cats. Will go again when more kinds and different names are awake. Most were asleep as it was twilight when I went. But I heard a heffalump snore. I know I did.

  love and more love

  s.

  TO Aurelia Schober Plath

  Saturday 13 June 1953*

  TLS with envelope,

  on Mademoiselle letterhead,

  Indiana University

  Saturday morning

  Dear mother . . . .

  Well, I went to bed at 8.45 last night and slept a good 12 hours, so I now feel that I could write the great American novel, walk up and around the whole island of New York and construct a Philosophy of Life. If I perchance sounded wistful in my letters, it was mainly because I was very tired and wishing that I knew Men in the city that could take me the places that I couldn’t go alone at night.

  The dance Wednesday night produced no potential dates for me, and most of the other girls, although a few ended up with eligible New Yorkers. However, in itself, it was spectacular and most thrilling. We had cocktails on the outdoor sky terrace of the St. Regis roof, with hedges around the iron railings, the sun going down in glory, and all the tops of the buildings around. I had my picture taken (one of the 20 for the Editors memo in which we all appear) in a foursome,* daquiri in hand, big beaming smile of joy on face . . . wish I could get the big copy of it, cause it’s a great picture of me . . . will appear in minute size in mag all over nation with caption something like: “Sylvia and Anne* smile ecstatically over champagne and two male dates of girls in the office”.

  Dinner was lovely, music, dancing between courses, shrimp, chicken, salad, parfaits, cordials, etc. etc, and two bands that alternated, one sinking into the floor, the other rising, taking up the same tune so that there was no apparent break. Rosy ceiling, painted like sunset sky, pink tableclothes, everything washed with a rose glow and outside the floorlength windows: all the lights of the New York skyscrapers. My dinner partners were 3 boys from Columbia, all about my height, one of whom was quite goodlooking, all of whom were embryonic composers of lyrics and showtunes and actors in the dramatic club. The goodlooking one was supposed to drive me to Jones Beach* today but since the temperature is sub-zero and the ceiling of clouds is lower than the trees,, we called it off . . . which leaves me dateless for the weekend. After writing letters to everybody this morning, I am going to take a sketch pad and walk over as much of the city of New York as possible before nightfall, when I will come back and go to bed . . . early. The prospect pleases me . . . I will make the most of being off on my own and not sulk in my Barbizon trou.

  Since Mlle pays us every two weeks at the end of two weeks, I cashed your welcome and much-needed check to pay my hotel bill for these first two weeks. I’ll pay you back when I come home. Other business: sent O’Connor letter off with Minton story alone, as you suggested. The other sketch was awful; I hadn’t realized how awful. I just pray I get into the O’Connor course because I want to write this summer, and being there on scholarship means I have to take two courses, so if I don’t get O’Connor, I’ll have to take another course, and wouldn’t have time to write . . . and also won’t have time to write while doing my thesis, which would be disastrous. I of course can make changes in my program, even drop the scholarship and take only one course so I can write, but that will have to wait until I see what develops with O’Connor. I no doubt have competition from all over the nations, even from many professional writers and grown-ups. Let me know what you think about my chances, also my determination to have time to really work at writing daily, which I have never done.

  My job in the office, is, I am sure, the most valuable I could ever have. Met Santha Rama Rau* yesterday (she’s a very good friend of Miss Abels) . . . went to lunch with Miss Abels and Vance Bourjailly* Thursday (he’s the co-editor of a new and wonderful literary periodical: “discovery” and had a
lovely talk . . . and I made a mental note that I wanted to try writing stories for his periodical . . . real excellent “literary” publication). Paul Engle,* poet-teacher of a new program at Iowa State where you can get your MA in creative writing, dropped in, talked, read some of my poems, and poems by a friend guest editor who writes brilliantly . . . and said he’d send us booklets describing the Iowa graduate program . . . he’s co-editor of the O’Henry collection this year.

  Lots of the other girls just have “busy work” to do, but I am constantly reading fascinating manuscripts and making little memo comments on them, and getting an idea of what Mlle publishes and why . . . . I am awfully fond of Miss Abels, and think she is the most brilliant clever woman I have ever known.

  Thursday night, on the way to the New York Center ballet, our taxi was stopped in traffic, and a very genial tall man came over, leaned in, paid the fare, and said to the four of us: “Too many pretty girls for one taxi. I’m Art Ford,* the disc jockey. Come in for a talk.” So we got out, went into a cafe, were treated to a cocktail and a standing invitation to be taken by Art Ford (written up by MLLE as one of the bright young men in New York) to Greenwich Village after his night show got over at 3 a.m. A pleasant interlude. The ballet, with Maria Tallchief* and Tanaquil LeClerq,* was magnificent . . . Scotch Symphony, Metamorphoses, Fanfare, and Con Amore.

  In the intermission, one of those peculiar coincidences happened which always evidently do in New York . . . I met Mel Woody, a tall blond sophomore at Yale, and who was in much the same relationship to Marcia that Phil McCurdy was to me a while back. He is a brilliant guy, very nice, and chivalrously offered to take me out for beer and a talk after the show . . . we walked to third avenue, collecting chianti bottles in the back of restaurants, peering in windows, listening to violinists on street corners, stting over beer steins in a small cafe and talking about our respective philosophies of life till about 2 a.m. Very stimulating, and I had a lovely time with the boy.

  The main surprise that has touched me . . . Gregory Kamirloff1 called yesterday from the UN (Mrs. Norton had written him to say I was in New York) and invited me out for the beginning of next week. I was so overcome that I called up Mrs. Norton to thank her and to ask for details concerning the man so I would at least recognize him in the lobby. (She no doubt is sure I am completely mad.) Anyway, I won’t wear heels, because he doesn’t sound very tall, but for one evening that shouldn’t matter, and if I get rested this weekend, I should be able to engage the brilliant character in some kind of conversation which he doesn’t find too dull. At this point, I don’t know whether he is just going to see me for a short talk, or take me on a tour of the UN, or what. Cross your fingers that it goes all right.

  If you look at the television game of the Yankees next Saturday, you might see some of the guest editors if they teleview the audience, as we will be there in a guest box.

  Did I tell you that some of us went to see the Herb Shriner show last Tuesday? It was very exciting, and lots of fun, and Herb Shriner is a real dear. To see the TV cameras roll down the ramps and focus on 3 stage sets, and then to see the picture simultaneously on the TV sets ahead, was really intriguing. TV is a rising thing . . . I wonder what it would be like to write for it

  Thoughts are with you and Warren at graduation this weekend. Hope all goes well. Really, I couldn’t have come with the cost of it. Money goes like water here, and I rebel against ever taking taxis, but walk everywhere.

  It is a big unbelievable town, and I will be homesick for it. I love being Guest managing ed. We’ll all have our pictures in Mlle four times* . . . I have the poet article and the Introduction bylines, too.

  Your rested daughter . . . .

  sivvy

  TO Myron Lotz

  Saturday 13 June 1953

  TLS on Mademoiselle letterhead,

  Indiana University

  Saturday, June 13

  Dear Mike . . .

  Got your postcard today, felt inexplicable nostalgia for scent of magnolia mingling with tobacco, and imagined you striking out gasping batters right and left and getting a bronze tan at the same time. I liked hearing from you, because it is almost as good as having a conversation with a special friend.

  Here I am living at the Barbizon Hotel for circumspect young women, on the 15th floor, overlooking the 3rd street el, rooftops, gardens, and a minute chink of the East River . . . and, if I lean far enough out the window, the UN. Never have I lived so high, and it is a thrill to sit at my desk at night, music on the radio, typing away, empty Chianti bottles on the table, and look out at the colored lights winking and shining across the east side.

  I’m Guest Managing Editor of MLLE, hang out in the office of brilliant managing ed Cyrilly Abels, who, I’m convinced of it, knows all the writers, publishers, and poets in the world. Have met many intriguing people through her, such as Santha Rama Rau, the Indian woman writer who went to Wellesley College once upon a time; the new co-editor of the O’Henry short story collections; and several authors. I type rejection letters, read fascinating manuscripts and write comments on them, run errands, and generally listen to Cyrilly Abels conversations on the phone and with important people, and am learning innumerable things about magazine work and human beings.

  Extra-curricular activities have included fashion show, guest tickets to Herb Shriner’s TV show “Two for the Money” (I never watch TV, but seeing the mechanics of the ramps and stagesets and rolling cameras was an experience I’ll never forget. This modern age. Sometimes I think it is impossible to comprehend and assimilate more than an infinitely small and modest segment of the total-time-space existence . . . so small and transient that it is at once pathetic and laughable.) Anyhow, this week we had our big Guest Editors dinner dance and party on the St. Regis roof overlooking the city and sunset; tablecloths, chairs, ceiling et. al. colored pink, the world awash with rosy glow, and music continuous, with two bands that alternated, one sinking into the floor, the other rising and playing the same song so that no break was discernible, and outside the windows, all the lights of the city. So wish you could have been there. Had picture taken with cocktail glass in hand, most untypical and cosmopolitan, for MLLE.

  Night before last all 20 of us had orchestra seats for the New York City Center ballet . . . you would have been elated to see it, I know: Maria Tallchief and Tanaquil LEClerq starred; the four selections were “Con Amore”, music by Rossini;* “Scotch Symphony”(Mendelssohn),* a lyric poem of grace and enacted on a sweeping blue and green craggy scottish set; then the oriental Hindemith’s* “Metamorphoses”, with Balinese-type dances, shimmering insect costumes, and an intriguing episode with wings. The last section was Benjamin Britain’s* “Fanfare”, where every dancer was dressed as an instrument in the orchestra: the woodwinds a haunting poignant blue color, the violins and strings starting out warm rose, and descending in color and tone range to a vibrant red for the double bass . . . brasses an insolent yellow, percussion, clownish black, white and red, and the harp a white queen. All most humorous and charming.

  After which I by utter chance met a friend of mine in the lobby, walked all over the 3rd street section of the city, where there are innumerable and bizarre antique shops under the shade of the 3rd avenue El, plus hundreds of bars . . . went into a plotzy German one where the tables were heavy scarred wood, and an accordianist, pianist and violinist played and everybody sang . . . then to a little red checked tableclothed one, observed people, discussed philosophies of life, all strange and other-worldly. Lives drip away like water here, not even making a dent in the acres of concrete.

  Last weekend, I wandered around central park, discovered a carousel, baseball park, zoo, and didn’t hear a word of English the whole time. Also went to Museum of Modern Art and to an annual open air art exhibit in Greenwich Village. Drank gingerale in a sidewalk cafe, contemplated the Empire State Building.

  Today it is sub-zero, pouring rain, and the fog hangs low, shredded among the gleaming wet black rooftops. I might just
go out and walk alone in the rain later on. I like to do that.

  Arrowsmith* almost made me cry in places. I loved . . . was it Gottleib? It was so long ago that I read it. Tell me what you think about it.

  Any time you want to talk on paper, just write me c/O 26 Elmwood. Anything: gripes, elations, horrors, loves, livings, details . . . I like listening to anything that comes to your mind.

  Am seeing the Yankees next saturday* at the stadium: wish you could be beside me to point out all the details I’m sure to miss, neophyte that I am. We’re guests of Mel Allen.* Ever know a guy named Jim Biery* in Keokuk? He’s engaged to one of my favorite guest eds* here. Told her about you.

  your bucolic newyorker,

  syl

  P.S. don’t forget to sneak incognito to the mag stands & get a copy of the AUGUST Mademoiselle!

  TO Warren Plath

  Sunday 21 June 1953

  TLS (photocopy) on Mademoiselle

  letterhead, Indiana University

  June 21

  Dear Warren . . .

  Forgive me for not writing years ago to tell you how tremendously enormously proud I am of you and your superlative honorific graduation. I thought about you all that weekend, and if I could have traveled for nothing with the speed of thought, I would have been there in person to congratulate you a million times. I am so glad I have you for a brother.

  I have not rounded up letter paper and a 3 cent stamp for a long time, and I just today felt: heavens, I haven’t thought about who I am or where I come from for days. It is abominably hot in NYC . . . the humidity is staggering, and I am perishing for the clean unsooted greenness of our backyard.

  I have learned an amazing lot here: the world has split open before my gaping eyes and spilt out its guts like a cracked watermelon. I think it will not be until I have meditated in peace upon the multitude of things I have learned and seen that I will begin to comprehend what has happened to me this last month. I am worn out now, with the strenuous days at the office and the heat and the evenings out . . . I want to come home and sleep and sleep and play tennis and get tan again (I am an unhealthy shade of yellow, now) and learn what I have been doing this last year.