by Sylvia Plath
Now, about the Morocco job. I thought I would wait until my interview with Mr. Robert Shea,* head of the American School in Tangier, today, before countering all your arguments, which I now feel very justified in doing.
I was sorry that you jumped to hasty conclusions about both the job and my future plans before waiting to hear the facts. Obviously you are against the job, or you would realize that your questions, while practical, have no real bearing on the subject at hand, which is what I want to do with my time.
Now with me, writing is the first delight in life. I want time and money to write, both very necessary. I will not sacrifice my time to learn shorthand because I do not want any of the jobs which shorthand would open up, although those jobs are no doubt very interesting for girls who want them. I do not want the rigid hours of a magazine or publishing job. I do not want to type other people’s letters and read their manuscripts. I want to type my own and write my own. So secretarial training is out for me. That I know. Of course I shall be glad to learn the dictaphone and other machines with you spring vacation, because I may have to do part time work now and then.
As for the job teaching fifth grade (it is really any grade from kindergarten to 8th), the charming, handsome diplomat who interviewed me today stressed that in the very new school in Tangier which has 200 pupils of over 20 different nationalities, wants good will, interest and a general liberal arts education in preference to a rigid program of education courses. That is why he is interviewing seniors at Smith. The program at the school (which has 13 teachers) puts each new recruit with a seasoned teacher (he showed me pictures of one from England who has her ‘life certificate’ and one from Sweden who is also superbly trained). Thus they initiate their own staff to their own needs which are unique, and which no Teachers’ College in the world could begin to prepare for. As you no doubt know, it is only the public schools which ask for “specific information and preparation.” The private schools have descended on Smith seniors avidly demanding girls without any education courses to join their programs at top salaries and openly prefer not to have those with preconceived notions. They teach their own.
So much for the need of preparation. As you see, I would be expected to do nothing more than learn from the expert teacher who shared my grade, and to teach the whole grade, all courses, which would be a remarkably versatile training for me. I believe that in America much too much emphasis is put on courses---with the idea that anything from cooking to writing can be mastered if a course certificate is had. Well, I believe I can learn from books by myself, and certainly will read up on my age group and lesson theories when and if I get this job . .
I do not want state certification or more years sitting at a desk learning how to teach when I can live and learn from the best schoolbook yet: real children in a real international community. This is the beginning of my professional training, The “veteran” teachers in Tangier are if anything more skilled and versatile than those here, so I will be a trainee there, too. This will thus eliminate all fear of “failure” which you seem to have. A lively love and general education and creative outlook are what they want. They will train themselves.
As for this job, I certainly am looking beyond the “vacation.” You say that the teaching experience would not help me get a job here! I don’t see how you can ignore the reputation of an international school, where at the third grade each pupil starts a 2nd language, and where the demands for versatility and quick thinking are everywhere, what with the international and interracial problems in this community!
You see, all your worries about “teacher training” are inapplicable here, and Sue and I would live in an apartment (the most luxurious, with patio and 5 or 6 rooms is $50 a month!) and do our own cooking (food is abundant, especially fruit and vegetables). We would have a maid to purchase for us because her salary would cost no more than what we would be cheated out of as foreigners at the public markets. Our program would be 5 days a week from about 9-4, beginning in the middle of September till June 30.
I can hardly describe the vitality of this small international community, which was founded, according to legend, by Antheus, the son of Neptune, and which is governed by a Committee of Consuls of Spain, France, Portugal, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Great Britain and the U.S. The man who spoke to me is head of the school, and he is the sort that would be the utmost delight to work under . . . he has a radiance and a love that make me really want to serve. English is taught, and is the language of the school; French is the language of the polite society; Spanish is the language of the street. And the rest ranges from Icelandic to Arabic.
How can you not see that living here would be a thousand times more advantageous for my languages and growing interest in international politics than “courses” at a sweet American desk?
The question for me is not a “definite objective”, but rather a growing way of life which can adapt itself to surprises and alterations of all sorts. After a year in England, or a year in Morocco, who knows what I wouldn’t be equipped to do? With me, the process of living is a justification in itself, especially if I believe in it with my mind, heart and soul. I have no time to waste, as you so well realize, but our interpretations of wasted time are quite different. To me, anything which will not let me write and grow and learn by leaps and bounds in my own way, which is more and more versatile, is not only confining, but stunting.
The international outlook is the coming world view, and I hope to be a part of that community with all I have in me. I am young enough to learn languages by living, and not the artificial acceleration or plodding of “book” courses. I want people opposite me at tables, at desks, not merely books.
I do hope you do not get blind with anger at these statements, which, I think you will find, upon careful, cool consideration, are not only logical, but live up to my ideas of the true life.
As for the climate and culture in Morocco, you will be glad to know that it is healthier than England and New England by far! It is a “Cool, dry climate with a hot sun”, which is just my dish . . . and the doctors are excellent, as Mr. Shea said, and the American Navy Base has plane service nearby to the school in case an appendix needed to be cut out, so there is no worry there. Mr. Shea is like the intelligent, loving, liberal father I have always longed for, and I can think of no man except Mr. Crockett who so much made me think that there are saints on earth, with a radiance and love of service and helping others to grow which is almost superhuman. The easy-going sunny nature of this man attracted me from the first. It is impossible not to love him. He is an international Mr. Crockett, and gave up a top job as diplomat in Persia because he loved the project of this school so much.
He is sending Sue and myself applications, and we will not know until late April or early May, which is fine, because all my other offers will be in then, or refusals, as the case may be. Ultimately, although he must discuss us with the Tangier Board, his decision is final.
During my divine poetry hour with Mr. Fisher today, I discussed all this in detail, and he said, after approving heartily (He too was dubious about it last week, when the complete facts weren’t known) “Do you really want this job?” I assented earnestly, and he left the room a moment. When he came back, he said he’d just called the man, who was in the middle of interviews, and given me the highest recommendation he could think of. Such dearness I can hardly believe. Mr. Fisher is the ideal reader and professor for me, for my particular poetry. Week by week I can feel the growth and heightened sensitivity, sprouting up inside me. Again, he treated me to coffee, and I believe I am experiencing the most stimulating creative process of two minds meeting and growing . . . I learn so much from him, and in turn I feel I am giving all that is in me, and he is happy with it.
Well, enough of this rambling. I did feel though that I wanted you to have the facts whereby to make a judicious considered judgment of this possibility which I feel you were not able to do before (and neither was I) because of lack of concrete information.
I have always wanted to combine my creative urges with a kind of service to the world. I am not a missionary in the narrow sense, but I do believe I can counteract McCarthy and much adverse opinion about the U.S. by living a life of honesty and love amidst these people for a short time. It is, in a way, serving my religion, which is that of humanism, and a belief in the potential of each man to learn and love and grow: these children, their underdeveloped lands, their malnutrition, . . . all these factors are not the neat rigid American ideals, but I believe the new races are going to influence the world in turn, much as America did in her day, and however small my part, I want a share in giving to them.
I know what my professors have done for me, how I remember Miss Raguse* and Mr. Crockett, Mary Ellen Chase and Mr. Fisher. Even if my level is only making a Mexican get excited about history, or dramatizing a government problem simply to recreate an abstract idea vividly, this is what I would like. This is for now. For perhaps only one year. I hope after that to be a much more linguistic and experienced woman. Maybe I’ll be a reporter. Or a poet living in Italy. Or a student at Radcliffe. The important thing is that the choice grows naturally out of my life and is not imposed on it by wellmeaning friends.
Do consider what I say seriously. I hope you understand!
xx
sivvy
TO Gordon Lameyer
Thursday 10 February 1955
TLS in greeting card,*
Indiana University
love, / sylvia / inside ↓
thursday, february 10
dear gordon . . .
forgive me for not being more verbose, but for the first time in my life I’ve been impatient as hell with letters, and want to talk in person because there is so much much much to say. hope I will see you before I explode with all the news . . . .
it is a black month in the sense that a hideous committee of 4 smug men interviewed me at harvard for a national teaching scholarship (ww) and found me wanting because I was a woman and would obviously get married someday. the dean of radcliffe wrote me a very encouraging letter about this, for as the head of the committee was head of harvard grad school, I figured it would annihilate my chances for a grant at radcliffe. not at all she said. I was a woman, and radcliffe is more hospitable to women. so I was relieved there.
otherwise, it has been rejection all around. one poem after another. the worst was a story the “Ladies’ Home Journal” suggested me to rewrite and which they finally rejected a second time, thereby smashing my dreams of $850 to save me from debtors’ prison, where I am rapidly heading. but somehow, I am happier in this wave of refusal than I ever was two years ago on my flashy crest of success . . .
the best part is the weekly sessions with fisher, who as I’ve said hundreds of times, reminds me of you. he is The Reader for my poetry. so sensitive, with a feeling for nuance and allusion, a love for joyce, a linguistic genius, that makes me go around in a state of metaphysical love and light from week to week, writing at least 5 poems a week, and dying to write more and give all else up, and hoping to arrange a book, which is already crystallizing, and should be ready in a year or so . . .
oh, the most fantastic thing is to come (forgive me the queer paging, but I’m getting hectic). I had an interview for a job teaching in morocco today at the american school in tangier, and I can think of nothing else. sue and I want to go together, and the man, robert smith shea, who interviewed us, was the handsomest, most radiant, polished fellow I’ve ever met. we both felt we could literally follow him to the ends of the earth, which is what we may well be doing.
the school itself is in an old sultan’s palace, and there are 200 pupils from 20 different nationalities. I forget whether you’ve been here or not, but he said the port lido (?) navy base was connected to this place by plane. details will have to wait till I see you, and sue and I won’t know definitely till late april, but I am really exhilarated at the prospect of putting my theories and philosophy of life into practice . . . of having people and not merely books opposite me at the desk!
I am obsessed by writing as the first thing in life, and the poems come more and more, as I said. and next I am entranced by the coming importance of an international orientation in life, which is what I want to have. languages in morocco are like the tower of babel: french is for polite society; spanish is for the street; the rest range from arabic to Icelandic . . . . oh, cross your fingers for sue and me! two such desiring ulysses!
loved your last long letter* as always. this semester is much harder than last, and I have dropped to a B* in all my courses except writing, because I am giving my love and time to it . . . but it is worth it for me . . . .
please let me know as soon as you are coming back so I can clear away work and see you the first time possible . . .
bon voyage home, darling . . . .
goodbye for a while, your terza rima dreamer,
sylvia
TO Atlantic Monthly
Saturday 12 February 1955
TLS (photocopy), Yale University
Lawrence House
Smith College
Northampton, Massachusetts
February 12, 1955
Accent on Living Editor
ATLANTIC MONTHLY
8 Arlington Street
Boston 16, Massachusetts
Dear Sir:
Almost five months ago, on September 29, I mailed a group of seven poems to your department, and as I have not heard from you as yet, I should like to make sure that my manuscript has not gone astray.
The poems are: “Never Try To Know More Than You Should,” “Verbal Calisthentics,” “The Dispossessed,” “Insolent Storm Strikes At The Skull,” “Ennui,” “Suspend This Day,” and “Circus in Three Rings.”
At present, I am enclosing six of my recent poems which I hope you will consider for publication in your magazine: “Temper of Time,” “Epitaph in Three Parts,” “Dirge,” “Rondeau Redoublé,” “Danse Macabre”, and “Prologue to Spring.”
If by any chance the stamped, self-addressed envelope which I enclosed with the last set of poems has been lost, I should be glad to send another. At any rate, I should very much appreciate hearing whether the poems were received intact by your department.
Poems, stories and articles of mine have been published previously in Mademoiselle, Seventeen, and Harper’s.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely yours,
Sylvia Plath
TO Ruth Cohen*
c. Monday 14 February 1955*
TL,* Indiana University
Lawrence House
Smith College
Northampton, Massachusetts
Dear Miss Cohen,
I was glad to receive your letter* informing me that I have been admitted as an affiliated student at Newnham College to read for the English Tripos. It is with pleasure that I accept this offer of admission for the two years’ course leading to the B.A. Honours degree.
Recently I was notified that my Fulbright papers have been sent on to Washington and that I am in the final round of the Fulbright competition. Since the outcome of Fulbright applications is not announced until late in the spring, I have also applied for supplementary grants to cover the cost of my first year in England in case the Fulbright is not forthcoming. In any case, I plan to arrive at Newnham in October, 1955.
I should be most appreciative if you would let me know whe
never possible what the increase of College and University fees will involve in new total of expense for an American student so that I will be able to plan my finances accordingly.
I should also be intereste to know about the possibilities for my living in the Hall for graduate students at Newnham. (I believe this is Whitstead Hall).
In conclusion, I wish to thank you for your time and kind consideration. It is with pleasant anticipation that I look forward to my arrival at Newnham next October.
TO Aurelia Schober Plath
Monday 14 February 1955*
ALS (postcard), Indiana University
monday night
dear mother . . .
your welcome check came today, narrowly saving me from debtor’s prison & enabling me to buy my senior robe, which somehow thrilled me. am fighting off a cold with pyrobenzamine and it does wonders, this will be a month of unadulterated work & meetings & so will march. fruits should all bear sometime in april. hope to contradict t. s. eliot’s words that “april is the cruellest month.”* You’ll be happy to hear of an ecstatic coffee hour spent at the home of my dearest friend, mary ellen chase, discussing my plans for next year, which have suddenly taken a bright turn: cambridge university accepted me as a foreign affiliate for 2-year program for honors B.A. – M.A. is automatic & all colleges in america will hold out arms to me as teacher – whole english dept. here is behind me and against machine-made american grad degrees. if fulbright doesn’t come, will get money some how. don’t tell anyone except grandparents & warren. but it looks like what I’ve always wanted in my secret heart –