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“Daddy” by Sylvia Plath: A Critical Analysis

Introduction: “daddy” by sylvia plath.

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Text: “Daddy” by Sylvia Plath

You do not do, you do not do   

For thirty years, poor and white,   

You died before I had time——

Big as a Frisco seal

In the waters off beautiful Nauset.   

In the German tongue, in the Polish town   

But the name of the town is common.   

So I never could tell where you   

The tongue stuck in my jaw.

I could hardly speak.

An engine, an engine

I began to talk like a Jew.

Are not very pure or true.

I may be a bit of a Jew.

And your neat mustache

Not God but a swastika

The boot in the face, the brute   

In the picture I have of you,

Any less the black man who

At twenty I tried to die

But they pulled me out of the sack,   

I made a model of you,

And I said I do, I do.

The voices just can’t worm through.

And drank my blood for a year,

There’s a stake in your fat black heart   

They always knew it was you.

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Themes: “Daddy” by Sylvia Plath

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Daddy Summary & Analysis by Sylvia Plath

• Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis
• Poetic Devices
• Vocabulary & References
• Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme
• Line-by-Line Explanations

"Daddy" is a controversial and highly anthologized poem by the American poet Sylvia Plath. Published posthumously in 1965 as part of the collection Ariel , the poem was originally written in October 1962, a month after Plath's separation from her husband, the poet Ted Hughes, and four months before her death by suicide. It is a deeply complex poem informed by the poet's relationship with her deceased father, Otto Plath. Told from the perspective of a woman addressing her father, the memory of whom has an oppressive power over her, the poem details the speaker's struggle to break free of his influence.

• Read the full text of “Daddy”

The Full Text of “Daddy”

“daddy” summary, “daddy” themes.

Gender and Oppression

Power and Myth-Making

• Lines 22-23
• Lines 24-28
• Lines 30-35
• Lines 36-37
• Lines 38-40
• Lines 41-45
• Lines 46-56
• Lines 64-67
• Lines 71-80

Death and Family Trauma

• Lines 14-15
• Lines 41-67
• Lines 68-70

Lines 75-80

Line-by-line explanation & analysis of “daddy”.

You do not ... ... breathe or Achoo.

Daddy, I have ... ... a Frisco seal

Lines 11-15

And a head ... ... Ach, du.

Lines 16-21

In the German ... ... dozen or two.

Lines 22-27

So I never ... ... ich, ich, ich,

Lines 28-33

I could hardly ... ... Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.

Lines 34-39

I began to ... ... my Taroc pack

Lines 40-45

I may be ... ... panzer-man, O You—

Lines 46-50

Not God but ... ... brute like you.

Lines 51-56

You stand at ... ... heart in two.

Lines 57-62

I was ten ... ... together with glue.

Lines 63-68

And then I ... ... I’m finally through.

Lines 69-74

The black telephone’s ... ... want to know.

Daddy, you can ... ... bastard, I’m through.

“Daddy” Symbols

• Line 2: “black shoe”
• Lines 46-47: “Not God but a swastika / So black no sky could squeak through.”
• Lines 54-56: “no not / Any less the black man who / Bit my pretty red heart in two.”
• Line 65: “A man in black with a Meinkampf look”
• Line 69: “The black telephone’s off at the root”

Holocaust Imagery

• Line 15: “Ach, du.”
• Lines 16-21: “In the German tongue, in the Polish town / Scraped flat by the roller / Of wars, wars, wars. / But the name of the town is common. / My Polack friend / Says there are a dozen or two.”
• Lines 26-35: “It stuck in a barb wire snare. / Ich, ich, ich, ich, / I could hardly speak. / I thought every German was you. / And the language obscene / An engine, an engine / Chuffing me off like a Jew. / A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen. / I began to talk like a Jew. / I think I may well be a Jew.”
• Lines 36-45: “The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna / Are not very pure or true. / With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck  / And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack / I may be a bit of a Jew. / I have always been scared of / you, / With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. / And your neat mustache / And your Aryan eye, bright blue. / Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You—”
• Line 48: “Every woman adores a Fascist,”

The Telephone

• Lines 69-70: “The black telephone’s off at the root, / The voices just can’t worm through.”

• Line 6: “Daddy, I have had to kill you.”
• Line 68: “So daddy, I’m finally through.”
• Line 75: “Daddy, you can lie back now.”
• Line 80: “Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through.”

“Daddy” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

• Lines 1-2: “You do not do, you do not do / Any more, black shoe”
• Lines 6-7: “Daddy, I have had to kill you. / You died before I had time—”
• Lines 14-15: “I used to pray to recover you. / Ach, du.”
• Lines 22-24: “So I never could tell where you / Put your foot, your root, / I never could talk to you.”
• Line 29: “I thought every German was you.”
• Lines 41-45: “I have always been scared of / you, / With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. / And your neat mustache / And your Aryan eye, bright blue. / Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You—”
• Lines 50-53: “Brute heart of a brute like you. / You stand at the blackboard, daddy, / In the picture I have of you, / A cleft in your chin instead of your foot”
• Line 57: “I was ten when they buried you.”
• Line 59: “And get back, back, back to you.”
• Line 64: “I made a model of you,”
• Line 72: “The vampire who said he was you”
• Lines 74-80: “Seven years, if you want to know. / Daddy, you can lie back now. / There’s a stake in your fat black heart / And the villagers never liked you. / They are dancing and stamping on you. / They always  / knew / it was you. / Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through.”
• Lines 8-9: “Marble-heavy, a bag full of God, / Ghastly statue with one gray toe”
• Line 16: “In the German tongue, in the Polish town”
• Line 18: “wars, wars, wars.”
• Line 23: “your foot, your root,”
• Line 33: “A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.”
• Line 36: “The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna”
• Line 42: “With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo.”
• Lines 2-3: “black shoe / In which I have lived like a foot”
• Lines 9-10: “one gray toe / Big as a Frisco seal”
• Line 32: “Chuffing me off like a Jew.”
• Line 34: “I began to talk like a Jew.”
• Lines 16-18
• Lines 25-47
• Lines 54-56
• Lines 61-62
• Lines 69-70
• Lines 2-5: “ black shoe / In which I have lived like a foot / For thirty years, poor and white, / Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.”
• Lines 8-13: “Marble-heavy, a bag full of God, / Ghastly statue with one gray toe / Big as a Frisco seal / And a head in the freakish Atlantic / Where it pours bean green over blue / In the waters off beautiful Nauset.”
• Lines 16-18: “town / Scraped flat by the roller / Of wars, wars, wars.”
• Lines 25-26: “The tongue stuck in my jaw. / It stuck in a barb wire snare.”
• Lines 31-32: “An engine, an engine / Chuffing me off like a Jew.”
• Lines 36-37: “The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna / Are not very pure or true.”
• Lines 43-44: “And your neat mustache / And your Aryan eye, bright blue.”
• Lines 46-47: “a swastika / So black no sky could squeak through.”
• Line 49: “The boot in the face,”
• Lines 51-53: “You stand at the blackboard, daddy, / In the picture I have of you, / A cleft in your chin instead of your foot”
• Line 56: “Bit my pretty red heart in two.”
• Lines 61-62: “But they pulled me out of the sack, / And they stuck me together with glue.”
• Lines 72-73: “The vampire who said he was you / And drank my blood for a year,”
• Line 76: “There’s a stake in your fat black heart”
• Line 78: “They are dancing and stamping on you.”
• Lines 2-3: “shoe / In which I have lived like a foot”
• Lines 11-13: “And a head in the freakish Atlantic / Where it pours bean green over blue / In the waters off beautiful Nauset.”
• Lines 16-19: “the Polish town / Scraped flat by the roller / Of wars, wars, wars. / But the name of the town is common.”
• Lines 31-33: “An engine, an engine / Chuffing me off like a Jew. / A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.”
• Lines 36-39: “The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna / Are not very pure or true. / With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck  / And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack”
• Lines 41-46: “I have always been scared of / you, / With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. / And your neat mustache / And your Aryan eye, bright blue. / Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You— / Not God but a swastika”
• Lines 57-59: “I was ten when they buried you. / At twenty I tried to die / And get back, back, back to you.”
• Line 61: “But they pulled me out of the sack,”
• Line 65: “Meinkampf”
• Line 66: “And a love of the rack and the screw.”
• Lines 1-2: “do / Any”
• Lines 2-3: “shoe / In”
• Lines 3-4: “foot / For”
• Lines 9-10: “toe / Big”
• Lines 10-11: “seal / And”
• Lines 11-12: “Atlantic / Where”
• Lines 12-13: “blue / In”
• Lines 16-17: “town / Scraped”
• Lines 17-18: “roller / Of”
• Lines 20-21: “friend / Says”
• Lines 22-23: “you / Put”
• Lines 30-31: “obscene / An”
• Lines 31-32: “engine / Chuffing”
• Lines 36-37: “Vienna / Are”
• Lines 38-39: “luck  / And”
• Lines 39-40: “pack / I”
• Lines 43-44: “mustache / And”
• Lines 46-47: “swastika / So”
• Lines 49-50: “brute / Brute”
• Lines 53-54: “foot / But”
• Lines 54-55: “not / Any”
• Lines 55-56: “who / Bit”
• Lines 58-59: “die / And”
• Lines 65-66: “look / And”
• Lines 72-73: “you / And”
• Lines 76-77: “heart / And”

End-Stopped Line

• Line 4: “white,”
• Line 5: “Achoo.”
• Line 6: “you.”
• Line 7: “time—”
• Line 8: “God,”
• Line 13: “Nauset.”
• Line 14: “you.”
• Line 15: “du.”
• Line 18: “wars.”
• Line 19: “common.”
• Line 21: “two.”
• Line 23: “root,”
• Line 24: “you.”
• Line 25: “jaw.”
• Line 26: “snare.”
• Line 27: “ich,”
• Line 28: “speak.”
• Line 29: “you.”
• Line 32: “Jew.”
• Line 33: “Belsen.”
• Line 34: “Jew.”
• Line 35: “Jew.”
• Line 37: “true.”
• Line 40: “Jew.”
• Line 41: “you,”
• Line 42: “gobbledygoo.”
• Line 44: “blue.”
• Line 47: “through.”
• Line 48: “Fascist,”
• Line 50: “you.”
• Line 51: “daddy,”
• Line 52: “you,”
• Line 56: “two.”
• Line 57: “you.”
• Line 59: “you.”
• Line 60: “do.”
• Line 61: “sack,”
• Line 62: “glue.”
• Line 63: “do.”
• Line 64: “you,”
• Line 66: “screw.”
• Line 67: “do.”
• Line 68: “through.”
• Line 69: “root,”
• Line 70: “through.”
• Line 71: “two—”
• Line 73: “year,”
• Line 74: “know.”
• Line 75: “now.”
• Line 77: “you.”
• Line 78: “you.”
• Line 79: “you.”
• Line 80: “through.”
• Line 1: “do, you”
• Line 2: “more, black”
• Line 4: “years, poor”
• Line 6: “Daddy, I”
• Line 8: “Marble-heavy, a”
• Line 15: “Ach, du”
• Line 16: “tongue, in”
• Line 18: “wars, wars, wars”
• Line 23: “foot, your”
• Line 27: “Ich, ich, ich, ich”
• Line 31: “engine, an”
• Line 33: “Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen”
• Line 36: “Tyrol, the”
• Line 42: “Luftwaffe, your”
• Line 44: “eye, bright”
• Line 45: “Panzer-man, panzer-man, O”
• Line 49: “face, the”
• Line 51: “blackboard, daddy”
• Line 54: “that, no”
• Line 59: “back, back, back”
• Line 67: “do, I”
• Line 68: “daddy, I’m”
• Line 71: “man, I’ve”
• Line 74: “years, if”
• Line 75: “Daddy, you”
• Line 80: “Daddy, daddy, you,” “bastard, I’m”
• Line 1: “You do not do, you do not do”
• Line 16: “In the,” “in the”
• Line 22: “I never could”
• Line 23: “your,” “your”
• Line 24: “I never could”
• Line 25: “stuck”
• Line 26: “stuck”
• Line 27: “Ich, ich, ich, ich,”
• Line 31: “An engine, an engine”
• Line 32: “a Jew.”
• Line 33: “A Jew”
• Line 34: “a Jew.”
• Line 35: “a Jew.”
• Line 39: “And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack”
• Line 40: “a Jew.”
• Line 42: “your,” “your”
• Line 43: “And your”
• Line 44: “And your”
• Line 45: “Panzer-man, panzer-man,”
• Line 49: “brute”
• Line 50: “Brute,” “brute”
• Line 54: “less”
• Line 55: “less”
• Line 62: “And”
• Line 63: “And,” “do.”
• Line 66: “And”
• Line 67: “And,” “I do, I do.”
• Line 71: “I’ve killed,” “I’ve killed”
• Line 74: “years”
• Line 78: “They,” “you.”
• Line 79: “They,” “you.”
• Line 80: “Daddy, daddy,”

Alliteration

• Line 1: “do,” “do,” “do,” “do”
• Line 3: “lived like”
• Line 5: “daring”
• Line 6: “Daddy,” “have had”
• Line 7: “died”
• Line 8: “bag,” “full,” “God”
• Line 9: “Ghastly,” “gray”
• Line 10: “Big,” “Frisco”
• Line 11: “freakish”
• Line 12: “bean,” “green,” “blue”
• Line 13: “beautiful”
• Line 16: “tongue,” “town”
• Line 24: “talk to”
• Line 25: “tongue,” “stuck”
• Line 26: “stuck,” “snare”
• Line 44: “bright blue”
• Line 46: “swastika”
• Line 47: “So,” “sky,” “squeak”
• Line 49: “boot”
• Line 50: “brute”
• Line 51: “blackboard”
• Line 54: “no,” “no not”
• Line 55: “black”
• Line 56: “Bit,” “two”
• Line 57: “ten,” “buried”
• Line 58: “twenty,” “tried,” “to”
• Line 60: “bones”
• Line 61: “But,” “sack”
• Line 62: “stuck,” “together,” “glue”
• Line 64: “made,” “model”
• Line 65: “man,” “black,” “Meinkampf,” “look”
• Line 66: “love”

Anadiplosis

• Line 71: “If I’ve killed one man, I’ve killed two—”
• Lines 73-74: “year, / Seven years”
• Line 34: “I”
• Line 35: “I”
• Line 36: “The,” “the”
• Line 63: “And”
• Line 67: “And”
• Line 78: “They”
• Line 79: “They”
• Line 1: “You do,” “do,” “you do,” “do”
• Line 2: “shoe”
• Line 5: “Barely daring,” “Achoo”
• Line 7: “died,” “I,” “time”
• Line 9: “Ghastly statue”
• Line 12: “bean green,” “blue”
• Line 13: “waters off,” “beautiful,” “Nauset”
• Line 14: “you”
• Line 15: “du”
• Line 21: “two”
• Line 22: “you”
• Line 23: “Put,” “foot,” “root”
• Line 24: “you”
• Line 29: “you”
• Line 32: “Jew”
• Line 34: “Jew”
• Line 35: “Jew”
• Line 36: “snows,” “Tyrol,” “clear beer”
• Line 37: “true”
• Line 40: “Jew”
• Line 41: “you”
• Line 42: “gobbledygoo”
• Line 44: “blue”
• Line 45: “You”
• Line 46: “God,” “swastika”
• Line 47: “through”
• Line 49: “boot,” “brute”
• Line 50: “Brute,” “brute,” “you”
• Line 52: “you”
• Line 53: “foot”
• Line 54: “less,” “devil”
• Line 55: “less,” “who”
• Line 56: “red,” “two”
• Line 57: “ten when,” “you”
• Line 58: “twenty,” “I tried,” “die”
• Line 59: “get,” “back, back, back,” “you”
• Line 60: “do”
• Line 62: “glue”
• Line 63: “knew,” “do”
• Line 64: “you”
• Line 66: “screw”
• Line 67: “do,” “do”
• Line 68: “through”
• Line 69: “root”
• Line 70: “through”
• Line 71: “two”
• Line 72: “you”
• Line 74: “you”
• Line 75: “Daddy,” “back”
• Line 76: “fat black”
• Line 77: “you”
• Line 78: “dancing,” “stamping,” “you”
• Line 79: “knew,” “you”
• Line 80: “Daddy, daddy, you bastard,” “through”
• Lines 3-4: “foot / For thirty years, poor”
• Line 5: “Barely daring,” “breathe”
• Line 7: “died,” “had”
• Line 8: “Marble-heavy,” “bag full of God”
• Lines 9-10: “gray toe / Big”
• Line 10: “Frisco”
• Line 11: “freakish,” “Atlantic”
• Line 13: “off beautiful Nauset”
• Line 17: “Scraped,” “roller”
• Line 19: “name,” “town,” “common”
• Line 22: “tell”
• Line 25: “tongue stuck”
• Line 26: “stuck,” “barb wire snare”
• Line 28: “could,” “speak”
• Lines 31-32: “An engine, an engine / Chuffing”
• Line 32: “off,” “Jew”
• Line 33: “Jew”
• Line 36: “clear beer”
• Line 37: “very pure or true”
• Line 38: “gipsy ancestress,” “luck”
• Line 39: “Taroc pack,” “Taroc pack”
• Line 47: “So black,” “sky could squeak”
• Line 48: “Fascist”
• Line 49: “boot,” “face”
• Lines 49-50: “brute / Brute heart”
• Line 51: “blackboard,” “daddy”
• Line 52: “picture”
• Line 53: “cleft”
• Line 54: “But,” “less,” “devil,” “no not”
• Line 55: “less,” “black man”
• Line 56: “Bit,” “pretty red heart,” “two”
• Line 58: “At twenty,” “tried to”
• Line 61: “sack”
• Line 62: “stuck”
• Line 65: “man in black,” “Meinkampf look”
• Line 66: “love,” “rack,” “screw”
• Line 67: “said,” “do,” “do”
• Line 68: “daddy”
• Line 69: “telephone’s off”
• Line 71: “killed,” “killed”
• Line 73: “drank,” “blood”
• Line 75: “can,” “back”
• Line 76: “stake,” “black”
• Line 77: “villagers never,” “liked”
• Line 78: “dancing,” “stamping”
• Line 80: “Daddy, daddy,” “bastard”
• Line 45: “Panzer-man, panzer-man”
• Line 67: “I do, I do.”
• Line 55: “ less”
• Line 73: “year”
• Line 74: “ years”

Onomatopoeia

• Line 5: “Achoo”
• Line 32: “Chuffing”

“Daddy” Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen
• Gobbledygoo
• The rack and the screw
• (Location in poem: Line 9: “Ghastly”)

Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Daddy”

Rhyme scheme, “daddy” speaker, “daddy” setting, literary and historical context of “daddy”, more “daddy” resources, external resources.

The Poem Out Loud — "Daddy" as read by Sylvia Plath for BBC Radio.

Who was Otto Plath? — A Guardian article regarding the inspiration for "Daddy": Plath's own father, Otto Plath.

Biography and More Poems — A biographical account of Plath's life and additional poems, courtesy of the Poetry Foundation.

A Short Introduction to Plath's Poetry — Benjamin Voigt breaks down a few of Plath's most famous poems. 

An Interview With the Poet — A 1962 interview with Sylvia Plath, conducted by Peter Orr.

Confessionalism — A brief introduction to Confessionalism, a poetic moment that helps contextualize Plath's work. 

LitCharts on Other Poems by Sylvia Plath

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Poppies in October

Sheep in Fog

The Applicant

The Arrival of the Bee Box

The Moon and the Yew Tree

The Munich Mannequins

The Night Dances

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A Summary and Analysis of Sylvia Plath’s ‘Daddy’

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

‘Daddy’ is undoubtedly Sylvia Plath’s most widely studied poem, and it is probably her most famous too. It is also her most controversial. But is ‘Daddy’ a searingly honest exploration of Plath’s own relationship with her father, or something closer to the dramatic monologue in which an invented speaker talks to us about her father?

Similarly, is ‘Daddy’ a serious, tragic, and heartfelt poem about a daughter’s troubled attitudes to her dead father, or is it a work of dark comedy? Many readers may opt for the first assessment of Plath’s poem, but in doing so, they would disagree with Plath herself as to the meaning of her poem.

Let’s take a closer look at this difficult and surprising poem, first by summarising its content and then by turning to an analysis of its broader meaning. Plath wrote ‘Daddy’ in a single day, on 12 October 1962, just four months before she took her own life.

When she introduced the poem for a BBC radio reading, Sylvia Plath herself described ‘Daddy’ as a poem about ‘a girl with an Electra complex’ whose ‘father died while she thought he was God.’ Plath goes on to state that the father in the poem was a ‘Nazi’ and the speaker’s mother probably part Jewish.

So, ‘Daddy’ is spoken by a female speaker who is the offspring of bully and victim, oppressor and oppressed. Plath’s use of the Holocaust in this poem is one of the key reasons for ‘Daddy’ being regarded as a highly controversial poem.

Plath also tells us that the daughter in the poem ‘has to act out the awful little allegory once over before she is free of it.’ So, ‘Daddy’ is a ‘performance’ on two levels: both by Plath herself, and by the (fictional) speaker within the poem.

The poem begins with its speaker acknowledging that the way she has been living will no longer ‘do’ or suffice. It is like living in a black shoe, feeling restricted and oppressed, like a shoe fitting tightly within the shoe. She can barely breathe or sneeze, so tightly constrained is she within her life.

In the second stanza, the speaker addresses her father. She tells him she has had to kill him, even though he actually died long before she could do so. He is as heavy as marble, almost divine, like a grotesque and large statue whose toe is as big (and as grey) as a seal found in San Francisco bay.

Meanwhile, her father’s head is in the Atlantic: he is so vast he literally spans the whole of the continent of North America from one side to the other. (‘Nauset’ is in Massachusetts, on the east coast; ‘Ach, du’ is German for ‘Oh, you’.) She tells her father she used to pray that he would come back from the dead.

In the next couple of stanzas, Plath’s speaker discusses a Polish town whose name is so common there could be many towns with the same name. She would pray for her father’s return in German, but she could not locate his roots, where he came from, because she didn’t know which Polish town with that name was the one he was from.

As a result, she could never talk to him, as if her tongue were caught in barbed-wire trap, and she would simply stammer the word ‘Ich’ (‘I’ in German) over and over. Her father was the same as every other German: she couldn’t distinguish him.

As for the German language he spoken, it was ‘obscene’, putting her in mind of the train engines which carried Jewish people to the concentration camps at Dachau, Auschwitz, and Belsen, where they would be killed. Instead of talking like her father, the speaker began to talk like ‘a Jew’, and started to think of herself as Jewish.

After all, she has little in common with the Austrian city of Vienna, either its snows or the beer they drink there. But her Romani ancestry and her strange luck, as well as her fondness for using Tarot cards, suggest to the speaker that she might be ‘a bit’ Jewish.

She tells her father she has always been afraid of him, because of his association with the German air force or ‘Luftwaffe’ and the nonsense he spoke (which perhaps sounded impressive to the speaker when she was a child). His neat moustache and blue eyes, linking him to the ‘Aryan’ race which the Nazis regarded as the pure race, meant that she associated him with the ‘panzer’ division of the German army (‘panzers’ were tanks used by the Germans during the Second World War).

Her father, she has come to realise, was not God (despite her initial assumption, as expressed in Plath’s BBC note to the poem mentioned above) but was instead like the swastika, that symbol of the Nazi regime: a symbol so dark (in every sense) that no light could get through. She then declares that every woman really loves a fascist because they enjoy a ‘boot in the face’ and being brutalised by strong, violent men like her father.#

Next, the speaker contemplates a photograph of her father that she has. In the photograph he is standing in front of a blackboard (implying he is a teacher: Plath’s own father was an academic) with a cleft chin, although she also imagines he has a cleft foot like the devil, and like the evil man who broke the speaker’s heart.

She was ten years old when her father died (Plath’s father died when she was eight). Ten years later, she attempted to take her own life in order to be reunited with her father in the afterlife (Plath’s first attempt to take her own life was when she was twenty years old, too), or even just being dead and a pile of ‘bones’ next to him.

But the speaker’s attempt was thwarted and she was ‘fixed’ and put back together, like a broken object being stuck together with glue. So as she couldn’t reach her father through dying, the speaker made a model of him – a figure of a man in black who looked like a Nazi (Hitler’s memoir outlining his ambitions was titled Mein Kampf , or ‘my struggle’) who loved torturing people.

The speaker then ‘married’ herself symbolically to this model which represented her father, saying the marriage vow (‘I do’). And now she’s ‘finally through’ or done with him. It’s like a telephone which has been pulled out, so the voices can’t get through to her (the voices inside her head?).

In the penultimate stanza, Plath’s speaker declares that, in ‘killing’ her father, she’s effectively killed two, since her husband (the model she symbolically ‘married’, or her actual husband? it’s a cliché that many women marry men who resemble their fathers in some way) who vampirically fed on her blood for seven years has also been ‘killed’ through this act of exorcising the demons from her past.

And in the final stanza, the speaker’s ‘daddy’ is like the vampire, vanquished with a stake through his heart like a vampire whom the people of the village never liked. They are dancing on his grave and stamping on his body, because they always knew that he was also a vampire, feeding on the living.

The speaker tells her father that she’s ‘through’, supposedly meaning she is over and done with him and can finally lay his memory to rest, letting go of the hold he has had over her. However, as critics have pointed out, ‘I’m through’ is ambiguous here, and could also suggest that the speaker is ‘worn out’, ‘done with life’, and ‘finally defeated’. How triumphant the speaker is at the end of the poem remains open to interpretation.

In many ways, Plath’s ‘Daddy’ can best be understood as a poem about somebody struggling to come to terms with infant trauma. This is Tim Kendall’s interpretation of the poem in his insightful AMAZON, in which he links the poem to Plath’s interest in the psychoanalytic theories of Sigmund Freud.

As Kendall points out, the poem’s title (‘Daddy’, not ‘Dad’ or the more formal ‘Father’), as well as its repeated use of simple, babyish ‘oo’ rhymes, suggest a speaker who has reverted to – or perhaps never successfully moved beyond – an infantile understanding of her father. (The form of the poem is, like many of Plath’s mature poems, a balance between formal restraint and something freer: all stanzas contain five lines and those ‘oo’ sounds permeate the poem throughout, but there is no fixed rhyme scheme beyond this.)

He links the poem to Freud’s account, in his Beyond the Pleasure Principle , of the ‘ fort-da ’ game in which an young child throws a cotton reel outside of his cot and yells ‘fort’ (‘gone’ in German), whereupon the child’s mother retrieves it for him and the child says ‘da!’ (‘there!’ in German; ‘da’, of course, is also the beginnings of ‘daddy’).

Inscribed within this game is what Freud identifies as the compulsion to repeat: a habit which involves doing the same thing over and over again, and which Freud links to the death drive, or compulsion to annihilate oneself. The biographical links with Plath here are too obvious to need spelling out, and ‘Daddy’, we should note, is a poem containing many repetitions.

It is also, in Kendall’s words, a poem containing ‘transgressive humour’: he cites the poet Anne Stevenson, who reports Plath reading aloud ‘Daddy’ to a friend, whereupon both women fell about with laughter. Indeed, Plath herself categorised ‘Daddy’, somewhat surprisingly, as ‘light verse’.

Plath as Confessional Poet

Sylvia Plath is often categorised as one of the Confessional Poets , along with fellow American poets Robert Lowell (from whose writing classes she learnt so much), Anne Sexton, and W. D. Snodgrass. Confessional poetry often explores or unearths the role that trauma in early childhood has played in forming, and wounding, the adult poet, who is often beset by dark thoughts and family struggles.

But in some ways, ‘Daddy’ – probably Plath’s best-known and certainly most widely studied poem – offers an object lesson in why the ‘confessional’ label is too narrow and restrictive for Plath’s work. This is something Philip Larkin understood, when reviewing Plath’s poetry and identifying a ‘jauntily impersonal’ tone to much of her writing.

As Plath herself said in the prefatory note she added to the poem when recording it, ‘Daddy’ is about a woman, but although the woman shares some features with Plath herself (a German father), other elements – such as that father being a Nazi and the speaker’s mother being Jewish – are clearly fictional and do not relate to Plath’s own life.

We might then analyse ‘Daddy’, following Tim Kendall’s own suggestion, as a kind of hybrid of the traditional lyric poem and the dramatic monologue . In the latter, an invented speaker, who is not the poet herself, speaks to us, their audience; the speaker of ‘Daddy’ is a fictional persona who nevertheless shares much with Plath herself, but who does not share everything with her.

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1 thought on “A Summary and Analysis of Sylvia Plath’s ‘Daddy’”

This analysis might make more of the refs in the poem to Sylvia’s obsessional, repeated suicide attempts, made in the almost certain knowledge that somebody wd arrive and call for help in time to save her. She blames her father for shaping her life, and for making it the hopeless wreck that it seems to be.

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By Sylvia Plath

‘Daddy’ by Sylvia Plath uses emotional, and sometimes, painful metaphors to depict the poet’s opinion of her father and other men in her life.

Sylvia Plath

Nationality: American

She tried to kill herself a number of times throughout the early 60s and in February of 1963, she succeeded.

Key Poem Information

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Central Message: Father/daughter relationships are very complicated.

Themes: Death , Identity

Speaker: Sylvia Plath

Emotions Evoked: Pain , Sadness

Poetic Form: Free Verse

Time Period: 20th Century

This is a powerful and deeply personal work that explores themes of abuse, trauma, and the complexities of family relationships, and it remains a widely studied and revered piece of poetry today.

Poem Analyzed by Allisa Corfman

Degree in Secondary Education/English and Teacher of World Literature and Composition

Sylvia Plath is most known for her tortured soul. Perhaps that is why readers identify with her works of poetry so well, such as ‘ Daddy’.  She has an uncanny ability to give meaningful words to some of the most inexpressible emotions. She writes in a way that allows the reader to feel her pain. In this poem, ‘ Daddy’ , she writes about her father after his death. This is not a typical obituary poem, lamenting the loss of the loved one, wishing for his return, and hoping to see him again. Rather, Plath feels a sense of relief at his departure from her life. She explores the reasons behind this feeling in the lines of this poem. 

When speaking about her own work, Plath describes herself (in regards to ‘Daddy’  specifically) as a “girl with an Electra complex. Her father died while she thought he was God”. She adds on to this statement, describing her father as “a Nazi and her mother very possibly part Jewish”. Through the poem, she “has to act out the awful little allegory once before she is free of it.”

Literary historians have determined that neither of these statements about her parents was accurate but were introduced into the narrative in order to enhance its poignancy and stretch the limits of allegory.

Explore Daddy

• 1 Summary 
• 2 Poetic Techniques 
• 4 Analysis, Stanza by Stanza
• 5 Conclusion

Summary  

‘ Daddy ‘ by Sylvia Plath uses emotional, and sometimes, painful metaphors to depict the poet’s own opinion of her father.

The poem begins with the speaker describing her father in several different, striking ways. He is, at once, a “black shoe” she was trapped within, a vampire, a fascist and a Nazi. While alive, and since his death, she has been trapped by his life. He holds her back and contains her in a way she’s trying to contend with. She has to “kill” her father in order to get away from him.

Poetic Techniques  

Plath makes use of a number of poetic techniques in ‘Daddy’  these include enjambment , metaphor , simile , and juxtaposition . The former, juxtaposition, is used when two contrasting objects or ideas are placed in conversation with one another in order to emphasize that contrast . A poet usually does this in order to speak on a larger theme of their text or make an important point about the differences between these two things.  in this poem, there is a consistent juxtaposition between innocence or youthful emotions, and pain. 

Metaphors and similes appear throughout the text in order to convey the speaker’s emotional opinions about her father. He is compared to a Nazi, a sadist, and a vampire, as well as a few other people and objects.

Another important technique that is commonly used in poetry is enjambment. This occurs when a line is cut off before its natural stopping point.   It forces a reader down to the next line, and the next, quickly. One has to move forward in order to comfortably resolve a phrase or sentence. There are instances in almost every stanza , but a reader can look to the beginning of stanzas three and four for poignant examples of this technique.

In regards to the most important themes in  ‘Daddy’,  one should consider the conversation Plath has in the text about the oppressive nature of her father/daughter relationship. The theme of freedom from oppression, or from captivity is prevalent throughout this text, and others Plath wrote. Despite her father’s death, she was obviously still held rapt by his life and how he lived.

That being said, life and death should also be considered important themes within Plath’s  ‘Daddy’.  Without her father living as he did, and dying when he did while Plath was quite young, this poem would not exist as it does.

Analysis, Stanza by Stanza

You do not do, you do not do Any more, black shoe In which I have lived like a foot For thirty years, poor and white, Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.

In this first stanza of ‘ Daddy’ , the speaker reveals that the subject of whom she speaks is no longer there. This is why she says and repeats , “You do not do”.  The following line is rather surprising, as it does not express loss or sadness. On the contrary, it begins to reveal the nature of this particular father-daughter relationship. The speaker compares her father to a “black shoe”. It seems like a strange comparison until the third line reveals that the speaker herself has felt “like a foot” that has been forced to live thirty years in that shoe. The foot is “poor and white” because, for thirty years, it has been suffocated by the shoe and never allowed to see the light of day.

The last line in this stanza reveals that the speaker felt not only suffocated by her father, but fearful of him as well. In fact, she expresses that her fear of him was so intense, that she was afraid to even breathe or sneeze.

Daddy, I have had to kill you. (…) Big as a Frisco seal

In the second stanza of ‘ Daddy’ , the speaker reveals her own personal desire to kill her father. The first line states, “I have had to kill you”. The next line goes on to explain that the speaker actually did not have time to kill her father, because he died before she could manage to do it. She does not make this confession regretfully or sorrowfully. Rather, she calls him “a bag full of God” which suggests that her view of her father as well as her view of God was one of fear and trepidation. She describes him as a “ghastly statue with one gray toe big as a Frisco seal”.

Her description of her father as a statue suggests that she saw no capacity for feeling in him. A “Frisco seal” refers to one of the sea lions that can be seen in San Francisco. When she describes that one of his toes is as big as a seal, it reveals to the reader just how enormous and overbearing her father seemed to her. He was hardened, without feelings, and now that he is dead, she thinks he looks like an enormous, ominous statue.

Stanza Three

And a head in the freakish Atlantic (…) Ach, du.

Here, looking at her dead father, the speaker describes the gorgeous scenery of the Atlantic Ocean and the beautiful area of “Nauset”.  However, she also uses the word “freakish” to precede her descriptions of the beautiful Atlantic Ocean. This reveals that even though her father may have been a beautiful specimen of a human being, she knew personally that there was something awful about him. In the final two lines of this stanza, the speaker reveals that at one point during her father’s sickness, she even prayed that he would recover. The last line of this stanza is the German phrase for “oh, you.”

Stanza Four

In the German tongue, in the Polish town (…) My Polack friend

In stanza four of ‘ Daddy’ , the speaker begins to wonder about her father and his origins. The speaker knows that he came from a Polish town, where German was the main language spoken. She explains that the town he grew up in had endured one war after another. She would never be able to identify which specific town he was from because the name of his hometown was a common name. This stanza ends mid-sentence. The speaker begins to explain that she learned something from her “Polack friend”.

Stanza Five

Says there are a dozen or two. (…) The tongue stuck in my jaw.

Here, the speaker finishes what she began to explain in the previous stanza by explaining that she learned from a friend that the name of the Polish town her father came from, was a very common name. For this reason, she concludes that she “could never tell where [he] put [his] foot”. It’s clear she will not ever be able to know exactly where his roots are from. She had never asked him because she “could never talk to [him]”.

After this, the speaker then explains that she was afraid to talk to him. She states, “The tongue stuck in my jaw” when explaining the way she felt when she wanted to talk to her father.

It stuck in a barb wire snare. (…) And the language obscene

In this stanza, she continues to describe the way she felt around her father. She felt as though her tongue were stuck in barbed wire. “Ich” is the German word for “I”. This reveals that whenever she wanted to speak to her father, she could only stutter and say, “I, I, I.”. She then describes that she thought every German man was her father. This reveals that she does not distinguish him as someone familiar and close to her. Rather, she sees him as she sees any other German man, harsh and obscene.

Stanza Seven

An engine, an engine (…) I think I may well be a Jew.

In stanza seven of ‘ Daddy’ , the speaker begins to reveal to the readers that she felt like a Jew under the reign of her German father. This is a very strong comparison, and the speaker knows this and yet does not hesitate to use this simile. The oppression which she has suffered under the reign of her father is painful and unbearable, something she feels compares to the oppression of the Jews under the Germans in the Holocaust. For this reason, she specifically mentions Auschwitz, among other concentration camps.

She then concludes that she began to talk like a Jew, like one who was oppressed and silenced by German oppressors. Then she concludes that because she feels the oppression that the Jews feel, she identifies with the Jews and therefore considers herself a Jew.

Stanza Eight

The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna (…) I may be a bit of a Jew.

In this stanza, the speaker continues to criticize the Germans as she compares the “snows of Tyrol” and the “clear beer of Vienna” to the German’s idea of racial purity. She concludes that they “are not very pure or true”. Then, the speaker considers her ancestry, and the gypsies that were part of her heritage. Gypsies, like Jews, were singled out for execution by the Nazis, and so the speaker identifies not only with Jews but also with gypsies. In fact, she seems to identify with anyone who has ever felt oppressed by the Germans. In the last line of this stanza, the speaker suggests that she is probably part Jewish, and part Gypsy.

Stanza Nine

I have always been scared of  you, (…) Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You——

Here, the speaker finally finds the courage to address her father, now that he is dead. She admits that she has always been afraid of him. She implies that her father had something to do with the airforce, as that is how the word “Luftwaffe” translates to English. “Gobbledygook” however, is simply gibberish. This implies that the speaker feels that her father and his language made no sense to her. In this instance, she felt afraid of him and feared everything about him.

She never was able to understand him, and he was always someone to fear. She was afraid of his “neat mustache” and his “Aryan eye, bright blue”. This description of his eyes implies that he was one of those Germans whom the Nazis believed to be a superior race. He was Aryan, with blue eyes. He was something fierce and terrifying to the speaker, and she associates him closely with the Nazis. A “panzer-mam” was a German tank driver, and so this continues the comparison between her father and a Nazi.

Not God but a swastika (…) Brute heart of a brute like you.

In this stanza, the speaker compares her father to God. She clearly sees God as an ominous overbearing being who clouds her world. This is why she describes her father as a giant black swastika that covered the entire sky. The third line of this stanza begins a sarcastic description of women and men like her father. She mockingly says, “every woman adores a Fascist” and then begins to describe the violence of men like her father. She calls uses the word “brute” three times in the last two lines of this stanza. If these lines were not written in jest, then she clearly believes that women, for some reason or another, tend to fall in love with violent brutes.

Stanza Eleven

You stand at the blackboard, daddy, (…) Any less the black man who

In the first line of this stanza, the speaker describes her father as a teacher standing at the blackboard. The author’s father, was, in fact, a professor. This is how the speaker views her father. She can see the cleft in his chin as she imagines him standing there at the blackboard. Then she describes that the cleft that is in his chin, should really be in his foot. This simply means that she views her father as the devil himself.

The devil is often characterized as an animal with cleft feet, and the speaker believes he wears his cleft on his chin rather than on his feet. Her description of her father as a “black man” does not refer to his skin color but rather to the darkness of his soul.  This stanza ends with the word “who” because the author breaks the stanza mid-sentence.

Stanza Twelve

Bit my pretty red heart in two. (…) I thought even the bones would do.

With the first line of this stanza, the speaker finishes her sentence and reveals that her father has broken her heart. She says that he has “bit [her] pretty red heart in two”. The rest of this stanza reveals a deeper understanding of the speaker’s relationship with her father. Even though he was a cruel, overbearing brute, at one point in her life, she loved him dearly. It is possible that as a child, she was able to love him despite his cruelty. As an adult, however, she cannot see past his vices.

This stanza reveals that the speaker was only ten years old when her father died, and that she mourned for him until she was twenty. She even tried to end her life in order to see him again. She thought that even if she was never to see him again in an after-life, to simply have her bones buried by his bones would be enough of a comfort to her.

Stanza Thirteen

But they pulled me out of the sack, (…) A man in black with a Meinkampf look

In this stanza, the speaker reveals that she was not able to commit suicide, even though she tried. She reveals that she was found and “pulled…out of the sack” and stuck back together “with glue”. At this point, the speaker experienced a revelation. She realized that she must re-create her father. She decided to find and love a man who reminded her of her father. Freud’s theory on the Oedipus complex seems to come into play here. The theory that girls fall in love with their fathers as children, and boys with their mothers, also suggests that these boys and girls grow up to find husbands and wives that resemble their fathers and mother.  

The speaker has already suggested that women love a brutal man, and perhaps she is now confessing that she was once such a woman. This is why the speaker says that she finds a “model” of her father who is “a man in black with a Meinkampf look”. While “Meinkampf” means “my struggle”, the last line of this stanza most likely means that the man she found to marry looked like her father and like Hitler.

Stanza Fourteen

And a love of the rack and the screw. (…) The voices just can’t worm through.

In this stanza, the speaker reveals that the man she married enjoyed to torture. This is why she describes him as having “a love of the rack and the screw”. She confesses that she married him when she says, “And I said I do, I do.” Then she tells her father that she is through. This means that having re-created her father by marrying a harsh German man, she no longer needed to mourn her father’s death. She then describes her relationship with her father as a phone call. Now she has hung up, and the call is forever ended.

Stanza Fifteen

If I’ve killed one man, I’ve killed two—— (…) Daddy, you can lie back now.

In this stanza of ‘ Daddy’ , the speaker reminds the readers that she has already claimed to have killed her father. She revealed that he actually died before she could get to him, but she still claims the responsibility for his death. Now she says that if she has killed one man, she’s killed two. This is most likely in reference to her husband. She refers to her husband as a vampire, one who was supposed to be just like her father. As it turned out, he was not just like her father. In fact, he drained the life from her. This is why she refers to him as a vampire who drank her blood.

It is not clear why she first says that he drank her blood for “a year”. However, the speaker then changes her mind and says, “seven years, if you want to know.” When the speaker says, “daddy, you can lie back now” she is telling him that the part of him that has lived on within her can die now, too.

Stanza Sixteen

There’s a stake in your fat black heart (…) Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through.

In this stanza, the speaker reveals that her father, though dead, has somehow lived on, like a vampire, to torture her. It is claimed that she must kill her father the way that a vampire must be killed, with a stake to the heart. She then goes on to explain to her father that “the villagers never liked you”. She explains that they dance and stomp on his grave. The speaker says that the villagers “always knew it was [him]”. This suggests that the people around them always suspected that there was something different and mysterious about her father.

With the final line, the speaker tells her father that she is through with him. While he has been dead for years, it is clear that her memory of him has caused her great grief and struggle. The speaker was unable to move on without acknowledging that her father was, in fact, a brute. Once she was able to come to terms with what he truly was, she was able to let him stop torturing her from the grave.

Sylvia Plath ( biography ) begins ‘ Daddy’ with her present understanding of her father and the kind of man that he was. She then offers readers some background explanation of her relationship with her father. As ‘ Daddy’ progresses, the readers begins to realize that the speaker has not always hated her father. She has not always seen him as a brute, although she makes it clear that he always has been oppressive. As a child, the speaker did not know anything apart from her father’s mentality, and so she prays for his recovery and then mourns his death. She even wishes to join him in death.

She then tries to re-create him by marrying a man like him. It isn’t until years after her father’s death that she becomes aware of the true brutal nature of her relationship. Though he has been dead in flesh for years, she finally decides to let go of his memory and free herself from his oppression forever.

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20th century, death of a father, fathers and daughters, confessional.

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I like the description of her dead overweight father as a ‘Frisco Seal.’ However, she would not be referring to the ‘famous sealions’ because they did not come to San Francisco until the 1990’s. There were lots of seals in the 50’s and 60’s though.

Wow – great knowledge! I had no idea.

why no mention of “electra complex”? Poem has a dichotomous sense of emotions, it is not one dimensional, this changes the meaning of the poem

I’m not sure that Plath is sexualising her father. Although there are hints to that effect by the fact that she married a man that the poem suggests is just like him.

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Corfman, Allisa. "Daddy by Sylvia Plath". Poem Analysis , https://poemanalysis.com/sylvia-plath/daddy/ . Accessed 14 October 2024.

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Sylvia Plath: Poems

By sylvia plath, sylvia plath: poems summary and analysis of "daddy".

"Daddy," comprised of sixteen five-line stanzas, is a brutal and venomous poem commonly understood to be about Plath's deceased father, Otto Plath .

The speaker begins by saying that he "does not do anymore," and that she feels like she has been a foot living in a black shoe for thirty years, too timid to either breathe or sneeze. She insists that she needed to kill him (she refers to him as "Daddy"), but that he died before she had time. She describes him as heavy, like a "bag full of God," resembling a statue with one big gray toe and its head submerged in the Atlantic Ocean. She remembers how she at one time prayed for his return from death, and gives a German utterance of grief (which translates literally to "Oh, you").

She knows he comes from a Polish town that was overrun by "wars, wars, wars," but one of her Polack friends has told her that there are several towns of that name. Therefore, she cannot uncover his hometown, where he put his "foot" and "root."

She also discusses how she could never find a way to talk to him. Even before she could speak, she thought every German was him, and found the German language "obscene." In fact, she felt so distinct from him that she believed herself a Jew being removed to a concentration camp. She started to talk like a Jew and to feel like a Jew in several different ways. She wonders in fact, whether she might actually be a Jew, because of her similarity to a gypsy. To further emphasize her fear and distance, she describes him as the Luftwaffe, with a neat mustache and a bright blue Aryan eye. She calls him a "Panzer-man," and says he is less like God then like the black swastika through which nothing can pass. In her mind, "Every woman adores a Fascist," and the "boot in the face" that comes with such a man.

When she remembers Daddy, she thinks of him standing at the blackboard, with a cleft chin instead of a cleft foot. However, this transposition does not make him a devil. Instead, he is like the black man who "Bit [her] pretty red heart in two." He died when she was ten, and she tried to join him in death when she was twenty. When that attempt failed, she was glued back together. At this point, she realized her course - she made a model of Daddy and gave him both a "Meinkampf look" and "a love of the rack and the screw." She promises him that she is "finally through;" the telephone has been taken off the hook, and the voices can no longer get through to her.

She considers that if she has killed one man, then she has in fact killed two. Comparing him to a vampire, she remembers how he drank her blood for a year, but then realizes the duration was closer to seven years. She tells him he can lie back now. There is a stake in his heart, and the villagers who despised him now celebrate his death by dancing on his corpse. She concludes by announcing, "Daddy, Daddy, you bastard, I'm through."

"Daddy" is perhaps Sylvia Plath 's best-known poem. It has elicited a variety of distinct reactions, from feminist praise of its unadulterated rage towards male dominance, to wariness at its usage of Holocaust imagery. It has been reviewed and criticized by hundreds and hundreds of scholars, and is upheld as one of the best examples of confessional poetry.

It is certainly a difficult poem for some: its violent imagery, invocation of Jewish suffering, and vitriolic tone can make it a decidedly uncomfortable reading experience. Overall, the poem relates Plath's journey of coming to terms with her father's looming figure; he died when she was eight. She casts herself as a victim and him as several figures, including a Nazi, vampire, devil, and finally, as a resurrected figure her husband, whom she has also had to kill.

Though the final lines have a triumphant tone, it is unclear whether she means she has gotten "through" to him in terms of communication, or whether she is "through" thinking about him. Plath explained the poem briefly in a BBC interview:

The poem is spoken by a girl with an Electra complex. The father died while she thought he was God. Her case is complicated by the fact that her father was also a Nazi and her mother very possibly part Jewish. In the daughter the two strains marry and paralyze each other –she has to act out the awful little allegory once over before she is free of it.

In other words, contradiction is at the heart of the poem's meaning. Neither its triumph nor its horror is to be taken as the sum total of her intention. Instead, each element is contradicted by its opposite, which explains how it shoulders so many distinct interpretations.

This sense of contradiction is also apparent in the poem's rhyme scheme and organization. It uses a sort of nursery rhyme, singsong way of speaking. There are hard sounds, short lines, and repeated rhymes (as in "Jew," "through," "do," and "you"). This establishes and reinforces her status as a childish figure in relation to her authoritative father. This relationship is also clear in the name she uses for him - "Daddy"- and in her use of "oo" sounds and a childish cadence. However, this childish rhythm also has an ironic, sinister feel, since the chant-like, primitive quality can feel almost like a curse. One critic wrote that the poem's "simplistic, insistent rhythm is one form of control, the obsessive rhyming and repeated short phrases are others, means by which she attempts to charm and hold off evil spirits." In other words, the childish aspects have a crucial, protective quality, rather than an innocent one.

"Daddy" can also be viewed as a poem about the individual trapped between herself and society. Plath weaves together patriarchal figures – a father, Nazis, a vampire, a husband – and then holds them all accountable for history's horrors. Like "The Colossus ," "Daddy" imagines a larger-than-life patriarchal figure, but here the figure has a distinctly social, political aspect. Even the vampire is discussed in terms of its tyrannical sway over a village. In this interpretation, the speaker comes to understand that she must kill the father figure in order to break free of the limitations that it places upon her. In particular, these limitations can be understood as patriarchal forces that enforce a strict gender structure. It has the feel of an exorcism, an act of purification. And yet the journey is not easy. She realizes what she has to do, but it requires a sort of hysteria. In order to succeed, she must have complete control, since she fears she will be destroyed unless she totally annihilates her antagonist.

The question about the poem's confessional, autobiographical content is also worth exploring. The poem does not exactly conform to Plath's biography, and her above-cited explanation suggests it is a carefully-constructed fiction. And yet its ambivalence towards male figures does correspond to the time of its composition - she wrote it soon after learning that her husband Ted Hughes had left her for another woman. Further, the mention of a suicide attempt links the poem to her life.

However, some critics have suggested that the poem is actually an allegorical representation of her fears of creative paralysis, and her attempt to slough off the "male muse." Stephen Gould Axelrod writes that "at a basic level, 'Daddy' concerns its own violent, transgressive birth as a text, its origin in a culture that regards it as illegitimate –a judgment the speaker hurls back on the patriarch himself when she labels him a bastard." The father is perceived as an object and as a mythical figure (many of them, in fact), and never really attains any real human dimensions. It is less a person than a stifling force that puts its boot in her face to silence her. From this perspective, the poem is inspired less by Hughes or Otto than by agony over creative limitations in a male literary world. However, even this interpretation begs something of an autobiographical interpretation, since both Hughes and her father were representations of that world.

Plath's usage of Holocaust imagery has inspired a plethora of critical attention. She was not Jewish but was in fact German, yet was obsessed with Jewish history and culture. Several of her poems utilize Holocaust themes and imagery, but this one features the most striking and disturbing ones. She imagines herself being taken on a train to "Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen," and starting to talk like a Jew and feel like a Jew. She refers to her father as a "panzer-man," and notes his Aryan looks and his "Luftwaffe" brutality. One of the leading articles on this topic, written by Al Strangeways, concludes that Plath was using her poetry to understand the connection between history and myth, and to stress the voyeurism that is an implicit part of remembering. Plath had studied the Holocaust in an academic context, and felt a connection to it; she also felt like a victim, and wanted to combine the personal and public in her work to cut through the stagnant double-talk of Cold War America. She certainly uses Holocaust imagery, but does so alongside other violent myths and history, including those of Electra, vampirism, and voodoo. Strangeways writes that, "the Holocaust assumed a mythic dimension because of its extremity and the difficulty of understanding it in human terms, due to the mechanical efficiency with which it was carried out, and the inconceivably large number of victims." In other words, its shocking content is not an accident, but is rather an attempt to consider how the 20th century's great atrocity reflects and escalates a certain human quality.

Indeed, it is hard to imagine that any of Sylvia Plath's poems could leave the reader unmoved. "Daddy" is evidence of her profound talent, part of which rested in her unabashed confrontation with her personal history and the traumas of the age in which she lived. That she could write a poem that encompasses both the personal and historical is clear in "Daddy."

Sylvia Plath: Poems Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Sylvia Plath: Poems is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

In which city did the Colossus once stand

It is believed that the Colossus of Rhodes stood beside Mandrákion harbour in Rhodes, Greece.

Short Summary of Morning Song by Sylvia Plath

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http://voices.yahoo.com/poetry-explication-sylvia-plaths-morning-8681323.html?cat=52

whats the poem "MUSHROOMS" about?

The poem is about the rise of Women Right's..... the journey of women from housewives to independence.

Study Guide for Sylvia Plath: Poems

Sylvia Plath: Poems study guide contains a biography of poet Sylvia Plath, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis of select poems.

• About Sylvia Plath: Poems
• Sylvia Plath: Poems Summary
• Sylvia Plath: Poems Video
• Character List

Essays for Sylvia Plath: Poems

Sylvia Plath: Poems essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of Sylvia Plath's poetry.

• Horror in the poetry of Sylvia Plath
• A Herr-story: “Lady Lazarus” and Her Rise from the Ash
• Sylvia Plath's "Daddy": A Cry for Help
• Winged Rook Delights in the Rain: Plath and Rilke on Everyday Miracles
• Fuhrers and Fathers

Lesson Plan for Sylvia Plath: Poems

• About the Author
• Study Objectives
• Common Core Standards
• Introduction to Sylvia Plath: Poems
• Relationship to Other Books
• Bringing in Technology
• Notes to the Teacher
• Related Links
• Sylvia Plath: Poems Bibliography

Wikipedia Entries for Sylvia Plath: Poems

• Introduction

Lit. Summaries

• Biographies

Diving into the Depths of Sylvia Plath’s Daddy: A Literary Analysis

• Sylvia Plath

Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” is a powerful and haunting piece of literature that has captivated readers for decades. In this article, we will take a closer look at the poem and analyze its themes, imagery, and symbolism. We will explore the ways in which Plath uses language to convey her complex emotions and delve into the deeper meanings behind the words. Join us as we dive into the depths of Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” and uncover the hidden truths within.

Background Information

Sylvia Plath is widely regarded as one of the most influential poets of the 20th century. Born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1932, Plath began writing poetry at a young age and went on to study at Smith College. It was during her time at Smith that Plath began to struggle with depression and mental illness, themes that would later become prominent in her writing. In 1956, Plath married fellow poet Ted Hughes and the couple moved to England, where Plath continued to write and publish poetry. Tragically, Plath took her own life in 1963 at the age of 30, leaving behind a legacy of powerful and haunting poetry. “Daddy,” one of Plath’s most famous and controversial poems, was first published in 1965, two years after her death.

Biographical Analysis

Sylvia Plath’s life was marked by tragedy and mental illness, which undoubtedly influenced her writing. Born in Boston in 1932, Plath was a gifted student who excelled in academics and writing. However, her father’s death when she was only eight years old had a profound impact on her, and she struggled with depression and suicidal thoughts throughout her life. Plath attended Smith College, where she won several writing awards and published her first poems. After graduation, she received a Fulbright scholarship to study at Cambridge University in England, where she met and married fellow poet Ted Hughes. The couple had two children, but their marriage was tumultuous and ended in separation. Plath’s mental health continued to deteriorate, and she committed suicide in 1963 at the age of 30. Despite her short life, Plath left behind a powerful legacy of poetry and prose that continues to captivate readers today.

Themes and Motifs

One of the most prominent themes in Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” is the struggle for power and control. The speaker in the poem is constantly battling with her father, who is portrayed as a dominating figure. The use of the word “daddy” instead of “father” adds a layer of infantilization, emphasizing the power dynamic between the two. The speaker’s desire to break free from her father’s control is evident in lines such as “I have always been scared of you, / With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. / And your neat mustache / And your Aryan eye, bright blue.” The reference to the Luftwaffe and Aryan eye alludes to her father’s Nazi past, further emphasizing his oppressive nature. The theme of power and control is also reflected in the use of the Holocaust as a metaphor for the speaker’s own personal struggles. The speaker compares herself to a Jew and her father to a Nazi, highlighting the extreme power imbalance between the two. Overall, the theme of power and control adds depth and complexity to the poem, highlighting the speaker’s struggle for autonomy and independence.

Symbolism plays a crucial role in Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy.” The poem is filled with various symbols that represent different aspects of the speaker’s relationship with her father. One of the most prominent symbols in the poem is the image of the shoe. The speaker describes her father as a “black shoe” that she has been living in for thirty years. This symbolizes the suffocating and oppressive nature of their relationship. The shoe also represents the speaker’s feeling of being trapped and unable to escape her father’s influence. Another important symbol in the poem is the image of the swastika. The speaker compares her father to a Nazi, using the swastika as a symbol of his oppressive and controlling nature. The swastika also represents the speaker’s feelings of guilt and shame, as she is the daughter of a man who committed such atrocities. Overall, the use of symbolism in “Daddy” adds depth and complexity to the poem, allowing readers to explore the speaker’s complex emotions and relationship with her father.

Imagery is a crucial element in Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy.” Throughout the poem, Plath uses vivid and often disturbing imagery to convey her complex emotions towards her father. One of the most striking examples of imagery in the poem is the repeated use of the color black. Plath describes her father as a “black shoe” and a “black telephone,” emphasizing his cold and distant nature. She also compares him to a “black man” and a “Panzer-man,” evoking the image of a menacing figure. This use of color imagery creates a sense of darkness and foreboding, reflecting Plath’s feelings of fear and oppression. Another powerful image in the poem is the metaphor of the Holocaust. Plath compares her father to a Nazi and herself to a Jew, using this historical event to express her sense of victimization and trauma. The use of such intense and disturbing imagery in “Daddy” is a testament to Plath’s skill as a poet, as well as her ability to convey complex emotions through language.

Tone and Mood

The tone and mood of Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” are crucial to understanding the poem’s meaning and impact. Plath’s use of language and imagery creates a dark and oppressive atmosphere, reflecting the speaker’s feelings of entrapment and despair. The tone is bitter and angry, with the speaker addressing her father in a confrontational and accusatory manner. The mood is tense and unsettling, with the repetition of the word “daddy” adding to the sense of claustrophobia and suffocation. As the poem progresses, the tone shifts to one of defiance and liberation, as the speaker declares her independence from her father’s influence. The mood becomes more hopeful, with the final lines suggesting a sense of release and catharsis. Overall, the tone and mood of “Daddy” are integral to its emotional impact and its exploration of complex themes such as identity, power, and trauma.

Structure and Form

The structure and form of Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” is a crucial element in understanding its meaning and impact. The poem is composed of sixteen stanzas, each with five lines, and follows a consistent rhyme scheme of ABAB. This structure creates a sense of order and control, which contrasts with the chaotic and emotional content of the poem. Additionally, the repetition of certain phrases, such as “I have always been scared of you” and “Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through,” emphasizes the speaker’s obsession with her father and her struggle to break free from his influence. The use of enjambment, or the continuation of a sentence or phrase onto the next line, also adds to the poem’s sense of urgency and desperation. Overall, the structure and form of “Daddy” contribute to its powerful and haunting impact on the reader.

Narrative Techniques

One of the most striking narrative techniques used in Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” is the use of repetition. Throughout the poem, the speaker repeats the word “Daddy” over and over again, creating a sense of obsession and fixation. This repetition also serves to emphasize the speaker’s feelings of anger and resentment towards her father, as she uses the word almost like a weapon to attack him. Additionally, Plath uses repetition in the form of rhyme, with the repeated sounds of “oo” and “ay” creating a sense of musicality and rhythm in the poem. These narrative techniques help to create a powerful and memorable poem that explores complex themes of trauma, identity, and family relationships.

Language and Style

Sylvia Plath’s Daddy is a poem that is rich in language and style. The poem is written in free verse, which means that it does not follow a specific rhyme scheme or meter. This allows Plath to experiment with language and structure, creating a unique and powerful piece of literature. The language used in Daddy is also significant, as it is full of vivid imagery and metaphors that help to convey the speaker’s emotions. For example, the speaker compares her father to a “black shoe” and a “ghastly statue” to emphasize his oppressive and controlling nature. Additionally, the use of repetition throughout the poem, particularly with the phrase “I never could talk to you,” adds to the overall sense of frustration and helplessness that the speaker feels. Overall, the language and style of Daddy are essential to understanding the poem’s themes and the emotions of the speaker.

Interpretation and Analysis

Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” is a complex and layered work that requires careful interpretation and analysis. At its core, the poem is a deeply personal exploration of the speaker’s relationship with her father, who is portrayed as a larger-than-life figure with a domineering presence. However, the poem also touches on broader themes such as the legacy of World War II, the Holocaust, and the struggle for female empowerment.

One of the key elements of the poem is its use of imagery and symbolism. Plath employs a range of metaphors and allusions to create a vivid and haunting portrait of her father. For example, the speaker describes her father as a “black shoe” and a “ghastly statue” that she has been trying to kill off for years. These images suggest a sense of suffocation and entrapment, as if the speaker is struggling to break free from her father’s influence.

Another important aspect of the poem is its use of language and tone. Plath’s writing is often characterized by its intensity and emotional rawness, and “Daddy” is no exception. The poem is filled with powerful and evocative language, such as the repeated use of the word “you” to address the father figure. This creates a sense of direct confrontation and adds to the overall feeling of anger and frustration that permeates the poem.

Overall, “Daddy” is a complex and challenging work that rewards careful interpretation and analysis. By exploring the poem’s use of imagery, symbolism, language, and tone, readers can gain a deeper understanding of Plath’s personal struggles and the broader themes that she addresses in her writing.

Reception and Criticism

Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” has been widely discussed and analyzed since its publication in 1965. The poem has been praised for its powerful imagery and emotional depth, but it has also been criticized for its controversial themes and the way it portrays Plath’s relationship with her father.

Some critics have argued that the poem is a feminist manifesto, a powerful statement against patriarchy and the oppression of women. Others have criticized the poem for its use of Holocaust imagery and its portrayal of Plath’s father as a Nazi figure. Some have even accused Plath of being anti-Semitic.

Despite the controversy surrounding “Daddy,” the poem remains a powerful and influential work of literature. Its themes of trauma, loss, and the struggle for self-identity continue to resonate with readers today. Whether you love it or hate it, there’s no denying the impact that “Daddy” has had on the world of poetry and literature.

Comparative Analysis

When it comes to analyzing Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy,” it’s important to consider the poem in comparison to her other works. One notable comparison is with her poem “Lady Lazarus,” which also deals with themes of death, rebirth, and the struggle for control. Both poems feature a speaker who is grappling with their own identity and the legacy of their father, and both use vivid and often disturbing imagery to convey their emotions. However, while “Lady Lazarus” is more focused on the speaker’s own agency and power, “Daddy” is more about the speaker’s feelings of entrapment and victimization. By examining these similarities and differences, we can gain a deeper understanding of Plath’s complex and often contradictory worldview.

Cultural and Historical Context

Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” is a powerful and haunting work that delves into the complex relationship between a daughter and her father. To fully understand the themes and imagery in the poem, it is important to consider the cultural and historical context in which it was written. Plath was a poet of the mid-twentieth century, a time when women were beginning to challenge traditional gender roles and expectations. Additionally, Plath’s personal life was marked by struggles with mental illness and a tumultuous relationship with her own father. These factors undoubtedly influenced the themes and tone of “Daddy,” making it a deeply personal and emotionally charged work. By examining the cultural and historical context of the poem, readers can gain a deeper appreciation for the ways in which Plath’s experiences and the larger societal forces of her time shaped her writing.

Psychological Analysis

Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” is a complex and deeply personal work that delves into the author’s psyche. Through the use of vivid imagery and metaphor, Plath explores her complicated relationship with her father, who died when she was just eight years old. The poem is often interpreted as a cathartic release of the anger and resentment Plath felt towards her father, as well as a reflection of her own struggles with mental illness.

One of the most striking aspects of “Daddy” is the use of Nazi imagery to describe the speaker’s father. This has led many critics to interpret the poem as a commentary on the legacy of World War II and the Holocaust. However, it is important to note that Plath’s use of this imagery is deeply personal and rooted in her own experiences. The speaker’s father is portrayed as a “black shoe” and a “ghastly statue” who “bit [her] pretty red heart in two.” These images suggest a sense of oppression and violence that the speaker associates with her father.

Another key theme in “Daddy” is the speaker’s struggle to come to terms with her own identity. Throughout the poem, she refers to herself as a “Jew” and her father as a “panzer-man.” This suggests a sense of conflict between her Jewish heritage and her father’s German ancestry. The speaker also describes herself as a “foot” and a “doll” who is “stuck” in her father’s shadow. This suggests a sense of powerlessness and a desire to break free from her father’s influence.

Overall, “Daddy” is a powerful and deeply personal work that offers a glimpse into Sylvia Plath’s complex psyche. Through the use of vivid imagery and metaphor, Plath explores her complicated relationship with her father and her own struggles with identity and mental illness.

Gender and Feminist Analysis

Sylvia Plath’s Daddy is a poem that has been analyzed through various lenses, including gender and feminist analysis. The poem is a powerful expression of the speaker’s complex relationship with her father, who is portrayed as a dominating and oppressive figure. Through a feminist lens, the poem can be seen as a critique of patriarchal power structures and the ways in which they can harm women. The speaker’s struggle to break free from her father’s influence can be seen as a metaphor for the struggle of women to assert their autonomy in a society that often seeks to control and limit them. Additionally, the poem can be read as a commentary on the ways in which women are often forced to define themselves in relation to men, and the damage that can be done when those relationships are unhealthy or abusive. Overall, Daddy is a complex and multifaceted work that invites readers to explore a range of themes and ideas, including those related to gender and feminism.

Religious and Spiritual Analysis

Sylvia Plath’s Daddy is a poem that has been analyzed from various perspectives, including religious and spiritual analysis. The poem is known for its intense imagery and the use of metaphors that depict the speaker’s relationship with her father. From a religious perspective, Daddy can be interpreted as a representation of the speaker’s struggle with God. The poem’s opening lines, “You do not do, you do not do / Any more, black shoe / In which I have lived like a foot / For thirty years, poor and white,” can be seen as a reference to the speaker’s feeling of abandonment by God. The use of the word “shoe” can be interpreted as a symbol of the speaker’s soul, which has been left behind by God. The poem’s later lines, “I have always been scared of you, / With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. / And your neat mustache / And your Aryan eye, bright blue,” can be seen as a reference to the speaker’s fear of God’s wrath. The use of the word “Luftwaffe” can be interpreted as a reference to the Nazi regime, which is often associated with evil. The poem’s final lines, “Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through,” can be seen as a reference to the speaker’s rejection of God. From a spiritual perspective, Daddy can be interpreted as a representation of the speaker’s journey towards self-discovery. The poem’s use of metaphors, such as the “black telephone” and the “foot,” can be seen as a representation of the speaker’s search for identity. The poem’s final lines, “Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through,” can be seen as a representation of the speaker’s liberation from the past and her journey towards self-acceptance. Overall, Daddy is a poem that can be analyzed from various perspectives, including religious and spiritual analysis.

Philosophical Analysis

Sylvia Plath’s Daddy is a poem that delves into the complexities of human relationships, particularly the relationship between a daughter and her father. The poem is a powerful exploration of the psychological impact of a father’s death on a daughter, and the ways in which this loss can shape her identity and sense of self.

At its core, Daddy is a meditation on the nature of power and control in human relationships. Plath uses the figure of her father to explore the ways in which power can be wielded over others, and the ways in which this power can be both destructive and transformative.

Through her use of vivid imagery and metaphor, Plath creates a world in which the father figure is both a source of fear and a source of fascination. The poem is a powerful exploration of the ways in which we are shaped by the people around us, and the ways in which our relationships with others can shape our sense of self.

Ultimately, Daddy is a deeply philosophical work that raises important questions about the nature of power, control, and identity. It is a poem that invites us to reflect on our own relationships with others, and to consider the ways in which these relationships shape who we are and who we become.

Social and Political Analysis

Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” is a powerful piece of literature that delves into the complex relationship between a daughter and her father. However, it also touches on larger social and political themes that were prevalent during the time it was written. Plath was a feminist writer who often explored the role of women in society and the patriarchal structures that oppressed them. In “Daddy,” she uses the metaphor of her father as a Nazi to comment on the oppressive nature of patriarchy and the trauma it can inflict on women. Additionally, the poem can be read as a commentary on the Holocaust and the atrocities committed by the Nazi regime. By analyzing the social and political themes present in “Daddy,” we can gain a deeper understanding of Plath’s message and the impact of her work on feminist literature.

Impact and Legacy

Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” has had a significant impact on the literary world and continues to be studied and analyzed today. The poem, which was first published in 1965, is a powerful and deeply personal exploration of Plath’s relationship with her father and the impact that relationship had on her life.

One of the most notable legacies of “Daddy” is its influence on feminist literature. Plath’s raw and honest portrayal of her experiences with patriarchy and the male-dominated society of her time has inspired countless writers and artists to explore similar themes in their own work. The poem has also been credited with helping to break down barriers for women in the literary world, paving the way for future generations of female writers to tell their own stories and challenge societal norms.

In addition to its impact on feminist literature, “Daddy” has also had a lasting impact on the field of poetry as a whole. The poem’s use of vivid imagery, powerful metaphors, and complex symbolism has been praised by critics and scholars alike, and has influenced countless poets in the decades since its publication.

Overall, Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” remains a powerful and important work of literature, one that continues to resonate with readers and inspire new generations of writers. Its impact on feminist literature and the field of poetry as a whole cannot be overstated, and its legacy will continue to be felt for many years to come.

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Daddy Sylvia Plath Analysis

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Introduction, the father-daughter relationship, the impact of the holocaust, identity and self-expression.

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Literary Theory and Criticism

Home › Literature › Analysis of Sylvia Plath’s Daddy

Analysis of Sylvia Plath’s Daddy

By NASRULLAH MAMBROL on April 1, 2021 • ( 0 )

The title of this poem sets its tone from the outset. “Daddy” typically is a name that a child first calls her parent. It is colloquial, lacking the formality and implied respect of “Father.” The poem’s first line is insistent, frustrated, and full of repetitive sounds, all of which are sustained to the poem’s end. It is what one might expect from an angry child or in an incantation—single-syllable words repeated with a single-minded purpose. The “Achoo” at the stanza’s end also is a word that a child might use instead of the word “sneeze.” Critics have commented on the poem’s nursery-rhyme-like sound, some believing it marvelously appropriate in light of the childhood reflections, others deeming it a disaster in light of the poem’s horrific rage. The poem begins:

You do not do, you do not do Any more, black shoe In which I have lived like a foot For thirty years, poor and white, Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.

At the beginning of the second line there is a switch, which can easily be missed because it is so short and easily rushed over due to the quickness of the poem. But this switch is an early indication of the narrator’s own shifting perspectives. “You do not do, you do not do / Any more,” the author says. The words “Any more,” reveal that this narrator’s Daddy was, at some point, acceptable to her.

Now we see that, at the age of thirty (in fact, Plath wrote this just before turning thirty), the narrator is rejecting the life her father made for her, wherein she had no chance to enjoy its riches and was barely able to live. She sees him as black and herself as white; on a basic level they can be no further apart. At the same time, the narrator is saying she no longer wants to be poor, barely able to breathe and, seemingly, white. But if she doesn’t want to be white, the alternative, then, is to be less white and more like him. As the poem progresses, such conflicts grow fierce. Some critics have questioned whether the intenseness of the daughter’s raw anger at her father actually can coexist with her need for him. Freud and many observers of humanity have answered yes.

Already by the second stanza, the narrator rejects her role as victim and asserts violent revenge. “Daddy, I have had to kill you,” she says, and the rather sickeningly controlled, matter-of-fact line sits by itself as a complete sentence on top of the rest of the stanza. Yet the daughter cannot have her way, for, she says, “You died before I had time—.” It is almost as if, even with his death, the father has tricked his daughter. Similarly, the reader is tricked here too. For after reading this first sentence, we assume the daughter has killed her father, since she doesn’t say “I wanted to kill you” or “I wished I could kill you” but “I have had to kill you” (emphasis added). Only in the next line do we find out that she did not literally kill him. Now we see that “I have had to kill you” was partially a wish and partially means that she has had to kill his remaining presence in her life.

There are numerous autobiographical elements in the poem. Plath’s father did die when she was young, from a complication as a result of an operation for a gangrenous toe. The toe is referred to in the poem, as is Nauset, the old name for a town on Cape Cod where her father originally arrived in America from Germany. This section of the poem is one of its few calm spots, both literally and aurally:

In the waters of beautiful Nauset. I used to pray to recover you. Ach, du. [translated from German as “Oh, you.”]

In attempting to “recover” her father, the speaker says she looked for his history in war-torn Europe but could not find his roots. From this it follows that she herself lacks roots. She speaks not just of never having been able to talk to him, but when she did try, she says, her tongue got stuck in her jaw, “a barb wire snare.” This is one of the poem’s first Holocaust illusions. The imagery quickly intensifies:

I thought every German was you. And the language obscene

An engine, an engine Chuffing me off like a Jew. A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen. I began to talk like a Jew. I think I may well be a Jew.

If the narrator’s father is a horrible German, she surmises that she must be the helpless Jewish victim. (This obscures the fact that if her father is German, she too is part German.) Even the German language is obscene and has overwhelming power to the narrator. It takes on the power of an engine. But this is not any engine; it is the engine pulling its train-load of victims to the death camps. As the narration continues, however, even though the daughter says she has always been “scared of you ,” she is less of a victim and more of a chastiser. She starts name-calling, taunting like a girl in a schoolyard who knows she can just run away: “Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You—” (“panzer” originating from the German word meaning “armored”). Then she jeers: “Every woman adores a Fascist, / The boot in the face, the brute / Brute heart of a brute like you.” She mocks him as well as sadistic male/female roles overall and their propaganda.

Next she calls her father a devil, and her personal pain returns as she explains that he “Bit my pretty red heart in two.” It could be that his evil is what destroyed her heart, or that the pain of his early death is what destroyed it. The poem returns to the autobiographical elements. The narrator says she was young when her father died, and that at twenty she tried to kill herself to “get back, back, back to you.” In light of the anger that comes before this point, as one reads this line one almost anticipates that it will say “get back, back, back at you,” in which case the act of suicide would become twisted revenge. The repetition and the harsh “ack” sound are still violent and desperate, but this time from the daughter who misses her father and needs to return to him; the violence is directed more at the source that has taken him away. The slowness and quiet of the next line reinforces her sad anguish in trying to be near him, even if it meant her own death—“I thought even the bones would do.”

Pile of shoes at Auschwitz Museum/GettyImages

After being brought back from death at twenty and prevented from uniting with her father, the narrator is again viciously angry. Out of her need for a paternal figure and as a result of her unresolved issues because her father died when she was so young, she is now connected to a new man who is just like him. She tells her dead father that her husband is “a model of you, / A man in black with a Meinkampf look / And a love of the rack and the screw.”

Again she is confronted with a lack of communication, symbolized by the telephone that will not let voices through. The poem is written just after Plath split up with her husband because of another woman. But as much as this man is evil too, she is not a helpless victim here now. While she lived with this “vampire” of a husband for seven years, she has “killed” him, just as she killed/removed her father. She appears triumphant, as she addresses her father, now that he is exorcised from her life: “There’s a stake in your fat black heart.”

The narrator has removed the horror in her life, and the last line proclaims finality—“Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through.” It is as if she is overwhelmingly relieved to be done not only with him but with her husband and with the whole Freudian scenario she was forced to play out. At the same time, the final “I’m through” can mean that she’s done in, especially in light of Plath’s suicide a few months later.

Further Reading Aird, Eileen. Sylvia Plath. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1973. Bawer, Bruce. “Sylvia Plath and the Poetry of Confession.” New Criterion 9 (1991): pp. 18–27. Broe, Mary Lynn. “‘Oh Dad, Poor Dad’: Sylvia Plath’s Comic Exorcism.” Notes on Contemporary Literature 9 (1979): pp. 2–4. Gilbert, Sandra M. “Teaching Plath’s ‘Daddy’ to Speak to Undergraduates.” ADE Bulletin 76 (Winter 1983): pp. 38–42. Herman, Judith B. “Plath’s ‘Daddy’ and the Myth of Tereus and Philomela.” Notes on Contemporary Literature 7 (1977): pp. 9–10. Newman, Charles, ed. The Art of Sylvia Plath. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1971. Platizky, R. “Plath’s Daddy.” Explicator 55 (Winter 1997): pp. 105–7. Smith, Nigel. “Sylvia Plath’s ‘Daddy.’” English Review 1 (September 1990): pp. 16–17. Srivasta, K. G. “Plath’s ‘Daddy.’” Explicator 50 (Winter 1992): pp. 126–28. Source: Bloom, H., 2001. Sylvia Plath: Bloom’s Major Poets. Chelsea.

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