The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath And Ted Hughes

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I am a Minka Kent fan and, usually, Minka Kent's fast-paced, twisty thrillers offer more elements of realism than this book. I made a whole lot of other notes when I read this for the second time but I have tried your patience enough.

what is truth? The responsibility of the biographer vs the irresponsibility of the journalist. and that the reasoned 'truthful' 'responsible' biography is paint drying dull; dishwater dull, when compared to the salacious memoir. Sylvie lives in her ex-husband's caretaker's cottage, located on the premises of Wells and Jade's elysian estate. (Huh?)I've read several books by Minka Kent and enjoyed them all, so I was happy to try another one. I loved the premise of this one, and from the description, it seemed pretty straightforward. However, I know this author likes to add in some wild twists to her stories, so I had developed some theories as I read and I was sure one of them would be correct. I have to say that this book surprised me in more than one way. The non-spoiler way in which it surprised me, is that the main character is very smart and keeps her cards close to her chest most of the time, instead of blabbing her suspicions to other people. There were only a couple of times that I thought maybe she shouldn't tell someone something. I loved that she went about investigating what happened to her husband's first wife in an intelligent way. Also, nothing in this book stood out to me as not in keeping with the characters as they developed, even when we finally find out the truth. This was a problem I had with one of this author's other books, Unmissing. Every journalist who is not too stupid or full of himself to notice what is going on knows that what he does is morally indefensible. Listen to silence. It has so much to say" was an intriguing theme that was introduced at the beginning of the book that, unfortunately, the author abandoned.

There are rabbit holes you can fall down. Janet Malcolm leaps determinedly into this Sylvia Plath rabbit hole head first. Sylvia’s awful suicide of February 1963 at the age of 30 began a conflict which lasted at least until Ted Hughes died in 1998. Ted himself edited Sylvia’s latest poems and published them in 1965 as Ariel. This was a book of poetry so great that readers who never read poetry would read and reread it. The widely accepted narrative is that Plath, a tortured, unhappy artist, was pushed over the edge by Hughes's extra-curricular activities outside their marriage and opted out of life itself. Thus Hughes is the adulterous villain who was indirectly responsible for the loss of the supremely talented Plath. How is it that I never read Janet Malcolm (beyond the occasional New Yorker article) before? I was prompted to do so by Malcolm's recent passing.

Success!

Relatives are the biographer’s natural enemies; they are like the hostile tribes an explorer encounters and must ruthlessly subdue to claim his territory. Eeeeeeeek! Minka Kent is one of my favorite authors and I was sooooo excited to get my hands on this new book.