12 Sylvia Plath Quotes for Writers and About Writing

Here are 12 Sylvia Plath quotes for writers and about writing from the author of The Colossus and Other Poems, Ariel, and The Bell Jar. In these quotes, Plath covers poetry, love, Shakespeare, and more.

Sylvia Plath was best known as an American author of The Bell Jar, Ariel, and The Colossus and Other Poems. She was a member of the confessional poetry movement, which has often led to debate about how autobiographical her writings were, were not, and/or if it should matter in literary interpretation of the text.

(Life into fiction: turning a true event into compelling story.)

Plath married the poet Ted Hughes, and the two lived in the United States and England before separating in 1962. On February 11, 1963, she took her own life at the age of 30. Her posthumous collection, The Collected Poems, won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1982.

Here are 12 Sylvia Plath quotes for writers and about writing.

"At one point, I was absolutely wild for Auden."

"Daddy, I have had to kill you."

"I always like someone who can teach me something practical."

*****

Write Better Novels!

Push yourself beyond your comfort zone and take your writing to new heights with this Advanced Novel Writing workshop meant for novelists who are looking for book editing and specific feedback on their work. When you take this online workshop, you won't have weekly reading assignments or lectures. Instead, you'll get to focus solely on completing your novel.

While it is possible to write a novel in a month, in this workshop you'll spend 15 weeks writing yours—all the while gaining valuable feedback and getting the encouragement you need in order to finish writing your novel. You'll also learn specific tips for outlining and how not to write a novel. One thing is for certain though—by the end of this online workshop, you will have the tools and know-how to write a great novel.

Click to continue.

*****

"I may never be happy, but tonight I am content."

"I'm a rather political person."

"It's presumptuous to say that one is influenced by someone like Shakespeare. One reads Shakespeare."

(33 words coined by Shakespeare.)

"Love set you going like a fat gold watch."

"My first book The Colossus, I can't read any of the poems aloud now. I didn't write them to be read aloud."

(Readings that work for you and your listeners.)

"Perfection is terrible, it cannot have children."

"Poetry is a tyrannical discipline."

(100 poetic forms for poets.)

"Some things are hard to write about. After something happens to you, you go to write it down, and either you over dramatize it or underplay it, exaggerate the wrong parts or ignore the important ones. At any rate, you never write it quite the way you want to."

"I believe that one should be able to control and manipulate experiences, even the most terrifying, with an informed and intelligent mind."