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Ellen Van Atta

English 12/Dual Credit
Mrs. Tieman
24 March 2014
Spinster Analysis
Spinster, by Sylvia Plath, begins with a woman taking a walk with her new boyfriend
in April, when she all the suddenly realizes the irregularity of the birds noise and the leaves
everywhere. Being affected by these, she observed that her lovers movements caused an
unbalance in the air and his walk was uneven. She felt the whole season was off, including the
petals of the wild flowers. She wanted nothing more than for winter to come. She wanted the
order of winter: how everything has its place and was confined to it. Everything was as Exact as
a snowflake. She couldnt get this kind of order in spring. It was crazy and out-of-order enough
to cause her to have a mixture of vulgar thoughts. She believed only idiots would feel giddy
about spring and enjoy the season, so she withdrew quietly. She set up a barricade around her
house that no one or nothinglovecould get through. She felt that this would protect her from
spring. When this poem talks about the seasons, its really a metaphor for love. It can seem kind
of crazy and cause us to be off balance (spring) so sometimes it is easier and safer to live life
without love (winter).
This poem takes on more of a story feel with the use of enjambment in almost every
stanza. The use of enjambment causes the reader to connect the lines to one another instead of
looking at each line as its own meaning. It shows the relationship between the woman and the
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seasons and why the woman feels the way she does. This helps the reader to then connect the
meaning and usage of the metaphor of love and the poem itself.
Through appealing to the senses, imagery, and word choices, diction, Plath is also able to
show the reader how affected the woman is by the seasons. When Plath uses the wording, But
therea burgeoning/ unruly enough to pitch her five queenly wits/ into vulgar motely
(Stanza 4), she gives the reader a different view of springor lovethrough the eyes of the
woman. The reader gets a sense of the woman being unable to handle the unbalance that spring
and love bring. She needs to have order in her life. The imagery and diction allow the reader to
have a greater understanding of the woman and how she feels. Plath also uses personification in
Spinster when she talks of winter. She gives winter human personality when describing its
action, Scrupulously austere in its order (Stanza 3). Giving these characteristics to winter
allows the reader to see what draws the woman toward it and how most humans want those
characteristics.
The attitude/tone of the poem starts off giving the reader a feeling of on edge with
stanza 1 and 2. The woman feels uncomfortable and out of sorts with the unbalance that spring
and love bring. She is observing everything that is out of place as if they are things that make her
uncomfortable and she is observing with acceptance that nothing is perfect. The word choice
helps to set up this tone in the first stanza, Found herself, of a sudden, intolerably struck
(Stanza 1). The phrase intolerably struck helps to give off the feel that the woman cant stand
the unbalance that spring and her new lover are causing. It is making her uncomfortable and on
edge.
There is a tone shift from the second stanza to the third. In the third, the tone is more
admiring. The woman is giving credit and awe to winter with the order it brings and keeps with
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itshearts frosty discipline (Stanza 3). She longs for this order because of the unbalance she
is feeling at the moment of her April walk. However, this is not the last shift of tone. There is
also a shift between the third and fourth stanzas. From the fourth stanza on, the poems
tone/attitude is back to making the reader feel on edge and some fearful. The woman is still
cautious and unhappy with the way everything is off center in spring. But her uneasiness is
brought to a whole new level when she decides to retreat from spring altogether and barricade
herself in her house.
Building on the metaphor that spring is symbolizing love and winter the lack of love in
the womans life, the reader can see that love makes the woman uneasy and as if she is out of
control. She blames this on the fact that she has love in her life and she doesnt like how
unpredictable it is, she/ observed her lovers gestures unbalance the air,/ his gait stray
uneven (Stanza 2). She rather it be winterno love in her lifebecause it has more
predictability and she is always in control. This drives her to make the decision to lock herself
away from love so that it can never break through and get into her life again, And round her
house she set/ such a barricadeas no mere insurgent man could hope to break/ with curse, fist,
threat/ or love either (Stanza 5).
My impression of the title Spinster didnt change mush from the beginning to after
doing some analysis. The most that changed was that first reading the title I assumed that the
poem would be about an older woman who had yet to be married, but after reading the poem, I
felt it was about a younger woman. The title is a little like foreshadowing, since the younger
woman in the poem who is afraid of love will always be afraid. She will let the barricade she
built around her househeartdown to let love in eventually causing her to be considered a
spinster, an older woman who had yet to be married. This poem is giving love a lesser view than
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what most of society sees it as, a beautiful thing that most people seek out. It is showing love as
this unbalanced and unpredictable thing that may be better left out of our lives.