Sylvia Plath as a Huge Camellia
By Kianna Kinsey (’23)
Content Warning: this post contains references to mental illness and death.
When walking into Lyman Conservatory at Smith College, one cannot miss the calm and beautiful ambiance created by the Camellia Corridor. Camellias can thrive for more than one hundred years, and one of them in our collection (Camellia sinensis #1930-6192) even dates to before Sylvia Plath’s time, meaning that she likely viewed it during her time at Lyman for a botany course her first year at Smith.
Sylvia Plath is known to be one of the most dynamic and admired poets of the 20th century, considered a pioneer of the confessional poetry style. Plath was known in the Anglophone literary world during her life, but she became widely famous as a cultural icon after her death—in some corners specifically because of her death. I argue that Plath should not be defined by her death and tragedies but rather by her motives to live and expression of resilience. Consider her poem, “Fever 103°,” and its usage of the camellia. In late 1962, when she wrote it, she was reeling from the break-up of her marriage to the poet Ted Hughes, seeking the strength to raise two young children on her own in England.
“Fever 103°” is an eighteen-stanza lyric poem that narrated by a person suffering from a high, hallucinatory fever. The speaker is in agony, and they deliver a corresponding image of heat and ritual purification. It begins at the scene of hell, far from purity, with the Greek mythological three-headed hellhound Cerberus guarding the entrance to the underworld. Plath repeats the word “sin” twice, in two different sections of the poem, conjuring a sense of guilt and fear. Darkness and terror hang over the scene, populated with reference to a “devilish leopard” and the bombing of Hiroshima. In the aftermath of an intense fire, the agony of sin abates. By the eighth stanza, we’ve arrived at a comedown—like a fever snapping. The poem emerges into a positive and hopeful moment: “To Paradise” (Plath 2018: 231). It is as though the poem embodies the aphorism, “without darkness, there is no light.”
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Camellias are shrubs or small trees with broad, dark, glossy green leaves and gorgeous wax-like flowers, with over 200 species recorded. They have been commonly deployed in literature and elsewhere as symbols of resilience and rebirth, probably because the common tea plant Camellia japonica is considered winter hardy and typically blooms during late winter. They are known for their large, showy flowers that come in various colors, including white, pink, red, and variegated. However, camellias are also susceptible to several fungal diseases and troublesome pests.
The speaker declares a metaphorical relationship between themselves and camellias in “Fever 103°,” writing, “I am a huge camellia.” It is safe to assume at least some relationship between Plath and her speaker. Both speaker and plant figure as symbols of resilience in the face of adversity because of their ability to endure difficult conditions and continue to thrive. If you’re at Lyman at the right time of year, you’ll notice that the camellia’s flowers do not whither on the plant. Neither do individual pedals fall off one by one. Instead, the entire flower falls, beautiful and intact. And, even when the flowers are gone, it leaves behind a thriving, glossy-leafed bush. As though arriving to the other side of a traumatic experience, such as mental health crises or the collapse of a marriage, speaker and camellia remain in tact.
Mental health and marriage difficulties were taboo topics during Plath’s time, and one important part of Plath’s legacy has been to present these topics to readers so they can be seen and understood and common parts of the human experience. Having survived these experiences, she created groundbreaking poems that made sense of them. Plath’s poetry speaks to universal experiences of pain, loss, and resilience; her ability to confront these difficult emotions in her writing is a testament to her strength and courage. Ultimately, this legacy is a complex and multifaceted one, and it is important to approach her work with nuance and sensitivity. Rather than focusing solely on her tragic death, we should appreciate the depth and power of her poetry and how it continues to resonate with readers today. Both camellias and Plath have been pillars of resilience.
As she said herself in “Fever 103°,” she is a huge camellia.
Works Cited