Literature Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 6

Literature - Essay Example Burke argues that in `Daddy’ Sylvie Plath proves otherwise. Security, or authority, as defined by Plath is an authoritarian state which is expressed in fascist and militaristic domination. Accordingly, Plath’s father is a Nazi soldier while she is a helpless Jew. This analogy depicts security at its most extreme but, as Plath proves, it can be escaped. Security can be escaped as it is a state of mind. In order for oppression/security to occur, the oppressed has to accept it. Plath’s rejection of her `father,’ and of his control establishes that escape from security is possible if the oppressed reject it. This is the manner in which Burke interprets Plath’s poem and, as earlier mentioned, it is an extremely interesting interpretation. Ramzani, a professor of English Literature, argues that several of Plath’s poems, and most especially `Daddy,’ are elegies, or poems of mourning. Ramzani acknowledges that her interpretation of Plath’s poem, `Daddy,’ will create a great deal of controversy for one simple reason. This reason is that, literary critics define elegies as poems of love in which a dead person is both honored and remembered. They are, in the tradition of poetic genres, among the most beautiful and, quite often, the most romantic. To suggest, therefore, the Plath’s `Daddy’ is an elegy, as were many of Milton’s and Shelley’s appears, therefore, to be based on a misinterpretation and misunderstanding of the characteristics of the elegiac genre. This criticism would only hold true if Plath were writing in the same era and tradition as Milton or Shelley but the fact that has to be taken into account is that she is a post-modern poet. In other words, the de finition and style of the elegy has changed. It is still a poem of communication with the dead and a poem of morning but, rather than express love, it can express rage. This is