SYLVIA PLATH

¡§Virgin in a Tree¡¨

Study Guide

 

Summary ¡U Pictorial Background

Mythological, Biblical and Historical Sources ¡U Form ¡U Commentary

 

 

n          Summary:

The poem begins with an ironic exclamation by the speaker who mocks the virgin in Klee's etching and the conventional acclamation to females who choose chastity over sexuality.  The speaker refers to the traditional approval for virginity as being like a "parody of that mousetrap / Set in the proverbs stitched on samplers."  There is juxtaposition between "moral mousetrap" and "samplers."  On the one hand, virginity is a snare that makes the chaste woman a victim; on the other, the virgin also presents herself as a typical prototype, a sampler.

The speaker then describes in stanza two the virgin in a tree as wearing a "nun-black / Habit"¡Xwhich alludes to a nun's long dress¡Xthat would "sheathe" herself "In a scabbard of wood," like the virgin-maiden Daphne, and drive away all pursuers.

When the speaker retreats with mockery, from the third to sixth stanza, the puritan voice appears to affirm victory of virginity.  The puritan voice intends to celebrate Syrinx and Pitys' chastity.  Unlike Eva, Cleo, and Helen, who had lost their virginity, Syrinx and Pitys would keep everlasting fame and make their virginity a ¡§sanctum.¡¨

In the seventh and eighth stanza, the puritan voice disappears and the speaker comes back to address Klee.  First, the speaker laments the glory that has been historically preserved for "ugly spinsters and barren sirs."  Then, the speaker indicates Klee's Virgin in a Tree in which he defies tradition by portraying the virgin as a victim, and virginity as distorted, stern, and bitter.  The virgin in the tree is like the virgin "on her rack"¡Xan instrument of torture on which people were tied and stretched.  The virgin's tree becomes a scaffold of torment that destroys her identity and vitality.  The description of her gesture ("Lain splayed") implies a strong suggestion of sexual desire, yet the virgin becomes an overripe sour fruit for her choice of chastity. 

Finally, the last stanza concludes that youthful sexuality should not be wasted or "all beauty's bright juice sours."  The speaker mirrors the barren virgin as a "gross anatomy" in that her virginity is not just unnatural and distorting, but also is eventually destructive.  The poem ends with the word "break."  The speaker proclaims that the conventional viewpoint about virginity must be abolished.  This conclusive last word suggests that the creation of a new viewpoint concerning virginity must begin with the destruction of the traditional viewpoint.

 

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n          Pictorial Background:

Klee's 1903 etching Virgin in a Tree is mockery about the traditional view of chastity.  It reveals nineteenth-century imagery on the nature of woman and her place in society.  The etching is a union of forms through sinuous outlines and linear continuities.  The contours of the virgin are made to fit closely with the distorted branches of her tree.  The congruence of the tree, the virgin, and the birds that Klee etched purposely create a particular connection between them.  The contorted tree demonstrates the perverted nature of virginity.  The virgin in the tree is genuinely a virgin belonging to a part of the tree.  The linear physique of her body perfectly harmonizes with the linear outline of the tree.  And the dry, wilted, lifeless tree echoes the inert, barren, torpid virgin.  Thus, the dead tree is an ironic reflection of the unattractive virgin.  Also, the beast-like birds reflect the beast in men, the sensuality.  Yet they are not birds of love that can remind the virgin of a season of mating.  The contradiction between the birds and the virgin manifests the conflict between sensuality and virginity.  Instead of suggesting the pleasure of sensual love, the pair of birds almost looks like birds of prey ready to fall on the virgin.  To choose to be a virgin indicates a decision to renounce sexual desires.  Thus the birds, the representation of physical love, would not bring the virgin any joy, but can be dangerous and destructive.

 

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n          Mythological, Biblical and Historical Sources:

Daphne:
A nymph with whom Apollo fell in love with.  Running away from the god the chaste maiden cried for her father, the river god Peneus, who turned her into a bay tree.

Syrinx
: An Arcadian nymph, daughter of the river-god Ladon.  She was changed by her sisters into a reed in her flight from the enamored Pan.

Pitys:
A beautiful nymph.  Pan chased her and in order to get away from him Pitys turned herself into a pine tree.

Eva: or Eve.  In the Old Testament (Genesis), she is the wife of Adam.  They are first man and woman and parents of the human race.  Adam was created by God in His image out of dust.  Eve (from the Hebrew word for ¡§mother of all living¡¨) was made by God from one of Adam¡¦s ribs.  They were placed in the Garden of Eden, but they were expelled for eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Cleo: or Cleopatra.  She is the last and most famous of the Macedonian queens of Egypt.  She is best remembered for her love affairs with two Roman rulers, Julius Caesar and Mark Antony.  After Caesar¡¦s death, she became the lover of Mark Antony.  She was with him at the Battle of Actium, where he was defeated by Octavius for control of the Roman world.  According to legend, after Antony¡¦s death, she killed herself with the bite of an asp.

Helen of Troy: The divinely beautiful daughter of Zeus and Leda.  She was wooed by numbers of suitors, and at length gave her hand to Menelaus.  In the absence of her husband she was carried away to Troy by Paris the son of Priam, taking with her much treasure.  This was the origin of the Trojan War.

 

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n          Form:

The stanzaic form is rigid with a demanding rhyme scheme of abcde, which reflect the stern traditional concept.  Yet the poem does not present a sermon or praise for conventional approval of chastity.

 

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n          Commentary:

Sylvia Plath's ekphrastic poem on Klee's Virgin in a Tree does not simply reflect the subject matter of the etching, but undertakes a practice to destroy and to re-create the viewpoint of virginity.  As Klee did in his etching, Plath's ekphrastic poem also demonstrates a social critique and mockery of the conventional viewpoint about virginity.  However, Klee's picture intends to criticize the truism, but Plath offers more than criticism.  First of all, the theme of the poem is different from the etching.  Klee's etching intends to mock the ridiculousness of traditional perceptions about virginity.  Plath's poem not only illustrates the woman as a victim of conventional approval of chastity, and her role as a weaker sex in society, but also suggests a possibility to destroy the social bondage and free the virgin from a meaningless reputation for virginity's sake.  Second, the focus is different.  Klee's etching presents a barren virgin in a withered tree to convey the irony between absurdity and pathos.  Plath's poem keeps the irony; however, the focus is on a disagreement between the third-person speaker and the puritan voice¡Xa debate about the nature of virginity.  In order to indicate the irony, the speaker in the poem is both a narrator and a commentator.  While the speaker's sarcasm contradicts the puritan voice's boast, the poem, in fact, does not deliberately present a portrayal of the virgin in Klee's etching, but a struggle between sensuality and chastity, between the woman who prefers to follow her sexual desire and the woman who chooses to be a nun-like virgin.  Also, characters are changed.  The etching displays an inert woman and a pair of languid birds in a withered tree; Klee uses juxtaposition between them to denote the destructive nature of virginity.  Nevertheless, Plath uses sources from mythology, history, and the bible to demonstrate the results of the choice of chastity and sensuality.  The change of characters from birds to female figures helps Plath to emphasize the struggle.  There is an ambiguous irony in Plath's comparison between the mythological virgins, and the biblical and historical non-virgins.  The praise for the virgins is accompanied with a negative impression, while relating them with the tree image.  Yet the disapproval of the non-virgins also suggests an understatement that affirms their strength to determine what they want, but not what the society approves.  Instead of a contrast between a human being and the beasts as in Klee's etching, Plath uses virgins and non-virgins to reinforce women's struggle with virginity and sexuality.

 

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