MIRROR - (POETRY)Summary - Sylvia Plath

Sylvia Path (1932-63) is a controversial poet of the generation. She was married to Ted Hughes, the poet, but she was not happy. Her autobiographical accounts tell us that she was volatile and mentally unstable for a long time. In 1960 her first collection of poems, Colossus appeared. During the last three years of her life she seemed to be troubled by her personal experiences and wrote frantically. She wrote as a ‘Mother’ and a ‘Poet’, to identifies very close to her heart.

“Mirror” by Sylvia Plath shows the shallowness and superficial concerns of women through the personification and description of a mirror reflecting a woman’s life and her character. The poem is narrated by the mirror which does not really provide an impartial view contrary to its claim. Eventually it became difficult to differentiate between the women and the mirror. Like women, the mirror is subservient (faithfully reflects).

 In the first stanza, the mirror introduces itself. It claims to have no ‘preconceptions’. It represents itself as not cruel, only honest. This eventually becomes too honest and too blunt, for the woman who turns to the ‘liars’ that make her more beautiful – moonlight and candlelight.
“Mirror” could be termed an eye-opening poem because of its truthful descriptions of the relationship between the inner feelings of people and the outward appearances that they project
which affect them in the public scene.

The second section of the poem introduces a woman into the life of a mirror. She looks towards the mirror seeking to find youth and beauty, and the mirror sees her agitation and depression. She is always looking into the mirror to make sure everything is perfect. In this, the mirror, over the years, the young girl transforms into an old woman. Each day she is reminded by the mirror of her lost youth and beauty that was once projected back to her so faithfully.

The woman’s view of herself and her reluctance to accept her natural beauty shows how we all find it hard to accept ourselves for who we truly are.

 Many readers have found in the poem the anxieties related to woman’s desire to be loved and admired as well as a conflict between the ideal and the real. Throughout the poem, the mirror is shown as an arrogant object proud of its power and importance. The metaphor of the mirror being the “eye of a little god” is sustained throughout the poem signifying the power it has. The statement “I am important to her” states the value of the mirror for the woman and indicates that the woman is addicted to the mirror to the point where she is searching for what she really is in the mirror, despite the fact that the mirror is cruel and blunt.