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Quote by Sylvia Plath

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The Letters of Sylvia Plath Vol 2: 1956-1963 – A Pulitzer Prize-Winning Poet's Intimate Correspondence on Marriage and Mental Health

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Author

Sylvia Plath
Sylvia Plath

American poet, novelist, and playwright. Her works are known for their profound emotion and unique style, and she is considered one of the most important female writers of the 20th century. more

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“I felt that the metal of my spirit, like a bar of iron that is softened and bent by a persistent flame, was being gradually softened and bent by the troubles that oppressed it. In spite of myself, I was conscious of a feeling of envy for those who did not suffer from such troubles, for the wealthy and the privileged; and this envy, I observed, was accompanied—still against my will—by a feeling of bitterness towards them, which, in turn, did not limit its aim to particular persons or situations, but, as if by an uncontrollable bias, tended to assume the general, abstract character of a whole conception of life. In fact, during those difficult days, I came very gradually to feel that my irritation and my intolerance of poverty were turning into a revolt against injustice, and not only against the injustice which struck at me personally but the injustice from which so many others like me suffered. I was quite aware of this almost imperceptible transformation of my subjective resentments into objective reflections and states of mind, owing to the bent of my thoughts which led always and irresistibly in the same direction: owing also to my conversation, which, without my intending it, alway harped upon the same subject. I also noticed in myself a growing sympathy for those political parties which proclaimed their struggle against the evils and infamies of the society to which, in the end I had attributed the troubles that beset me—a society which, as I thought, in reference to myself, allowed its best sons to languish and protected its worst ones. Usually, and in the simpler, less cultivated people, this process occurs without their knowing it, in the dark depths of consciousness where, by a kind of mysterious alchemy, egoism is transmuted into altruism, hatred into love, fear into courage; but to me, accustomed as I was to observing and studying myself, the whole thing was clear and visible, as though I were watching it happen in someone else; and yet I was aware the whole time that I was being swayed by material subjective factors, that I was transforming purely personal motives into universal reasons.”

CharacterFree WillAlienationItalyObjectivitySubjectivityHegelCategorical ImperativeEssentialismPolitical AnimalUniversal Reasons
Book:Contempt
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“The traditions of . . . bygone times, even to the smallest social particular, enable one to understand more clearly the circumstances with contributed to the formation of character. The daily life into which people are born, and into which they are absorbed before they are well aware, forms chains which only one in a hundred has moral strength enough to despise, and to break when the right time comes - when an inward necessity for independent individual action arises, which is superior to all outward conventionalities. Therefore it is well to know what were the chains of daily domestic habit which were the natural leading-strings of our forefathers before they learnt to go alone.”

CharacterHistoryGenerationsCircumstancesHistoricalHabitsForefathersAncestorsTraditionsMindsets
Book:Ruth
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“The shaping of character mimics the smallest detail of habit; humans are creatures that learn from observation. Each little thing you do, and each thing you allow yourself to become desensitized to matters. They create you—whether you know it consciously or not.”

LifeCharacterSpiritualityGrowthHuman BeingsAwarenessSelf HelpPersonalityHabitSpiritual QuotesSpiritual AwakeningSpiritual DevelopmentSelf Improvement Book
Book:Awakening in the 21st Century
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