Medusa - Sylvia Plath

Question 1

Literary devices

Answer 1

• Imagery
• Symbolism
• Metaphor

Question 2

Imagery

Answer 2

Medusa is a mythical figure that is being used to represent Plath’s mother.

Religious imagery - “Blubbery Mary” (virgin Mary)

Question 3

Symbolism

Answer 3

Symbolism of suffocation

Question 4

Suffocation

Answer 4

“Did I escape you, I wonder” - questioning whether she ever managed to be free from her mother despite moving oversees
“Cobra light / squeezing breathe from the blood bells / of the fuscia. I could draw no breath” - plosive - anger. Comparing her mother’s suffocation to a cobra - slow, painful.
“Fat and red, a placenta” - giving life but fat, overbearing
“Overexposed, like an x-ray” - too much - can’t hide, mother sees through everything
“Off, off, eely tentacle” - links to cobra: feels as though her mother is trapping her and wrapping around her and she is attempting to rid herself of this.

Question 5

Confliction

Answer 5

“Your wishes / hiss at my sins” - hiss like medusa but towards sins, harsh but for kindness
“There is nothing between us” - ambiguous
“Fat and red, a placenta” - giving life but fat

Question 6

Final line

Answer 6

Ambiguous:

“There is nothing between us” - There is nothing that can get between them / there is no bond between them

Question 7

Medusa

Answer 7

“your wishes / hiss at my sins” - sibilance

“Off the landspit of stony mouth-plugs”

Question 8

Structure

Answer 8

The last line: “There is nothing between us” - ambiguity reflects the whole poem: she is conflicted between her love and need for her mother and her dislike for her mother and how suffocating she is.

Question 9

Context

Answer 9

Has a bad relationship with mother. Feels suffocated and wants to be separate: she moved from America to England.