My Papa’s Waltz Analysis

The poem was written in the 1940s and set in some earlier decade, and describes a scene from
family life, when a tipsy father waltzes with his little son around the kitchen. It might have been
inspired by the impressions from the poet’s childhood.

Symbolism
The main symbol in the poem is waltz. Waltz is a dance involving interaction and interdependence between
two people, thus symbolizing the relationship between the father and the son, as emotional and controversial
as it might be.

The story of the whiskey-drinking father fiercely waltzing his child around the room, holding him roughly
and beating time on his head, might be interpreted in a positive and negative way – either the father, a rough,
simple and hard-working man, loves his son and wants to have fun dancing with him, doing it in a simple
man’s clumsy manner, or this is a story of a drunkard actually neglecting and abusing his child.

The only active character is the father, exercising his power over his family members who obey him. The
father is an active manly character and a role model for his young son.

The entire poem is ambiguous and even the word choice is confusing – the word “beat” means the musical
beat in the waltz but might also be suggestive of the father beating his son with his belt, while the belt is also
mentioned it the poem for some reason – either simply as a clothing detail or a symbol of abuse.

The lines telling that the boy “hung on like death” on his father’s shirt because “such waltzing was not easy”
might also suggest either the boy’s strong love for his father or the fact that it was difficult for the boy to deal
with him.

Even the title of the poem itself is confusing – waltz is supposing to be a flowing and graceful dance, not a
clumsy “romping”, missing steps and kicking things down from the shelves. On the other hand, a hard-
working man’s fun dancing with his child who will grow into an adult man, too, might be more rough and
aggressive expression of the father’s love and not something particularly gentle.

However, the entire poem might be an expression of love of the son for his father, keeping in mind that the
poem was written in earlier times when drinking and even punishing children was considered quite a normal
everyday thing and also that the author’s father died when the author was only 14, so he might have loved his
father despite all difficulties and mistakes.

Analysis of Poem "Daddy" by Sylvia Plath

Sylvia Plath uses her poem, “Daddy”, to express intense emotions towards her father’s life and death
and her disastrous relationship with her husband. The speaker in this poem is Sylvia Plath who has
lost her father at age ten, at a time when she still adored him unconditionally. Then she gradually
realizes the oppressing dominance of her father, and compares him to a Nazi, a devil, and a vampire.
Later, the conflict of this relationship continues with her husba nd which led to a short and painful
marriage. In “Daddy” by Sylvia Plath, the author illustrates her feelings of anger and resentment
towards her father and husband along with being oppressed for most of her life through her poetic
devices of vivid metaphor, imagery, rhyme, tone, and simile.

The speaker creates a figurative image of her father, using many different metaphors to describe
her relationship with him. He's like a black shoe that she's had to live in; like a statue that stretches
across the United States; like God; like a Nazi; like a Swastika; and, finally, like a vampire. The
speaker, faced with her father as a giant and evil Nazi, takes the part of a Jew and a victim.
Yet, with this poem, the speaker gets her revenge, claiming that she's killed both her father and the
man she made as a model of her father – her husband. This poem shows her struggle to declare
that, no matter how terrible her father was and how much he remains in her mind, she is now
through with him.

The speaker indicates that her German father is like a Nazi, and that she is like a Jew. This is a
very powerful metaphor for how the speaker feels like she is a victim of her father, or perhaps for
how she feels about men in general.

At the end of this poem, the metaphor for the speaker's father and husband, and potentially all
men, shifts from Nazis to vampires. These men go from being depicted as living horrors to undead
horrors. We know that the speaker's father is dead, so it's super creepy to think that he's come
back to haunt her as a vampire.

The speaker in this poem describes herself as small, and her father as immense. But for the most
part she doesn't just come out and say so: she shows us with imagery and metaphors. This adds
to the feel that the speaker is the victim in this poem, and makes her father seem more looming
and scary.

Sylvia Plath: Poems Summary and Analysis of "Lady Lazarus"

The title is an allusion to the Biblical character, Lazarus, whom Jesus raised from the dead.

‘Lady Lazarus’ is a bitter dramatic monologue

The poem details the tragic life of a lady and her several suicide attempts. She says that she has tried to kill
herself many times, but surprisingly survived every time. She asks those who saved her from peeling off the
napkin from her face and see her wounded soul. She compares her suffering to Nazi prisoners to make the
readers understand the reason for her discontent. As the poem progresses, she provides graphic details of
physical and the mentality effects of suicide. She lashes out on her doctors and those who take her as
an object of entertainment. She concludes by calling herself a phoenix, rising from the ashes.

Throughout "Lady Lazarus," the speaker uses extended metaphors of death and resurrection to express her
own personal suffering. The speaker compares herself to Lazarus (a biblical reference to a man Jesus raised
from the dead), telling the reader that she has died multiple times, and is, in fact, dead when the poem
begins.

When she attempts to commit suicide, the speaker keeps being brought back to life! As such, the speaker
warns that, when she returns from death, she will “eat men like air.” The speaker intends to destroy the men
who have forced her to stay alive, and thus will finally be able to die as she wants. In fact, it starts to
seem as if she's performing a third death in front of a crowd at a circus or carnival. She
compares herself again to Holocaust victims, and imagines that she's been burned to
death in a concentration camp crematorium. At the end of the poem, she resurrects (or
returns to life from death) once again, and she "eat[s] men like air."