Born and raised in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts during the Great Depression, Sylvia Plath endured an oppressive and depressing childhood. On the surface, Plath appeared to be intelligent, sensitive, and flawless, but inside she was living in misery. Sylvia Plath's emotional life, and her arduous past with her father's death, her tragic break up with Ted Hughes, feminism, and bipolar disorder played an immense part in her career as a poet by inspiring her to create her somber masterpieces. Despite all her troubles, Sylvia Plath excelled as a student at Smith College, won awards, and prizes for her writing, and was a straight a student. Then, she met her future husband and ex-husband, Ted Hughes, whom she would have two children with. Sylvia Plath, was an extremely prodigious poet, she published her first poem, Circus in Three Rings, at age eight. By writing over 121 compelling poems and one stellar novel based on her life experiences, women's rights and injustices, she became the face of 20th century feminism.
Sylvia Plath’s poetry is mainly about 20th century feminism and women’s social injustices. "The poem Daddy criticizes the male aggression and depicts men being responsible for all the social injustices" (Hunt). In Sylvia Plath's versification Daddy, she illustrates how men are dominant over women, by comparing herself to Jews, and men to the Nazis. “I may be a bit of a Jew. I have always been scared of you” (Plath, "Daddy"). She outlines how women are a minority, and don’t have a voice in society by describing the sense of suffocation that women feel towards men. “Lord of the mirrors! It is himself he guides” (Plath, "Purdah"). In Purdah, the message, she conveys is that woman always hide in the shadows of their husbands, meaning they are afraid of them, reflecting their shadows thus acting like a mirror which is like a Purdah or a veil. In Jailer, Plath emphasizes that being a woman is not enough, she feels the need to be better than just a woman. She feels as if she is imprisoned in a jail, because she is female. “I am myself. That is not enough” (Plath, "Jailer"). She feels as if her identity doesn’t suit her. Although feminism played the lead role in Plath’s poetry, her somber life experiences possessed a magnanimous effect on her poetry.

Sylvia Plath’s traumatic childhood and experiences as an adult held great leverage on her career as a poet. Sylvia Plath’s father died of untreated diabetes. Edward Butscher, author of “Sylvia Plath: Method and Madness,” writes upon her inspiration “His life and, more importantly, his death nine days after her eighth birthday, left an imprint on her imagination that time did not erase or soften”(Butscher 6). Plath’s poem Daddy, references to her father’s death. “Any more, black shoe In which I have lived like a foot”(Plath, "Daddy"). She is referring to herself as the foot, and her father as the black shoe in which she has lived in so long. Shoes are meant to protect ones feet, which implies that Plath always felt protected in her father’s living memories. In 1961, Sylvia Plath’s unfortunate miscarriage left her heartbroken in despair and influenced her to contrive the poem Tulips. In the poem she is recovering from her miscarriage, “Learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly”(Plath, "Tulips"), yet she is struggling to do so. Although Sylvia Plath’s poem Stillborn, was written before her miscarriage, it is about a stillbirth. “And still the lungs won't fill and the heart won't start”(Plath, "Stillborn"). Another factor that had the greatest effect on Plath happened husband deserted her and two young kids of his for a woman named Assia Wevill. “Hers was the the final act of despair after Ted Hughes abandoned her for another woman” (Levy). She then fell into a deep stage of depression, and wrote her final legendary piece of work foreboding her suicide, entitled The Bell Jar. The Bell Jar disclosed a doleful anecdote based on the tragic events in Plath’s life. The Bell Jar was Sylvia Plath’s most meritorious and only novel. The book references to many real people, and dolorous events in Plath’s life. Her self image was portrayed in her book as the troubled character Esther Greenwood. Esther Greenwood is the narrator and protagonist of the novel. “I am at odds. I dislike being a girl, because as such I must come to realize that I cannot be a man” (Plath 54). Like Plath, Esther Greenwood does not enjoy the limitations of being a woman. Being a woman to Plath and her character meant being a slave. In the years Plath lived, women were inferior to men. The males job was to bring home the money, and the females role was to take care of their families, perform house chores, and cook. They weren't allowed to work, and if they were allowed, their husbands would receive their paychecks. Esther Greenwood and Sylvia Plath were very much alike, for instance Esther lost her father at an early age, grew up in Boston with her mother, edited for a magazine, feminists and were bipolar.

Sylvia Plath labored a strenuous life struggling with the demons of bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder is a mental disorder marked by alternating periods of elation and depression. Because she was bipolar, her depression, and self image were the main ingredients of her poetry and suicide. Her first suicide attempt was as a junior in college, after being rejected by Harvard college, she took her mothers sleeping pills and crawled underneath the house. She was found after three days, it was a miracle she was still alive, and spent six months in psychiatric care. Unfortunately, her second suicide was a success. On February 11, 1963, Plath had experienced enough life, she couldn’t ail another day in vain. "On a cold February day in 1963, with her two small children upstairs in their room, Sylvia Plath put her head inside her kitchen oven and turned on the gas"(Kakutani). Sylvia Plath saw herself as a disappointment, a failure, like she did everything wrong. Plath failed to recognize the many other ways to respond to her break up with Ted Hughes. Her suicide was a permanent solution to a temporary problem.