Mad Girl's Love Song: Sylvia Plath and Life Before Ted
“Wilson makes a convincing case that we can learn more about Plath and the pressures that shaped her by paying attention to her “life before Ted”—the high school and college years…Wilson is able to bring this phase of Plath’s life into sharper focus than before…yield[ing] significant insights.” (New York Times Book Review)“Likely to become the definitive account of Plath’s early years.” (Boston Globe)“Wilson is insightful on Plath’s tormented attempts to forge an identity in this oppressive environment…[he] fashions riveting scenes.” (Minneapolis Star-Tribune)“This is a rare biography whose narrative style is artful enough that its appeal will range from those who're utterly unfamiliar with Plath's work to those who've inundated themselves in it.” (Publishers Weekly (starred review))"Insightful...this portrait has much valuable new material about her early years." (Kirkus)"There’s a tragic ordinariness in this version of Sylvia Plath’s American girlhood—here she is, daughter, student, and lover, desperately trying to create a perfect self. Andrew Wilson’s fresh combing of the Plath archives and interviews with Plath’s classmates and boyfriends­show how economic frustration, sexual craving, and fierce ambition shaped the poet long before she met Ted Hughes, and even longer before her suicide made her famous."(Carol Sklenickaauthor of Raymond Carver: A Writer's Life)“Mad Girl’s Love Songis a compelling work that makes rich use of unseen material. Wilson renders the young Plath vividly and sometimes unsettlingly present on the page.” (Belinda McKeonauthor of Solace)“A comprehensive pictureof a young Plath with an electric mind, a cultural omnivorousness and asinister dark side…Wilson has written what is sure to become the officialbiography of young Sylvia.” (The Economist)