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“It is simply a sin not to live with you”
7. [21 October 1956]. An exceptionally emotionally charged letter from Sylvia Plath to Ted Hughes, on being unable to live without him and begging a return to living together. Six sides of blue letter paper (three sheets, folded horizontally, approximately 950 words) signed “love and more love - sylvia” and later, “your own sylvia”. Smudges to the ink in a number of places, likely teardrops. Plath writes to Ted in a state of despair at being apart from him “in spite of all my spas- modic calm & resolve I feel horrid & very black & wicked. it is simply a sin not to live with you. I could cry.” The first part of the letter is an exposition of her loneliness and inability to work, “The constant, deep - (so deep it is forming into vivid terrible night- mares) sense of terror, lack, superstition (symbolised by that traumatic last meeting in London which almost drove me wild)”. Ted’s permanent presence in Cambridge would be her solution, “I can probe & root most deeply & well when planted every minute in the rich, almost unconscious feel- ing of your presence”. Her desperation grows and she tries to convince Ted to make the move in spite of the fact that, “you hate cambridge & wouldn’t want to come here again, I know”. The other obstacle, would be College and scholarship authorities who might object to the marriage, “even now some opportunistic devil in me is arguing our case”. The upside, however, would be worth it, “I could then combine love &writing & study much better then splitting them this abnormal way - wasting time when away from you in wishing you were here & wasting time with you by cursing the swiftness of that time & dreading fresh separation”. All of this, she says in her final plea, “pales before the fact that I am rightfully sylvia hughes & I feel sad, sick & disinherited. my first purpose is not just a wedding - it is you; I am married to you & would work & write best in living with you. I waste so much strength in simply fighting my tears for you - please understand about this & help me work it out”. She then signs, “love & more love - sylvia”, before adding a two page postscript. Here Plath turns to the practical side of the potential move, “...the one difficult act would be telling newnham (there are married students here, though few; & dr. Krook, I’m sure, would back me up) & the fulbright (they also have many married students, though mostly male) & getting a place to live & moving me”. But she is convinced that it would work out, and be worth it, “all is as nothing without you, without constantly
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