Anne Sexton Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Mikhail Ann Long

SOURCE: "As If Day Had Rearranged Into Night: Suicidal Tendencies in the Poetry of Anne Sexton," in Literature and Psychology, Vol. 39, Nos. 1-2, Spring-Summer, 1993, pp. 26-41.

In the following essay, Long examines Sexton's preoccupation with death and suicide as an integral feature of her writing. According to Long, "Her poems clearly reflect her understanding of, and attempt to come to terms with, her mental illness and suicidal behavior."

      as if day had rearranged
      into night and bats flew in the sun.

Was Anne Sexton's poetry primarily about the nature of the closed world of suicide? Most critics agree on the fact that Sexton definitely wrote about wanting to die, and the nature of suicide, from a very personal point of view. Many critics believe that at least some of Sexton's poetry reflects this suicidal "lust." According to Diane Hume George, there are "at least twenty poems primarily dedicated to...
(read more)