Since her death, Plath has become such an icon that her fame frequently comes in the way of actual knowledge or enjoyment of her work. There’s a lot to learn about the author by looking over her body of work and learning about her background. So, let’s get started. This list includes Plath’s books (poetry, novels, letters, and diaries) that will help you understand the constant battle between the public and private personalities she built in her work and personal life
Whether you’re a long-time Plath lover or a curious reader, here are ten books you should add to your collection.
Ariel
Plath writes in “Kindness” that “the blood jet is poetry / there is no stopping it.” Even though she had been writing poems for almost her entire life, Ariel is without a doubt her best effort. She penned these poems following her divorce from Ted Hughes. She would get up as early as 3 a.m. every morning to write a few draughts before her children woke up in the Devon countryside
Ted Hughes changed her intended arrangement of the contents of Ariel after her death, even removing some poems – that version is available through Harper Perennial Classics. However, Plath’s daughter Frieda Hughes published Ariel: The Restored Version in 2004, which delivers the novel in the order Plath intended.
The Bell Jar
The Bell Jar, Plath‘s only novel, just celebrated its 52nd birthday. The Bell Jar has become obligatory reading for practically every high schooler, swimming through the murky seas of mental illness, cynicism, expectations, and failure, providing release and succor to disillusioned young men and women everywhere. Plath initially published the novel (which was rejected by both American and English publishers multiple times) under the pen name Victoria Lucas, as the work is largely autobiographical.
Also read: Best of Jane Austen: Explore the Victorian England
The Unabridged Journals
Plath was an obsessive diarist and her journals are a remarkable record of her most private thoughts, dating back to her teenage years. Harper Collins published an abbreviated version in 1982, eliminating much of what Plath’s mother and Hughes deemed “messy” information.
Fortunately, editor Karen V. Kukil republished the diaries in 2000, featuring excerpts from Plath’s time working as a file clerk in a mental institution, letters to her ex-boyfriend Richard Sassoon, and, most importantly, her battle to become the best writer and poet she could be.
Letters Home
Again, the letters between Plath and her mother portray a quite different picture — the picture Plath sought to present to her mother while she was away from home, first at Smith College, then at Cambridge, and finally in her marriage with Hughes. It’s a fascinating account of Plath’s life. 
But reading the unabridged journals alongside the letters gives you a sense of what was really going on in Plath’s life rather than what she was telling her frightened mother back in America.
Johnny Panic and the Bibles of Dream
Most people are unaware that Plath wrote a lot of short fiction when she was younger. She was published multiple times by Seventeen and Mademoiselle; her pieces eventually led to an internship at Mademoiselle, and her time in New York inspired The Bell Jar. Several of the stories in this book have the potential to be included in her second novel, Falcon Yard.
(Myth has it that after discovering Hughes’ infidelity, she burned this work.) Other wonderful contributions include “The 59th Bear,” a narrative about a failing marriage, and “Ocean 1212-W,” a memory of her childhood at her grandmother’s seaside home. Ted Hughes compiled this collection of twenty pieces of short fiction, which is now out of print but widely available in used copies online.
