Sylvia Plath

I read The Bell Jar a couple years ago and loved it, but for some reason I hadn't read any of Sylvia Plath's poetry until now. There's a consistency in tone between the novel and the poems in the sampler. She has a distinct, sharp, intelligent voice in her writing. It's extremely intimate; It haunts me, but I love it. I feel like I know her and can relate to her simply because of her voice, not because I relate to the content of the poems. 
Especially in Lady Lazarus, she comes off as strong and independent rather than tragic and weak. She seems to resent the "concern" of the doctors and the people in her life, who behave more as spectators at a show than people who actually care about her wellbeing. She thinks very little of them and their inability to understand her condition. She doesn't need their attention, their artificial concern; she is a phoenix who repeatedly resurrects herself, stronger each time.
She presents herself as layered, intelligent, dark - and she does so with unwavering confidence and composure, a stark contrast to the stereotypically petty, "hysterical" woman.


Here's a clip of her reading this poem: 

It's even more beautiful when read aloud. The combination of her voice and the overall tone of the poem is captivating.