Your Own, Sylvia by Stephanie Hemphill

Your Own, Sylvia by Stephanie Hemphill
Reviewed by Suzanne Dlugolonski, Teen Services Librarian

Your Own, Sylvia: A Verse Portrait of Sylvia Plath tells the tragic story of Sylvia Plath’s rise and fall through poetry. Author Stephanie Hemphill took true accounts from the life of Plath and imagined the thoughts, feelings, and exchanges that took place around those events. Hemphill included footnotes at the end of each poem that shed more light on the circumstances that inspired the preceding verse. These anecdotes revealed the more peculiar side of Plath, such as her and her husband’s reliance on a Ouija board to pick lottery numbers, and displayed Hemphill’s vast research on her subject.

I have never read Plath, knowing that works such as The Bell Jar were dark and tended toward the depressing. However, this book was a wonderful introduction to the enigmatic Plath. Additionally, Your Own, Sylvia would make a splendid companion for the seasoned Plath student. Hemphill is passionate about her subject, and this is much appreciated by the reader. I would have liked if more photographs were included, but this does detracts from neither the book’s literary merit nor the reader’s great enjoyment of it.

Your Own, Sylvia received Starred Reviews from Booklist, Kirkus, and Horn. On Monday, January 14 it was named a Printz Honor Book at the American Library Association’s 2008 Midwinter Conference. To read about author Stephanie Hemphill’s thoughts on Your Own, Sylvia visit Random House Authors. The Lewiston Public Library owns one copy; it can be reserved through NIOGA.