monk222: (Noir Detective)
Sylvia’s talent was rooted in some solid intellect and education.

_ _ _

Her background, of which I knew nothing then, belied her housewifely air: she had been a child prodigy - her first poem was published when she was eight - and then a brilliant student, winning every prize to be had, first at Wellesley High School, then at Smith College: scholarships all the way, straight A’s, Phi Beta Kappa, president of this and that college society, and prizes for everything. A New York glossy magazine, Mademoiselle, had picked her as an outstanding possibility and wined her, dined her and photographed her all over Manhattan. Then, almost inevitably, she had won a Fulbright to Cambridge, where she met Ted Hughes.

-- “The Savage God” by A. Alvarez

_ _ _

For the record, she came from an academic family, a schoolteacher mother and professor father, with both parents of German stock and German-speaking. She wasn't simply an eccentric who tried to compose verse to make her life meaningful. She was on a decided career path.

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monk222

May 2019

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