Chronology

1932
27 October	Sylvia Plath born in Boston, Massachusetts, to Otto Emil and Aurelia Schober Plath; the family lives at 24 Prince Street, Jamaica Plain, a neighbourhood in Boston.
1935
27 April	Warren Joseph Plath born.
1936
Autumn	The Plaths move to 92 Johnson Avenue in Winthrop, Massachusetts.
1937
September	Enrols in the Sunshine School, Winthrop.
1938
September	Enters Annie F. Warren Grammar School, Winthrop.
1940
February	Writes first letters to her parents.
September	Enters E. B. Newton School, Winthrop.
October	Otto Plath admitted to the New England Deaconess Hospital, Boston; his left, gangrenous leg amputated.
5 November	Otto Plath dies from an embolus in his lung.
1941
10 August	‘Poem’ appears in the Boston Herald; her first publication.
1942
October	Moves with her mother, brother, and grandparents, Frank and Aurelia Schober, to 26 Elmwood Road, Wellesley, Massachusetts. Enters the Marshall Perrin Grammar School.
1943/4
Summers	Attends Camp Weetamoe in Center Ossipee, New Hampshire.
1944
January	Begins writing in a journal.
September	Enters Alice L. Phillips Junior High School, publishes in school paper.
1945/6
Summers	Attends Camp Helen Storrow in Plymouth, Massachusetts.
1947/8
Summers	Attends Vineyard Sailing Camp at Oak Bluffs, Martha’s Vineyard.
September	Enters Gamaliel Bradford Senior High School, Wellesley.
1948
June	Named co-editor of school newspaper, The Bradford.
1949
March	Publishes poem ‘Sea Symphony’ in Student Life.
Summer	Attends Unitarian conference at Star Island, New Hampshire.
1950
March	Publishes article ‘Youth’s Plea for World Peace’ in the Christian Science Monitor.
May	Accepted into Class of 1954 at Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts. Receives Olive Higgins Prouty scholarship.
Summer	Works at Lookout Farm with Warren Plath in Natick, Massachusetts.
August	Publishes short story ‘And Summer Will Not Come Again’ in Seventeen.
Autumn	Enters Smith College, resides at Haven House. Meets Prouty.
1951
February	Begins dating Richard ‘Dick’ Norton, a senior at Yale University and Wellesley resident.
March	Attends Yale Junior Prom with Norton. Meets Eddie Cohen.
Summer	Works as nanny for Mayo family in Swampscott, Massachusetts. Her friend Marcia Brown nannies nearby.
Autumn	Writes articles for local newspapers as Press Board correspondent for Smith College.
1952
Summer	Waitresses at the Belmont Hotel in West Harwich, Massachusetts. ‘Sunday at the Mintons” wins Mademoiselle short fiction contest. Works as nanny for the Cantor family in Chatham, Massachusetts.
September	Moves to Lawrence House, a cooperative house, at Smith College.
Autumn	Continues writing for Press Board. Dick Norton treated for exposure to tuberculosis in New York.
November	Meets Yale student Myron Lotz; relationship with Norton strained.
December	Visits Norton at Ray Brook, New York; breaks leg in skiing accident.
1953
February	Dates Lotz and Gordon Lameyer, a senior at Amherst College. Writes villanelle ‘Mad Girl’s Love Song’.
April–May	Harper’s accepts three poems; wins Guest Editor competition at Mademoiselle in New York City.
June	Lives at Barbizon Hotel in New York; works at Mademoiselle.
July–August	Treated for insomnia and exhaustion; counselled by psychiatrist; given poorly administered outpatient electro-convulsive shock treatments.
24–26 August	Attempts suicide in the basement of her house by taking an overdose of sleeping pills. When found, admitted to Newton-Wellesley Hospital.
September	Transfers first to Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, then to McLean Hospital, Belmont, Massachusetts. Begins treatment with Dr Ruth Beuscher.
1954
January	Re-enters Smith College; repeats second semester of her junior year.
April	Meets Richard Sassoon, a Yale student.
Summer	Attends Harvard Summer School and lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Autumn	Senior year at Smith College on full scholarship; writes thesis on Dostoevsky.
1955
February	Accepted by Newnham College, University of Cambridge.
April	Competes in Glascock Poetry Contest, Mount Holyoke College, Hadley, Massachusetts.
May	Wins Fulbright scholarship to University of Cambridge.
6 June	Graduates Smith College, summa cum laude.
September	Sails on the Queen Elizabeth to UK.
October	Begins courses at Newnham College.
Winter	Travels to Paris and the south of France with Sassoon.
1956
25 February	Attends party at Falcon Yard, meets Edward ‘Ted’ James Hughes.
March–April	Travels through France, Germany, and Italy with Gordon Lameyer.
16 June	Marries Ted Hughes at St George-the-Martyr, Queen Square, London.
Summer	Honeymoons in Alicante and Benidorm; meets Warren Plath in Paris; lives at the Hughes home, The Beacon, in Heptonstall, Yorkshire.
Autumn	Begins second year at Newnham College; keeps marriage a secret.
December	Moves to 55 Eltisley Avenue, Cambridge, UK.
1957
23 February	Hughes’s poetry collection The Hawk in the Rain wins Harper’s poetry prize.
12 March	Smith College offers Plath teaching position on English faculty.
June	Finishes programme at Newnham and earns her second B.A. in English from University of Cambridge; sails on Queen Elizabeth to New York.
Summer	Vacations in Eastham, Massachusetts.
September	Moves to 337 Elm Street, Northampton, Massachusetts; begins teaching at Smith College.
1958
June	Leaves position at Smith College. Records poems for Woodberry Poetry Room, Harvard. Receives first New Yorker acceptances for ‘Mussel Hunter at Rock Harbor’ and ‘Nocturne’ [‘Hardcastle Crags’].
9 August	‘Mussel Hunter at Rock Harbor’ appears in The New Yorker.
September	Moves to 9 Willow Street, Beacon Hill, Boston.
10 December	Resumes seeing Dr Beuscher, records details in her journals.
1959
February	Records more poems for Woodberry Poetry Room. Attends Robert Lowell’s poetry course at Boston University, meets Anne Sexton.
8 March	Visits father’s grave in Winthrop.
July–August	Travels across North America; becomes pregnant.
Autumn	Spends two months at the writer’s colony Yaddo, Saratoga Springs, New York. Has creative writing breakthrough.
December	Sails on the United States to UK.
1960
January	Rents flat at 3 Chalcot Square, Primrose Hill, London.
10 February	Signs contract with Heinemann in London to publish her first collection of poetry, The Colossus and Other Poems.
1 April	Daughter, Frieda Rebecca Hughes born.
31 October	The Colossus published in Britain.
1961
February	Suffers a miscarriage.
March	Has an appendectomy.
Spring	Begins writing The Bell Jar.
June	Records poems for BBC series The Living Poet. Aurelia Plath visits England from mid-June to early August.
July	Travels to France; reads ‘Tulips’ at the Poetry at the Mermaid festival in London.
August	Purchases Court Green in North Tawton, Devonshire; sublets London flat to David and Assia Wevill.
1 September	Moves to Court Green.
1962
17 January	Son, Nicholas Farrar Hughes born.
May	Visits from Ruth Fainlight and Alan Sillitoe, as well as the Wevills.
Summer	Assia Wevill and Hughes begin an affair. Aurelia Plath visits Court Green.
September	Visits Irish poet Richard Murphy in Cleggan, Ireland; Hughes abruptly leaves.
October	Writes twenty-five poems; records ‘Berck-Plage’ for BBC and fifteen poems for British Council/Woodberry Poetry Room.
November	Rents flat at 23 Fitzroy Road, London, formerly a residence of W. B. Yeats.
10 December	Moves with Frieda and Nicholas into Fitzroy Road flat.
1963
January	Dubbed the ‘Big Freeze of 1963’, London experiences its coldest winter of the century.
10 January	Records review of Donald Hall’s Contemporary American Poetry for BBC.
14 January	Heinemann publishes The Bell Jar under the pseudonym Victoria Lucas.
4 February	Writes last known letters.
4–5 February	Writes last known poems.
7–10 February	Stays with Jillian and Gerry Becker at nearby 5 Mountfort Crescent, Islington.
11 February	Protects children then commits suicide by gas poisoning.
18 February	Laid to rest in Heptonstall.