Which version of Ariel are you reading?

You might already know this information, or it might be new to you.   When Plath died, she left a completely finished manuscript copy of Ariel on her desk.   The poems were ordered, finished and paginated.  After Plath’s death, I mean the day after, Hughes took that copy and edited it to his liking before submitting it to a publisher.  A lot has been written about why he made the changes he did, but the fact is, he cut out several pieces, and he ordered the poems so that Edge, arguably her most “deadly” poem, was the final piece.   If you really want to read Ariel as Plath intended, you must read the restored edition published by Harper  Collins in 2004.

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