| Title | : | Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0571351735 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780571351732 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 40 |
| Publication | : | First published January 3, 2019 |
Lips the colour of blood, the sun an unprecedented orange, train wheels that sound like 'guilt, and guilt, and guilt': these are just some of the things Mary Ventura begins to notice on her journey to the ninth kingdom.
'But what is the ninth kingdom?' she asks a kind-seeming lady in her carriage. 'It is the kingdom of the frozen will,' comes the reply. 'There is no going back.'
Sylvia Plath's strange, dark tale of independence over infanticide, written not long after she herself left home, grapples with mortality in motion.
Bringing together past, present and future in our ninetieth year, Faber Stories is a celebratory compendium of collectable work.
Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom Reviews
-
This is a rejected short story Sylvia Plath wrote when she was 20. Unearthed and published for the first time, it’s an exciting event for no one but us literary nerds.
The story itself is above-average quality. A bit wordy at the beginning, but amps up significantly by the halfway point. When the less-than-subtle suicide allegory kicks in, it becomes unputdownable for those of us obsessed with Plath’s personal life.
While clearly the work of someone still developing their craft, the themes provide an interesting insight into one of the greatest writers of all time. I was not disappointed! -
The Bell Jar, written by
Sylvia Plath, is one of my favorite books of all time.
(Picture courtesy- vinhanley.com. You could relate to many of the things mentioned in the above picture if you have ardently followed her works.) When I saw the name Sylvia I quickly jumped on to read this short story by her.
This book is about independence over infanticide, which was written after she left her home. We can see Plath's writing skills in the raw form in this book. Many topics which she discusses in her future books, like suicide and hope, are all well depicted in this book.
It is sad to hear that this was initially rejected when she wrote it at the age of 20. I am glad that someone was able to find this short story and publish it. -
I read the author's article and know that this book is not something that I can immediately figure out once finished. Especially when she said:
"I can’t let Shakespeare get too far ahead of me, you know"
— because let's be real. When else do you ever get to crack Shakespeare works without some help. So, if you're reading this simply to read, then I'm afraid you'll get nothing out of it; or depending on how you want to make of it.
But for all that, I hate to be kept in the dark so I did some digging on the figurative meaning behind this piece. And it's best to say, my second time rereading this was something else. The experience of reading Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom is inextricably linked to what we know is about to happen: an impending doom made all the more terrifying by the other passengers' blissful innocence. Hence, to escape the fate that awaits everyone else, Mary realizes, she will have to opt-out of the system.
To think that I love how the book starts its story because it reminds me of Harry's first ride with Hogwarts Express might be an understatement to delightful. Because if anything, Mary's trip to the Ninth Kingdom is anything but joy, and Mary's decision to get off the train is more likely a suicide allegory.
The story appears to suggest that life is miserable and leads to nothing but disaster and that the only way out is to stop living, reflecting the author's first suicide attempt the summer after writing this story. Having myself filled with this information gave me cold shivers, considering how clueless I was the first time I read this and how accurate it seems to the living day now.
All said and done, I know Plath's works may not be up to everyone's alley, but if you want something short and mindblowing. This book is perfect for you. -
My first encounter with Sylvia Plath in this short story. She wrote it at a young age and it was a rejected short story. A weird, dark and intriguing story of a young lady, Mary, being put on the train by her parents to 'the Ningth Kingdom'. But what is that 9th Kingdom and what is the symbolism/meaning of this story....She meets a 'kind-seeming lady' on the train who explains things... but things do not get any clearer it seems. As the journey progresses, at first quite pleasant, Mary starts to think she does not want to go to the Ninth Kingdom. The lady friend on the train gives her some advice what to do....
Lips the colour of blood, the sun an unprecedented orange, train wheels that sound like 'guilt, and guilt, and guilt': these are just some of the things Mary Ventura begins to notice on her journey to the ninth kingdom...
More to follow later. Intriguing and great writing style. -
Late in 1952, Smith College student Sylvia Plath completed this “vague symbolic tale” and submitted it to Mademoiselle. Although Mademoiselle commissioned Plath to interview poet Elizabeth Bowen, and invited her to come to New York as a guest editor (a heady and unsettling experience which provided inspiration for The Bell Jar), the magazine rejected her story. Although Plath later made a half-hearted attempt at revision, she never submitted “Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom” again.
It remained unpublished for more than fifty years. Until now. It’s no masterpiece, but it is quite good, well worthy of the magazine publication it never received and a significant contribution to the Plath legacy.
It is a tale of a young woman’s train journey—urged on her by her parents to a destination continually referred to as the Ninth Kingdom. Is it a good place or a bad place? Or perhaps “The Good Place” or “The Bad Place”? Is the knitting fat woman who sits next to Mary her friend, or is she an enemy? Should Mary continue to her final stop, or should she pull the emergency cord?
What makes this is good short story—at least for me—is that each detail of the journey is precisely imagined, and yet characterized by such doubleness, such unrelenting ambiguity, that the reader remains in doubt of the wisdom of Mary’s choice until her journey reaches its end. -
قصة قصيرة كتبتها سيلفيا بلاث وهي تبلغ من العمر ٢٠ عاماً..
لو قرأت القصة من غير ما تعرف حاجة عن حياة بلاث ممكن متفهمش أوي و لكن لو قرأت عنها حتفهم حاجات كتير و حتشوف إنها قصة مميزة جداً وتعبر عنها ولو بطريقة غير مباشرة...
سيلفيا بلاث انتحرت وهي عندها ٣٠ سنة وماتت أثر التسمم بأول أكسيد الكربون بعد أن حشرت رأسها في الفرن وقد حرصت على وضع مناشف مبللة تحت الأبواب لتكون حاجزًا بين المطبخ وبين غرف أطفالها!
بطلة الرواية علي ما أظن بتعبر عن سيلفيا و كانت هي كمان بتحاول تخرج من هذه الحياة بأي شكل!
قصة غريبة ومميزة و مشجعة جداً لقراءة كتب تانية للكاتبة..
(القصة متوفرة علي موقع كتب مملة) -
Mary Ventura bids a reluctant farewell to her parents before embarking on a train journey to the mysterious Ninth Kingdom. But what is the Ninth Kingdom - and will Mary reach it safely?
Sylvia Plath’s short story sounds dreamlike and that’s exactly how it reads! The premise and overall atmosphere feels like Plath by way of Shirley Jackson/The Twilight Zone though unfortunately it’s nowhere near as good as either. Considering she wrote this as a 20 year old undergraduate at Smith, the prose is surprisingly strong and you can see her literary talents emerging. Still, I wouldn’t call it a gripping or even half-interesting reading experience.
The deliberate vagueness and allegorical style intentionally lends itself to various interpretations. Is it simply a nightmare? A symbolic representation of Plath’s state of mind? A metaphor for the afterlife? Is the maternal woman on the train an angel or God? Is the train conductor Death? Is Mary dead – who killed her; her parents? Is the story a metaphor for Mary’s struggle to regain control of her life and destiny? An allegorical coming-of-age story? A metaphorical battle against the seeming inevitability of depression?
It’s impossible not to read the increasingly tense atmosphere and ominous tone of the story contextually, given Plath’s most famous for killing herself. Her first suicide attempt would shortly follow the completion of this story; she would fail for the last time ten years later.
I like aspects of the story – the strange train people, the doom-laden journey, the odd place names (Seventh Kingdom, Ninth Kingdom) – but, like a fleeting dream, Mary Ventura: Fret Detective was a little too insubstantial to leave much of an impression. Which is probably why Plath succeeded as a poet – that subtlety lends itself perfectly to the medium. And it’s fairly well-written, particularly considering her age at the time.
But it’s still a largely dull and unsatisfying read – like The Bell Jar, her prose leaves me cold and indifferent despite the potentially compelling subject matter. I find with Plath it’s more interesting thinking about her writing afterwards than it is reading it. -
A fairy tale full of atmosphere turns dark quickly - 3 stars
The shuttle of the train wheel struck doom into her brain. Guilt, the train wheels clucked like round black birds, and guilt, and guilt, and guilt.
Again I must compare the writing of
Sylvia Plath with
Stephen King. This short story of a train ride reminded me of the end of
The Waste Lands, where the main characters end up in sentient psychopathic train.
Following the tracks laid out by your parents or come into one’s own, even if that means sounding all the alarms, is the question at the heart of
Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom.
The protagonist of this story is led on the express train of life alone, and despite the train being quite full, there is almost no help for Mary during her trip. She comes to realise more and more during the ride, in a well done feeling of increasing unease, that not taking action will only lead her to the ominous Ninth Kingdom. Which I take to be a metaphor for depression, death or suicide, but which is not made specific by the author. The writing is very spheric, at the end I almost felt in the snow, running. Enjoyable, and with a lot of the alienation from normal life that we can see coming back in the
The Bell Jar, this was a surprisingly satisfying short story from a 20 year old. -
Surreal and arresting - can't help but see the the analogy that 'tracks' over into the life of this great poet towards the end. We can all relate to that feeling of 'movement' that a train makes; the different stations, always having to be ready to exit at some point. A reflection of Sylvia Plath that is haunting.
-
What a nice cover!
What a beautiful writing!
How dare they reject that brilliant short story from publishing?
Sylvia has been able to master writing these events in a very limited number of pages, no more than forty. -
Everyone has to go away sooner or later.
When I think of Plath, I don’t tend to think of The Twilight Zone, but that’s what came to mind here, and Alice in Wonderland, somehow. This surreal and ominous allegorical train ride builds quickly and is filled with creepy encounters and panicky imagery. It’s very short, and very dark, and manages to squeeze in an early dig at her father hiding under a hat, sentiments that would later show up in the more mature and angry poem “Daddy.” But then again, there is that theory that that poem is really about her mother, shown here with blood red lips, cold and domineering.
She was 20 when she wrote this. Knowing her fate, you can’t help but wonder about the prophecy of it. And you can’t help but think of Anna Karenina.
The shuttle of the train wheel struck doom into her brain. Guilt, the train wheels clucked like round black birds, and guilt, and guilt, and guilt. -
Sylvia Plath doing what Sylvia Plath does best- zinging imagery, with a dark and sinister air hovering in the background. This story was intense, ominous and knew exactly what it wanted to achieve. Not a word wasted
-
Striking, beguiling, and awfully sinister.
-
I think I'm open-minded about 1.) books on my library's new arrival shelf and/or 2.) checking out the works of notable or respected authors. With that in mind I checked out Plath's newly issued novella.
While it was not bad writing per se, the story - the title character is a young lady on a train ride with sinister overtones ( . . . I think?) - was too vague or overly dependent on a reader's interpretation. I was thinking it was heading towards a Twilight Zone twist / finale, but there was just nothing. -
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3.5 stars
I enjoyed this short story. It does strike me as a creative writing assignment as it seems to follow a certain formula (I remember in a creative class on short stories lecturers would always stress the 'wow ending'). There was an immediacy to this story which was intensified by the directness of the prose (narrative uses very simple statements and observations) and I thought it clever that such an ordinary thing as a train ride could come to convey such a sense of unease. This uneasiness quickly increases and the story ends in an almost predictable ambiguity. I like that most of the story is shrouded in mystery, and one could read into this story all sorts of things.
It definitely gave me Shirley Jackson vibes (I know that Plath admired Jackson's works). -
A vida exige que tomemos decisões a todo momento – das menores às definitivas.
Mary Ventura é uma jovem “condenada” pelos seus pais a fazer uma longa viagem de comboio que apenas terminará na última estação: O Nono Reino.
Uma alegoria que compara a vida a uma agradável e luxuosa viagem num comboio expresso - quase sem paragens, com túneis, paisagens e singulares jogos de luzes -, mas onde os passageiros são meras peças com movimentos limitados. Oferece a perspectiva de não retorno sobre as decisões que outros tomam por nós.
Precisamos de obedecer a todas as leis que a sociedade nos impõe?
Há excepções. Obedecer? Só às leis naturais.
Sylvia Plath não descreve as personagens, mas apresenta-as através de diálogos esmerados, como os que são trocados entre esta jovem e a sua companheira de viagem.
E, em poucas páginas, aprendemos ou (re) aprendemos que, mesmo que nos tenhamos submetido à vontade dos outros, há sempre uma hipótese de afirmar uma vontade de rebelia que julgávamos congelada.
Afinal, o que a vida nos pede é coragem.
Admito que possa haver outras interpretações para este conto maravilhosamente escrito, mas esta é a minha.
Gostei muito. Não estava à espera de gostar tanto, pois há o The Bell Jar.
[Estas edições liliputianas da RA são lindíssimas] -
“The shuttle of the train wheels struck doom into her brain. Guilt, the train wheels clucked like round black birds, and guilt, and guilt, and guilt.”
“Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom” is for the readers of Plath, who love Plath, for all that Plath represents. This short work, written during the time Sylvia was a student at Smith College, is speckled with brilliance and lines that will make up the alluring essences of
Ariel or even
The Bell Jar. For readers who enjoy curling in the secrets of her diary, “Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom” is almost a jolt— a prophetic warning of future suicide attempts and a life of pressures and second-guessing. The short story weighs on the reader like a damp quilt.
It seems as if HarperCollins Publishers excavated a true, infant gem in the massive plethora of what is available to Plath fans, a sort of fossilized egg that shares the DNA of its predecessors. Plath’s writing is so captivating and accessible that it is hard to imagine how private Plath was with her subconscious. “Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom” is a young Sylvia with the same outlook on life. To new Plath readers, keep in mind this short story is 11 years before the publication of The Bell Jar, years before her marriage with Ted Hughes, and barely months away from her first suicide attempt. Moreover, “Mary Ventura” was completed before her rejection from Harvard’s summer writing program. All in all, “Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom” mirrors Sylvia Plath before the scratches that would eventually become deeper wounds.
On the surface, “Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom" is a story about a young woman on a train to a destination unknown; however, like much of Plath’s work, the short story has translucent layers the reader must pull back. The short story allows us to see the dichotomy of female agency and independence; free will and paralysis; youth and death. Narrative-wise, the story is a quick, simple reader under 30 minutes. However, the wave of what is underneath hitting the reader right in the chest. You remain hopeful and somewhat proud of Mary’s agency and willingness at the end of the story. It seems as if the story echoes the plights and happy ending conventional to fairy tales...
Yet, reality sinks in. You leave the short work sad knowing Sylvia’s fate, wondering what led her astray and into the Ninth Kingdom and why Plath would never get the chance to meet the woman with the blue gaze of triumphant and love. Why Plath could not hear “I have been waiting for you, dear” in the hullabaloo of her life.
The train has departed. -
Una historia cierta e inédita que me pareció excepcional. Con un personaje que todo lo sabe y que es guía de la protagonista para tomar decisiones.
-
Allegorical short story about agency and self-determination. Deceptively simplistic.
-
"There are no return trips on this line,” the woman said softly. “Once you get to the ninth kingdom, there is no going back. It is the kingdom of negation, of the frozen will. It has many names".
A girl embarks on a train journey and a series of mysterious events take place.
Published when she was twenty and written in Plath's typical alluring and mystical style, this is a sinister and remarkable short story featuring many themes that haunted her throughout her life.
If your a Plath fan then you've probably read it, but if your yet to read any of her work then it's an ideal place to start. -
An intriguing short story of a girl who gets on a train and goes through a series of events.
What caught my attention is the fact that this story had been rejected once or twice and it had to be rewritten. -
A much fascinating short story, the whole vibe was really captivating.
-
To celebrate their 90th birthday, publisher Faber and Faber have launched a series called ‘Faber Stories’. A single short story by a host of well-known writers such as Samuel Beckett, Kazuo Ishiguro, P D James, Lorrie Moore, Flannery O’Connor and Sylvia Plath. The first launch of these individual shorts has twenty slim volumes. There will be more later in the year.
This story by Sylvia Plath was written in in 1952 when she was twenty years old. It was sent to a magazine for publication, but was rejected. Two years later she revised the story, making it less sinister and curtailing the ending. This version is the first one that Plath wrote and in Faber’s opinion is the better of the two. This is its first publication.
It is a beautifully written story. There is an increasing sense of unease that grows from start to finish. We begin at a railway station. Mary’s parents deliver her to the train and are keen that she doesn’t miss it. Mary is reluctant. At one point she says she would rather go another time, but her parents are insistent. They are also remote, almost unfeeling about their daughter. She waves, but they do not see her.
A woman comes to sit next to Mary, and takes out her knitting. The train eventually emerges from a tunnel and the setting sunlight is smoky. The older woman say that the cause is forest fires burning away to the north. She has travelled this journey before, the waiter in the restaurant car knows her usual order. They do not pay for their orders, everything will be deducted at the end of the journey.
All elements of the train trip are slightly unnerving. Things don’t quite feel right, but it is hard to put your finger on exactly why. There is a mix of passengers; business men, mothers and children, the old woman and her knitting. The older woman buys them a chocolate bar, and when Mary offers to pay the older woman says, ”… you’ll have enough to pay for by the end of the trip.” It is the first off-key note.
The vendor recognizes the old woman, and they laugh easily together. He is surprised she is making the trip again, and talks about some sort of mistake on a previous trip. It seems people don’t often travel this journey more than once.
From this point on, the alarm bells start to ring. Things are not right, something sinister is happening. I won’t say more about the content of the story, other than that I like the way things begin to move rapidly in the last third of the book. Like the train you are rushing down the line to a conclusion. Many questions will be left unanswered, left to the imagination of the reader. -
Sylvia Plath escreveu este conto aos 20 anos e a revista para a qual o enviou não quis publicá-lo.
Adoraria ver o caixote de lixo deles...
A escrita é fabulosa, os diálogos divertidos e, se compreendi bem esta alegoria, já cá estão temas presentes na vida de Plath. -
[Rtc]
-
This is my very first book of Sylvia Plath and I have to admit, I am immediately attracted to her storytelling style. There is something quite alluring, mystical and quite symbolic about the story, and I will go as far as to guess that the book refers to death, or a possible after life.
Regarding its content, there is an impressive and potential plot to this storyline, although it can further be developed. Perhaps this can be partly attributed to the nature of a short story.
My rating: 3.4/5 ☆ -
This short story is an allegorical tale of a woman who breaks free from the shackles of her mother and father and what they represent, nature and culture. Compelled by her eager parents, Mary goes on a train headed to the Ninth Kingdom, a mysterious place we soon come to associate with tyranny and oppression. Mary feels reluctant, but her mother and father push her on. She meets a woman who divulges some information about where the train is headed. Mary soon wakes up to the fact that she is being herded to some dangerous and seemingly oppressive place. She tells the woman that she wants to escape. The woman promptly agrees, excited that she finally found a woman who would readily say no. The escape is somewhat symbolic. Mary pushes on a lever to stop the train at the next station. She runs up a dark and scary stair, guarded by a snake that swivels around her ankle. She keeps running until the climb ends with her coming to a big city. There she meets the woman, who maternally leans over the boxes of flowers she lined along the street.
The tried symbol of the snake is reminiscent of the fall (here the climb) from innocence to experience. And I think that the upward trajectory symbolizes Mary’s coming to a higher mode of consciousness (this can also be read as climbing up from hell to heaven, that is, the narrator is really dead).
So, would I recommend this short story? Absolutely. I love symbolism and this story makes good use of its symbols. -
3.5
Sylvia Plath’s newly discovered short story, which was rejected from Mademoiselle magazine in 1952, was published earlier this year after hiding out in the archives ever since. Heralded as the literary event of the decade, it seems like “Mary Ventura” kind of got lost in the shuffle. It’s certainly an entertaining and often well-written story, but I don’t think it’s as monumental as we were led to believe. It’s still quite good, though.
Mary’s parents abandon her on a train with an unknown destination, and her mysterious seat mate seems to cast a curious spell over the situation, unwilling to give clues to this new passenger. But horrors soon start to arrive, and Mary learns that she’s headed toward this Ninth Kingdom. She must then decide if she should continue to this mysterious place or escape from her drowning fears.
There’s some great imagery here—Plath’s descriptions are lush and we get a feel for the train and its passengers and Mary’s future. The story often falls on the horror side of things, which I’m here for, and Plath does well with creating suspense and impending danger. That being said, it does still seem kind of juvenile—which it is. Plath wrote this when she was 20. I’m personally kind of impressed but I also kind of expected more. Nevertheless, I was entertained throughout and wished the story could have been (at the least) a novella.
It’s difficult to not compare this to Plath’s masterpiece, The Bell Jar. She obviously grew as a writer and improved considerably. And while this isn’t as great as The Bell Jar, I also think she’s packed a lot of detail and story into these 40 pages. It’s a quick and charming read that can be seen as a nice prologue to her masterwork and all of what applies to that and Plath’s life. (There’s some obvious symbolism here, but I don’t want to spoil the story.) Give “Mary Ventura” a shot and then go read Ariel and The Bell Jar. -
On my way to check out, I found this hidden away on a random shelf at Shakespeare & Co., like it was meant for me. This book itself was an exciting discovery for all Plath fans as it’s a never-before-published story, and I loved the way I happened upon it.
I also loved the language of the story, purely Plath, and the detailed descriptions of the train journey. The allegory for [death? suicide? coming-of-age? finding yourself?] can be interpreted and thought about in many different ways. At times the story is seemingly boring or silly, but those thoughts change when you reinterpret it to another theme. It’s a story that begs many re-readings and discussion with other readers. -
Damn.
