Sylvia Plath And Lady Lazarus

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the New Testament. Lazarus was raised from the dead by Jesus. The poem too, is about a sort of female Lazarus who can die and rise again. The woman in the poem, who is also the narrator, is famous for this ability. She speaks of dying over and over again. And how even when her body has begun to decay, she soon comes back to normal, almost as good as new. The comparison of herself to a cat with "nine times to die" indicates that she will not give up till she actually succeeds.
The repeated resurrections have made the woman into a horrifying spectacle. She does not expect a sympathetic response from the "crowd" of spectators that surround her. She does not feel any connection with the people that come to watch her. This is evident from the last stanza where she is describing herself as a mock phoenix, rising "out of the ash" from another failed suicide attempt. She is a myth that people want to marvel at from a distance. She does not feel that they can relate to her. She is a ...

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