more photos (1)

Anne Sexton’s Followers (2,306)

Add New
Videos

Anne Sexton reads "The Truth The Dead Know"

Add a comment

Add a comment

Anne Sexton

Born

in Newton, Massachusetts, The United States

November 09, 1928

Died

October 04, 1974

Website

http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/14

Genre

Poetry

edit data

Anne Sexton once told a journalist that her fans thought she got better, but actually, she just became a poet. These words are characteristic of a talented poet that received therapy for years, but committed suicide in spite of this. The poetry fed her art, but it also imprisoned her in a way.

Her parents didn’t expect much of her academically, and after completing her schooling at Rogers Hall, she went to a finishing school in Boston. Anne met her husband, Kayo (Alfred Muller Sexton II), in 1948 by correspondence. Her mother advised her to elope after she thought she might be pregnant. Anne and Kayo got married in 1948 in North Carolina. After the honeymoon Kayo started working at his father-in-law’s wool business.

In 1953 Anne gave birth Anne Sexton once told a journalist that her fans thought she got better, but actually, she just became a poet. These words are characteristic of a talented poet that received therapy for years, but committed suicide in spite of this. The poetry fed her art, but it also imprisoned her in a way.

Her parents didn’t expect much of her academically, and after completing her schooling at Rogers Hall, she went to a finishing school in Boston. Anne met her husband, Kayo (Alfred Muller Sexton II), in 1948 by correspondence. Her mother advised her to elope after she thought she might be pregnant. Anne and Kayo got married in 1948 in North Carolina. After the honeymoon Kayo started working at his father-in-law’s wool business.

In 1953 Anne gave birth to her first-born, Linda Gray. Two years later Linda’s sister, Joyce Ladd, was born. But Anne couldn’t cope with the pressure of two small children over and above Kayo’s frequent absence (due to work). Shortly after Joy was born, Anne was admitted to Westwood Lodge where she was treated by the psychiatrist Dr. Martha Brunner-Orne (and six months later, her son, Dr. Martin Orne, took over). The original diagnosis was for post-natal depression, but the psychologists later decided that Anne suffered from depression of biological nature.

While she was receiving psychiatric treatment, Anne started writing poetry. It all started after another suicide attempt, when Orne came to her and told her that she still has a purpose in life. At that stage she was convinced that she could only become a prostitute. Orne showed her another talent that she had, and her first poetry appeared in print in the January of 1957. She wrote a huge amount of poetry that was published in a dozen poetry books. In 1967 she became the proud recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for Live or Die (1966).

In March 1972 Anne and Kayo got divorced. After this a desperate kind of loneliness took over her life. Her addiction to pills and alcohol worsened. Without Kayo the house was very quiet, the children were at college and most of Anne’s friends were avoiding her because they could no longer sympathize with her growing problems. Her poetry started playing such a major role in her life that conflicts were written out, rather than being faced. Anne didn’t mention a word to Kayo about her intention to get divorced. He knew that she desperately needed him, but her poems, and her real feelings toward him, put it differently. Kayo talks about it in an interview as follows: “... I honestly don’t know, never have known, what her real, driving motive was in the divorce. Which is another reason why it absolutely drove me into the floor like a nail when she did it.”

On 4 October 1974 she put on her mother’s old fur coat before, glass of vodka in hand, she climbed into her car, turned the key and died of monodioxide inhalation. She once told Orne that “I feel like my mother whenever I put it [the fur coat] on”. Her oldest daughter, Linda, was appointed as literary executor and we have her to thank for the three poetry books that appeared posthumously.
...more

Combine Editions
Anne Sexton’s books

Average rating: 4.18 · 38,227 ratings · 2,409 reviews · 144 distinct works • Similar authors

	The Complete Poems 4.29 avg rating — 16,232 ratings — published 1981 — 34 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Transformations 4.13 avg rating — 7,018 ratings — published 1971 — 28 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Selected Poems by Anne Sexton, Linda Gray Sexton (Goodreads Author) (Editor) 4.20 avg rating — 2,407 ratings — published 1988 — 19 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Love Poems by Anne Sexton, Diana Wood Middlebrook (Foreword) 4.09 avg rating — 2,106 ratings — published 1969 — 20 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Anne Sexton: A Self-Portrait in Letters by Anne Sexton, Lois Ames (Editor), Linda Gray Sexton (Goodreads Author) (Editor) 4.27 avg rating — 1,782 ratings — published 1977 — 26 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Live or Die 4.11 avg rating — 1,756 ratings — published 1966 — 15 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	All My Pretty Ones 4.19 avg rating — 960 ratings — published 1962 — 8 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Awful Rowing Toward God 4.22 avg rating — 912 ratings — published 1975 — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	To Bedlam and Part Way Back 4.25 avg rating — 865 ratings — published 1960 — 9 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Death Notebooks 4.09 avg rating — 492 ratings — published 1974 — 5 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Anne Sexton…

Quotes by Anne Sexton (?)

“As it has been said:
Love and a cough
cannot be concealed.
Even a small cough.
Even a small love.”
― Anne Sexton

tags: poetry

3207 likes

“Watch out for intellect,
because it knows so much it knows nothing
and leaves you hanging upside down,
mouthing knowledge as your heart
falls out of your mouth.”
― Anne Sexton, The Complete Poems

tags: intellect, love, poetry

2635 likes

“Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard.”
― Anne Sexton

tags: living, soul

903 likes

See all Anne Sexton's quotes »

Topics Mentioning This Author

topics	posts	views	last activity
The Seasonal Read...: Winter Challenge 2010-2011 Completed Tasks (do not delete any posts)	2589	1083	Feb 28, 2011 09:05PM
Literary Exploration: What Are You Reading - October 2011	60	68	Nov 01, 2011 09:49AM
Apocalypse Whenever: What 5 dead authors would you invite to a dinner party?	41	118	Oct 14, 2012 01:28PM
Book Nook Cafe: Poetry -	463	345	Nov 27, 2012 07:46AM
The Next Best Boo...: The Title Game	20235	14519	May 30, 2013 12:53PM
Apocalypse Whenever: (CLOSED) What are you reading right now? (book titles should be clickable TEXT links!)	2075	1583	Jan 10, 2014 09:13AM
Terminalcoffee: Your next/current read?	3460	875	Apr 29, 2014 10:27AM
Building a SciFi/...: Fairytales	54	330	Aug 05, 2014 06:46AM

More…

Anne Sexton’s Followers (2,306)

Add NewVideos

Anne Sexton

Combine EditionsAnne Sexton’s books

Topics Mentioning This Author

Add New
Videos

Combine Editions
Anne Sexton’s books