Which young girl has been drowned? Where and how?
Which young girl has been drowned? Where and how?
The 'young girl' is the woman's own past, youthful self. She has been drowned in the mirror, which the poem turns into a lake, through the slow, irreversible process of ageing.
Marking Scheme
- 11 mark for identifying the young girl as the woman's past youthful self, lost in the mirror (lake) through the process of aging.
Hint
The mirror becomes a 'lake' in stanza 2. Think of what happens when something sinks in a lake. Who is the young girl in relation to the woman?
Quick Oral Answer
The young girl who has drowned is the woman's own younger self. She has drowned in the mirror, which is metaphorically a lake, through the slow and irreversible process of aging over the years.
Analysis & Explanation
This question tests interpretation of the central drowning metaphor in Plath's 'Mirror'.
Concept
- The 'young girl' who has drowned is not a real person but the woman's own youthful self/identity.
- Where: in the mirror, which the poem transforms into a lake in the second stanza ('Now I am a lake').
- How: through the slow, ongoing process of ageing — day after day her youth sinks beneath the surface while 'an old woman rises toward her'.
Common mistakes (परीक्षा में सावधानी)
- Taking the drowning literally instead of recognising it as figurative language — this is the most common error and scores zero.
- Since the question has three parts (which/where/how), the answer must briefly cover all three for the full mark.
Real-world
- The drowning metaphor reflects how people everywhere feel their younger identity slip away irreversibly with age.
Common Mistakes
- 1Taking the drowning literally and writing about an actual girl who died in water, completely missing the metaphorical meaning of lost youth.
- 2Identifying the young girl correctly but failing to explain 'where' (in the mirror/lake) and 'how' (through aging over time), since the question has three parts that all need to be addressed.
- 3Confusing the 'young girl' with a separate character in the poem. There is only one woman in the poem; the 'young girl' is her own past self, not another person.
Interesting Facts
The mirror-as-lake metaphor in Plath's poem draws from the ancient Greek myth of Narcissus, who drowned while gazing at his reflection in a pool. Plath, who studied classics at Smith College, was deeply familiar with Greek mythology.
Sylvia Plath's use of water imagery is a recurring motif in her work. In her novel 'The Bell Jar' (1963), she uses drowning as a metaphor for depression, making the 'drowned girl' in Mirror part of a larger symbolic pattern across her writing.
Literary scholars have noted that the progression in the poem from 'mirror' (stanza 1) to 'lake' (stanza 2) represents a deepening of self-examination, moving from surface reflection to deeper psychological exploration of identity and mortality.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Why does Plath use the word 'drowned' instead of 'lost' or 'disappeared'?
Plath uses 'drowned' because in the second stanza the mirror compares itself to a lake. Drowning in a lake creates a powerful image of the young self sinking beneath the surface of time, lost forever in the mirror's depths, with a sense of violence and finality.
Is the drowning in the poem literal or figurative?
It is entirely figurative. No actual person has drowned. The metaphor means that the woman's youth has been submerged and lost over time, just as something drowns and disappears beneath the surface of water.
What is the connection between the mirror as a lake and the drowning?
In the second stanza, the mirror says 'Now I am a lake'. This extended metaphor transforms the mirror into a body of water with depths, allowing Plath to use imagery of drowning and rising to describe how youth sinks away while old age surfaces.