Sylvia Plath was born on October 27, 1932 in Boston, Massachusetts. Her parents were German immigrants named Aurelia Schober who was a first generation American born in Boston of Austrian parents, and Otto Emil Plath, who was a professor of biology and German at Boston University. He was a German descendent that emigrated from Grabow in the Polish Corridor at age 15. She also had a younger brother named Warren who was born in 1935.
Her family moved to Winthrop, Massachusetts in 1936. At age 7, Sylvia studied the viola. In 1940, her father died. To get away from the pain and suffering, the rest of her family moved to Wellesley, Massachusetts. In 1942, while attending public school in Wellesley, she wrote her first poem and story. Because Sylvia was so smart, she was placed two years above her grade level in sixth grade, but her mother moved her back to fifth grade.
Sylvia attended Smith College. While attending, she published her first work in Seventeen Magazine in 1950. Her story was called "And Summer Will Not Come Again." She also worked for Mademoiselle Magazine and published "Ode on a Bitter Plum." .
Sylvia was a manic-depressive person. In 1953, she attempted suicide and was hospitalized. When she got out, she went to England to study at Cambridge and met her husband Ted Hughes who was also a poet in 1956. In 1957, she came back to the states and taught one year of English at Smith College. On April 1, 1960, Sylvia gave birth to her first child Frieda Rebecca. She also published The Colossus and Other Poems. In 1961, Sylvia got pregnant, but she came to find out she had a miscarriage. She still wanted another child. On January 17, 1962, She gave birth to her second child Nicholas Farrar. Sylvia had found out Ted was having an affair with another lady, and later that year she separated from Ted and moved to London. She lived in a little flat with her two young children and was very poor. The past couple years had been dreadful for Sylvia.