Sylvia Plath's Narrator in Ariel as the Nomadic Subject

Ariel, named after Sylvia Plath’s horse, is a free verse poem that challenges the binary opposition between the subject and the object through its telling of the experience of riding an uncontrollable horse. Through a fragmented yet amalgamating structure, Plath’s narrator in the poem achieves to subvert the rider’s position as the domineering subject with a clash with its object, Ariel the horse; emphasizing the narrator’s search of identity as the nomadic subject primarily expressed through the poem’s form. 

In her essay "Writing as a Nomadic Subject" Rosi Braidotti argues “writing is an intransitive activity” and “an affective and geometrically rigorous mode of inscription into life” (163). According to Braidotti’s theory founded upon post-structuralist theory as well as Lacanian discourse, language transcends being merely an instrument of communication; it rather constitutes the very core of culture (164). Echoing Braidotti’s theory within her writing, Plath exerts fragmentation in her language in Ariel as an indicator of her cultural identity being opposed to her desire to become one with the nature: enjambment in the poem interrupts the natural flow, arguably fabricating multifaceted meanings; and yet the poem includes many rhymes although it is structured within free form, indicating a unity although the fragmentation. It can thus be argued Plath’s use of language emphasizes the nomadic subject’s departure from its inhabited position to transcending its prior positioning and becoming “the arrow” (27) through uniting with Ariel. This instance is of unity within fragmentation is apparent in many lines such as “And I / Am the arrow,” (27-28). The interlapping meanings constituted within fragmented lines are also apparent in the poem’s different tercets, and the continuation of the last stanza of the previous tercet is pursued as the next tercet begins with its first stanza, exemplified in lines “The child’s cry / Melts in the wall.” (24-25); and perhaps the most crucial occurrence is evident in the ending as these lines conclude the poem: “Into the red / Eye, the cauldron of morning.” (30-31) It can then be suggested that the poem’s structure utterly echoes its content: through interruption of the original line, Plath’s writing parallels the nomadic subject’s disjunction in a previous established identity; in both, new meanings are constituted through fragmentation. Thus, the poem’s structure demonstrates how Plath’s narrator’s identity is flux as the nomadic subject, shifting through culture and nature; evidently mediating the shift through language. 

Braidotti’s evaluation of the subject is “a process made of constant shifts and negotiations between different levels of power and desire.” (169). Plath’s poem too can be considered within these conventions: as the rider of the horse, Plath’s first attained role as the subject which appears stable is evident in the beginning of the poem, reflected upon the S sound evident in “statis” (1), “darkness” (1), “substanceless” (2), and “distances” (3). Nevertheless, the S sound becomes a uniting sound in the second tenet with “lioness” (4), “heels” (6) and “knees” (6) as the narrator begins to describe how the horse and she begin to unite. The consonance in the poem thus shifts and subverts the meaning, illustrating how Plath’s narrator goes through the processes of the nomadic subject. Furthermore, as Plath’s narrator loses its control and therefore its power over its object, the horse being ridden, the power dynamic shifts: this flux is maintained with rhymes “I” (22, 26) and “drive” (29), indicating how the the narrator’s identity as the subject and as the driver are both being challenged. 

In conclusion, the nomadic subject is defined by its in-between positioning, appointed to question and challenge binary oppositions previously defined by structuralist and pre-structuralist conventions. Founded upon poststructuralist and post-Freudian psychoanalytic discourse, the theory of nomadic subject provokes the existing power dynamics with an aim to subvert. In Plath’s poem Ariel, when the poem’s narrator is analyzed as the nomadic subject, Plath’s use of language is revealed as the mediating force allowing fluidity for the nomadic subject. Consequently, the shift from the subject’s cultural placement blurs the lines between the oppositions between I and the Other, subject and object, rider and vehicle, human and animal, and culture and subject. Hence, the poem is deconstructive of the egocentric norms; positively transcending and transforming the subject.