Sylvia Plath wrote the poem, “Daddy” in reference to her father’s death and how she coped with her bereavement and feelings about the life her dad lived. The writer of the poem used symbolism to describe her father and her thoughts about him. The most prominent symbolism in the poem is the reference to her father as a Nazi. The comparison represents the how she felt detached from her father after his death. Although she struggled with his death, she was troubled by the brutal life the father had lived as a Nazi.

At the death of her father, she is ashamed of who her father was. She writes the poem saying, “Every woman adores a Fascist, / The boot in the face, the brute/ brute heart of a brute like you” (48-50). The writer of the poem is being sarcastic to shed light on her father’s behavior to show how cruel he was towards women. The writer continues to describe her father as “a man in black with a Meinkampf look” (65). The Meinkampf look is the use of symbolism to show that his father was similar to Hitler. Meinkampf is a book written by Hitler. The symbolism is used to show she is angry about her father’s death just as a Jew would be angry at Hitler for the problems he caused for killing the Jews.

The next symbol I picked from the poem is where the writer compared her father to Luftwaffe. The brutal comparison shows she regards her father as cruel. The cruelty of her father is similar to that of Hitler when he executed the Jews. When she gives the father the label of a Nazi and labels herself as a Jew, she is expressing how she has been a victim of the ruthless character of the father. Plath continues to compare the father to a panzer-man. The panzer-man is related to the Nazi, which shows she is stressing the point that her father was cruel.

When the writer repeatedly compares her father to a Nazi, it shows her deep-seated anger at her father. Additionally, the writer of the poem indicates that her father is a vampire. The symbol of a vampire indicates she is expressing the horrific moments she encountered with her father. The horror she has experienced is the death of her father who has died and left her alone. She feels that accepting the death of the father is a horrific experience she can rarely believe or accept. The death of her father is still haunting her even after he died when she was 10 years old. She sounds like she is angry at her father’s death and wants to get over it.

Plath explains that the father is a vampire who is always haunting her even when he is dead. The last symbol used in the poem is the black shoe. The writer indicates she lived like a foot inside a shoe. Plath says she has grieved for many years and she is about to get over the grief. She explains that she has been trapped in the memories of her father as a foot is trapped inside a shoe. Plath indicates she has been small enough even to fit inside the shoe of the father. The theme of the poem is an outrageous expression of anger. Plath does not find peace with the death of her father, but she has disturbing memories of her father. The poem shows the psychological fight inside the soul between her and the father. Rather than finding peace at her father’s death, she became angry at her father. Finally, she has found peace with his death, but she indicates she is through with the grieving.