An animation made in response to Plath's poem, 'The Arrival of the Bee Box'.
See the film here
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'I saw the poem as a metaphor for state of mind, and appropriated Plath's imagery to make my own metaphor, scratching into beeswax over and over until obliteration and cacophony coincided. I understood her nightmare state of mind where the turmoil is not physical at all, and I took a mirror and made Plath's little grid out of nothing but reflections so whoever looks at the piece becomes a part of it, and understands, too. And then I undid the locks and released the bees.'
Jane Tudge
The Arrival of the Bee Box
By Sylvia Plath
I ordered this, this clean wood box
Square as a chair and almost too heavy to lift
I would say it was the coffin of a midget
Or a square baby
Were there not such a din in it.
The box is locked, it is dangerous.
I have to live with it overnight
And I can't keep away from it.
There are no windows, so I can't see what is in there.
There is only a little grid, no exit.
I put my eye to the grid.
It is dark, dark,
With the swarmy feeling of African hands
Minute and shrunk for export,
Black on black, angrily clambering.
How can I let them out?
It is the noise that appals me most of all,
The unintelligible syllables.
It is like a Roman mob
Small, taken one by one, but my god, together!
I lay my ear to furious Latin.
I am not a Caesar.
I have simply ordered a box of maniacs.
They can be sent back.
They can die, I need feed them nothing, I am the owner.
I wonder how hungry they are.
I wonder if they would forget me
If I just undid the locks and stood back and turned into a tree.
There is the laburnum, its blond colonnades,
And the petticoats of the cherry.
They might ignore me immediately
In my moon suit and funeral veil.
I am no source of honey
So why should they turn on me?
Tomorrow I will be sweet God, I will set them free.
The box is only temporary.