The works of Sylvia Plath --- from the harrowing autobiographical novel THE BELL JAR to the ominous poetic offerings of ARIEL --- are well-known, and made all the more gut-wrenching by the author’s suicide in 1963. MARY VENTURA AND THE NINTH KINGDOM is a newly discovered story, found within Plath’s papers on file at her alma mater, Smith College, and demonstrates a popular theme of hers: artistic independence versus a path of domesticity.

A young woman named Mary Ventura is escorted to a train station by her parents, who seem anxious to put her on the train leaving on track 3: “It will be an easy trip. Everyone has to leave home sometime. Everyone has to go away sooner or later.” A nervous Mary boards the train, chooses a window seat and settles in for the ride to her inevitable future, whatever that may be. She strikes up a conversation with the woman sitting opposite her who seems to possess more knowledge about their destination than Mary: “‘One hardly notices the time go by on this trip,’ the woman nodded. ‘It is so comfortable here inside the train. But we have just passed the fifth stop along the way and that means we’ll be going into the long tunnel soon.’”

"This emblematic tale packs a punch in its 60 short pages, made all the more powerful by the knowledge of Plath’s troubled marriage and eventual suicide."

The world in which Mary lives seems futuristic, almost dystopian: “‘The air is so thick and smoky!’ she exclaimed, ‘I’ve never seen the sun that strange color before.”’ “‘It’s the forest fires,’ the woman replied. ‘The smoke always blows down from the north this time of year. We’ll be getting into more of it later on.’” As the train rattles on to its destination, Mary must decide if she wants to stay on until the ninth kingdom, or escape before the train reaches its destination. Which is the right decision for her? Once you get to the ninth kingdom, there’s no going back.

This story was written by Plath in 1952, when she was still a student at Smith College, and was submitted to --- and rejected by --- Mademoiselle magazine, where Plath had already won a writing prize. (Her subsequent internship at the magazine became the backdrop to THE BELL JAR years later). In this early allegorical story, Plath, like Jane Austen did before her, ponders the price of femininity, and how a woman decides between a life of the mind and the life of a wife and mother. What is the penance if one chooses the wrong path?

This emblematic tale packs a punch in its 60 short pages, made all the more powerful by the knowledge of Plath’s troubled marriage and eventual suicide. Combining classic themes of her later work with a smattering of Shirley Jackson and a touch of Margaret Atwood, and being published in this #metoo and “Handmaid’s Tale” climate, the story feels as relevant today as the day it was written.