In the early 1960s, when Plath committed suicide, the suicide rate for women of her age in England reached a staggering 10 per 100,000 - driven by a tragically high number of deaths by gas poisoning. That's as high as the suicide rate for women in England has ever been. By 1977,when the natural - gas changeover was complete, the suicide rate for women of that age was roughly half that. Plath was really unlucky. Had she come along ten years later there would have been no clouds like "carbon monoxide" for her to "sweetly, sweetly...breathe in."