Authors Like
By Lisanne Swart · 6 authors · Confessional Poetry · Updated July 2026
Anne Sexton began writing poetry on her therapist's suggestion, and her work never softened what it found there — mental illness, womanhood, and desire appear in her poems with a directness that was genuinely shocking when she began publishing. Live or Die, her Pulitzer Prize-winning collection, traces a period of real crisis with unflinching specificity rather than metaphor at arm's length. The writers below share her commitment to confessional honesty about the interior life, rendered with genuine formal craft rather than raw diary entry.
Readers who enjoy Anne Sexton often turn to Sylvia Plath for the closest confessional peer, sharing both workshop and unflinching subject matter, Adrienne Rich for feminist poetry examining womanhood with comparable directness, Robert Lowell for the confessional tradition Sexton and Plath both emerged from, Mary Oliver for poetry addressing interior life through closer attention to the natural world, Rainer Maria Rilke for solitude and difficulty treated with comparable seriousness, and Frida Kahlo for diary and visual confession rendered with the same refusal of protective distance.
Similar Voice & Approach
Sylvia Plath
Plath, Sexton's fellow student in Robert Lowell's Boston workshop, shares her unflinching confessional directness about mental illness and womanhood, the two poets directly influencing each other during a period that helped establish confessional poetry as a genuine literary movement.
Read Plath for the closest confessional peer to Sexton, sharing both workshop origins and unflinching subject matter. Ariel is essential.
Adrienne Rich
Rich shares Sexton's willingness to examine womanhood and desire with genuine directness, though her poetry moves toward more explicit political and feminist argument than Sexton's more purely confessional, interior register.
Read Rich for feminist poetry examining womanhood with comparable directness, pushed toward more explicit political argument. Diving into the Wreck is essential.
Robert Lowell
Lowell taught both Sexton and Plath in his Boston workshop, and his own Life Studies helped establish the confessional poetry tradition they both extended, addressing his own mental illness and family history with unusual directness for the era.
Read Lowell for the confessional tradition Sexton and Plath both emerged from and extended. Life Studies is the foundational text.
Mary Oliver
Oliver shares Sexton's interest in the interior life rendered through poetry, though her attention turns outward toward marshes and geese rather than inward toward psychiatric hospitalization and crisis, offering a gentler counterpart to Sexton's own confessional intensity.
Read Oliver for interior life addressed through closer attention to the natural world, a gentler counterpart to Sexton's confessional intensity. Devotions is essential.
→ See authors like Mary OliverRainer Maria Rilke
Rilke shares Sexton's willingness to treat difficult, unresolved interior experience with genuine spiritual and formal seriousness, though his register is more meditative and less clinically specific than Sexton's own confessional directness.
Read Rilke for solitude and difficulty treated with comparable seriousness, in a more meditative register than Sexton's own. Letters to a Young Poet is essential.
→ See all books written by Rainer Maria RilkeFrida Kahlo
Kahlo shares Sexton's refusal of protective distance when addressing pain, treating her own body and inner life as material serious enough to examine as closely and honestly in visual diary form as Sexton examined hers in confessional verse.
Read Kahlo for diary and visual confession rendered with the same refusal of protective distance as Sexton's own poetry. Her illustrated diary is essential.
→ Read more about Frida KahloMore from the shelf
Frequently asked questions about authors like Anne Sexton
Who should I read if I like Anne Sexton?
Readers who enjoy Anne Sexton often turn to Sylvia Plath for the closest confessional peer, sharing both workshop and unflinching subject matter, Adrienne Rich for feminist poetry examining womanhood with comparable directness, Robert Lowell for the confessional tradition Sexton and Plath both emerged from, Mary Oliver for poetry addressing interior life through closer attention to the natural world, Rainer Maria Rilke for solitude and difficulty treated with comparable seriousness, and Frida Kahlo for diary and visual confession rendered with the same refusal of protective distance.
Is Sylvia Plath similar to Anne Sexton?
Yes, Plath and Sexton studied together in Robert Lowell's Boston poetry workshop in the late 1950s, and the two directly influenced each other during a period that helped establish confessional poetry as a genuine literary movement. Both share unflinching directness about mental illness and womanhood.
What should I read after Live or Die?
Sylvia Plath's Ariel offers the closest confessional peer to Sexton's own work. Robert Lowell's Life Studies provides the foundational confessional tradition both poets emerged from. For feminist poetry examining womanhood with comparable directness, Adrienne Rich's Diving into the Wreck is an essential complement.
Did Robert Lowell teach Anne Sexton?
Yes, Lowell taught both Sexton and Sylvia Plath in his poetry workshop in Boston, and his own collection Life Studies, addressing his mental illness and family history with unusual directness for the era, helped establish the confessional poetry tradition both students went on to extend in their own distinct ways.
