Ted Hughes: A Brief Introduction
Edward J. Hughes grew up in Yorkshire where the bleak moorland and its wildlife provided a backdrop to many of his poems. He attended Mexborough Grammar School in a coal-mining town and won a scholarship to Pembroke College, Cambridge, where he studied English and anthropology. Before going to university he served for two years in the Royal Air Force.
At Cambridge he was known as a wild working-class student. He met and married the American poet Sylvia Plath who was to commit suicide in 1963. Their relationship was tempestuous and they moved to London where Hughes held a series of part-time jobs and worked on his first volume of poetry The Hawk in the Rain (1957). This was followed by Pike (1959) and Lupercal (1960) which received both the Somerset-Maugham Award and the Hawthornden Prize. The success of these books allowed Hughes to buy a cottage in Devon, but Plath’s depression deepened to the point where she took her own life. Hughes never got over her death. His German lover Assia Wevill also killed herself and her daughter in 1969.
Hughes was one of the original members of the Arvon Foundation which encouraged new writers. He was by now an established literary figure though with a reputation for poetry red in tooth and claw together with feral imagery — as witnessed in Crow (1970).
Awards and honours came to him: the OBE in 1977 and the Laureateship in 1984 on the death of John Betjeman, finally the OM.
His anthropological studies had given him an interest in mythology and magic. He believed that poetry is an exploration of the inner self and has a semi-religious function as a release of suppressed creative energies.
His last work Birthday Letters (1998) is a study of Sylvia Plath’s life with mystical overtones. By the date of its publication Hughes knew that he was dying of cancer. A memorial service was held in Westminster Abbey.
Ted Hughes’ Final Book of Poetry — “Birthday Letters” — A Review
In “Birthday Letters,” Ted Hughes final published book of poetry in his lifetime, the great poet reveals many intimate details of his life and marriage to his former wife- the late, great Sylvia Plath. If you are familiar with Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes, this collection of poems is a must have for your library. Those not familiar with the two literary greats would still enjoy this body of work as the poems are rich with description and emotion.
The poems have a deeply personal and confessional tone. The poet’s voice is calm, yet below the surface the reader can sense the trouble Ted Hughes had being married to a manic-depressive woman who continually saw the world through a dark, negative and hostile lens. A poem or two also is about ‘the other woman’ for whom Ted Hughes left Sylvia Plath, who was the mother of his two children.
Ted began writing the collection of poetry soon after Sylvia Plath took her own life. The volume is a constant dialog that Ted Hughes had with his former wife up until the day he died. “Birthday Letters” was published two weeks before Ted Hughes’ own death of natural causes. Some of the content was most likely edited as Ted Hughes was vilified for Sylvia Plath’s death. What is left is a remarkable portrait still of the inner workings a man who understood his wife to a large degree and who simply had difficulty in accepting her and her illness. Many of the poems document specific scenes and occurrences that the two literary greats shared together. The ‘snapshots’ are a remarkable view into a very private world.
In conclusion, Ted Hughes only volume of poetry specifically relating to Sylvia Plath is a work unlike any other. The poems vividly portray a husband and wife living together, traveling, sightseeing, dining etc as most married couples do, combined with a confession of the deepest nature of a man who simply could not stay with the mother of his two children because of her angry, hostile depression. Ultimately, the marriage failed and Ted Hughes lived while Sylvia Plath died and the poems, “Birthday Letters” are what remain of the aftermath. They are a must have for any fan of modern poetry. Find out more details about by clicking on www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/ted-hughes.
