Edward James "Ted" Hughes (17 August 1930 – 28 October 1998) was an English poet, translator, and children's writer. Critics frequently rank him as one of the best poets of his generation and one of the twentieth century's greatest writers. He was appointed
Poet Laureate
A poet laureate (plural: poets laureate) is a poet officially appointed by a government or conferring institution, typically expected to compose poems for special events and occasions. Albertino Mussato of Padua and Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch ...
in 1984 and held the office until his death. In 2008 ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ...
'' ranked Hughes fourth on its list of "The 50 greatest
British writers since 1945".
Hughes was married to American poet
Sylvia Plath
Sylvia Plath (; October 27, 1932 – February 11, 1963) was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer. She is credited with advancing the genre of confessional poetry and is best known for two of her published collections, '' Th ...
from 1956 until her death by suicide in 1963 at the age of 30. His last poetic work, ''
Birthday Letters'' (1998), explored their relationship.
Biography
Early life
Hughes was born at 1 Aspinall Street, in
Mytholmroyd in the
West Riding of Yorkshire
The West Riding of Yorkshire is one of three historic subdivisions of Yorkshire, England. From 1889 to 1974 the administrative county County of York, West Riding (the area under the control of West Riding County Council), abbreviated County ...
, to William Henry (1894–1981) and Edith ( Farrar) Hughes (1898–1969), and raised among the local farms of the
Calder Valley and on the Pennine moorland. Hughes's sister Olwyn Marguerite Hughes (1928–2016) was two years older and his brother Gerald (1920–2016) was ten years older.
[Bell (2002) p. 4.] One of his mother's ancestors had founded the
Little Gidding community.
Most of the more recent generations of his family had worked in the clothing and milling industries in the area. Hughes's father, William, a joiner, was of Irish descent and had enlisted with the
Lancashire Fusiliers
The Lancashire Fusiliers was a line infantry regiment of the British Army that saw distinguished service through many years and wars, including the Second Boer War, the First and Second World Wars, and had many different titles throughout its 2 ...
in the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fig ...
and fought at
Ypres
Ypres ( , ; nl, Ieper ; vls, Yper; german: Ypern ) is a Belgian city and municipality in the province of West Flanders. Though
the Dutch name is the official one, the city's French name is most commonly used in English. The municipality ...
. He narrowly escaped being killed when a bullet lodged in a pay book in his breast pocket.
He was one of just 17 men of his regiment to return from the
Dardanelles Campaign (1915–16). The stories of
Flanders fields filled Hughes's childhood imagination (later described in the poem "Out").
Hughes noted, "my first six years shaped everything".
Hughes loved hunting and fishing, swimming, and picnicking with his family. He attended the Burnley Road School until he was seven before his family moved to
Mexborough
Mexborough is a town in the City of Doncaster in South Yorkshire, England. Situated between Manvers and Denaby Main, it lies on the River Don close to where it joins the River Dearne, and the A6023 road runs through the town. It is contigu ...
, then attending Schofield Street junior school.
His parents ran a newsagent's and tobacconist's shop.
In ''Poetry in Making'' he recalled that he was fascinated by animals, collecting, and drawing toy lead creatures. He acted as retriever when his elder brother gamekeeper shot
magpies
Magpies are birds of the Corvidae family. Like other members of their family, they are widely considered to be intelligent creatures. The Eurasian magpie, for instance, is thought to rank among the world's most intelligent creatures, and is o ...
, owls, rats and
curlews
The curlews () are a group of nine species of birds in the genus ''Numenius'', characterised by their long, slender, downcurved bills and mottled brown plumage. The English name is imitative of the Eurasian curlew's call, but may have been ...
, growing up surrounded by the harsh realities of working farms in the valleys and on the moors.
[Sagar (1978), p. 6.] During his time in Mexborough, he explored Manor Farm at Old
Denaby, which he said he would come to know "better than any place on earth". His earliest poem "The Thought Fox", and earliest story "The Rain Horse" were recollections of the area. A close friend at the time, John Wholly, took Hughes to the Crookhill estate above
Conisbrough
Conisbrough () is a town within the City of Doncaster, in South Yorkshire, England. It is roughly midway between Doncaster and Rotherham, and is built alongside the River Don at . It has a ward population (Conisbrough and Denaby) of 14,33 ...
where the boys spent great swathes of time. Hughes became close to the family and learnt a lot about wildlife from Wholly's father, a gamekeeper. He came to view fishing as an almost religious experience.
Hughes attended
Mexborough Grammar School, where a succession of teachers encouraged him to write, and develop his interest in poetry. Teachers Miss McLeod and Pauline Mayne introduced him to the poets
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Gerard Manley Hopkins (28 July 1844 – 8 June 1889) was an English poet and Jesuit priest, whose posthumous fame placed him among leading Victorian poets. His prosody – notably his concept of sprung rhythm – established him as an innova ...
and
T.S. Eliot. Hughes was mentored by his sister Olwyn, who was well versed in poetry, and another teacher, John Fisher.
Poet
Harold Massingham also attended this school and was also mentored by Fisher. In 1946, one of Hughes's early poems, "Wild West", and a short story were published in the grammar school magazine ''The Don and Dearne'', followed by further poems in 1948.
By 16, he had no other thought than being a poet.
During the same year, Hughes won an open
exhibition
An exhibition, in the most general sense, is an organized presentation and display of a selection of items. In practice, exhibitions usually occur within a cultural or educational setting such as a museum, art gallery, park, library, exhibiti ...
in English at
Pembroke College, Cambridge, but chose to do his
national service first. His two years of national service (1949–51) passed comparatively easily. Hughes was stationed as a ground wireless mechanic in the
RAF on an isolated three-man station in east Yorkshire, a time during which he had nothing to do but "read and reread Shakespeare and watch the grass grow".
He learnt many of the plays by heart and memorised great quantities of
W. B. Yeats's poetry.
Career
In 1951 Hughes initially studied English at Pembroke College under M.J.C. Hodgart, an authority on
ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads derive from the medieval French ''chanson balladée'' or '' ballade'', which were originally "dance songs". Ballads were particularly characteristic of the popular poetry and ...
ic forms. Hughes felt encouraged and supported by Hodgart's supervision, but attended few lectures and wrote no more poetry at this time, feeling stifled by literary academia and the "terrible, suffocating, maternal octopus" of literary tradition.
[Sagar (1978), p. 8.] He wrote, "I might say, that I had as much talent for
Leavis Leavis is a surname, and may refer to:
* F. R. Leavis (1895–1978), British literary critic
* Q. D. Leavis (1906–1981), English literary critic and essayist
See also
* Beavis
* Leaves
* Leavisism, a form of literary studies named after F. R ...
-style dismantling of texts as anyone else, I even had a special bent for it, nearly a sadistic streak there, but it seemed to me not only a foolish game, but deeply destructive of myself."
In his third year, he transferred to
Anthropology
Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of be ...
and
Archaeology
Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts ...
, both of which would later inform his poetry. He did not excel as a scholar, receiving only a third-class grade in Part I of the Anthropology and Archaeology Tripos in 1954.
[Bell (2002), p. 5.] His first published poetry appeared in ''Chequer''.
A poem, "The little boys and the seasons", written during this time, was published in ''
Granta
''Granta'' is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centres on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story’s supreme ability to describe, illuminate and ma ...
'', under the pseudonym Daniel Hearing.
[Sagar (1978), p. 9.]
After university, living in London and Cambridge, Hughes went on to have many varied jobs including working as a rose gardener, a nightwatchman and a reader for the British film company
J. Arthur Rank. He worked at
London Zoo as a washer-upper, a post that offered plentiful opportunities to observe animals at close quarters.
On 25 February 1956, Hughes and his friends held a party to launch ''
St. Botolph's Review'', which had a single issue. In it, Hughes had four poems. At the party, he met the American poet
Sylvia Plath
Sylvia Plath (; October 27, 1932 – February 11, 1963) was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer. She is credited with advancing the genre of confessional poetry and is best known for two of her published collections, '' Th ...
, who was studying at Cambridge on a
Fulbright Scholarship
The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States Cultural Exchange Programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people ...
. She had already published extensively, having won various awards, and had come especially to meet Hughes and his fellow poet Lucas Myers. There was a great mutual attraction but they did not meet again for another month, when Plath was passing through London on her way to Paris. She visited him again on her return three weeks later.
Hughes and Plath dated and then were married at
St George the Martyr, Holborn, on 16 June 1956, four months after they had first met. The date,
Bloomsday, was purposely chosen in honour of
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the Modernism, modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important ...
.
Plath's mother was the only wedding guest and she accompanied them on their honeymoon to
Benidorm
Benidorm is a town and municipality in the province of Alicante, Valencia, on the Mediterranean coast of Spain.
Benidorm has been a tourist destination within Spain since 1925, when its port was extended and the first hotels were built, though ...
on the Spanish coast.
[Bell (2002), p. 6.] Hughes's biographers note that Plath did not relate her history of depression and suicide attempts to him until much later.
Reflecting later in ''Birthday Letters'', Hughes commented that early on he could see chasms of difference between himself and Plath, but that in the first years of their marriage they both felt happy and supported, avidly pursuing their writing careers.
On returning to Cambridge, they lived at 55 Eltisley Avenue. That year they each had poems published in ''
The Nation
''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's ''The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper tha ...
'', ''
Poetry
Poetry (derived from the Greek '' poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings ...
'' and ''
The Atlantic
''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science.
It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
''.
[Sagar (1978), p. 11.] Plath typed up Hughes's manuscript for his collection ''Hawk in the Rain'' which went on to win a poetry competition run by the Poetry centre of the
Young Men's and Young Women's Hebrew Association of New York.
The first prize was publication by
Harper, garnering Hughes widespread critical acclaim with the book's release in September 1957, and resulting in him winning a
Somerset Maugham Award. The work favoured hard-hitting
trochees and
spondees reminiscent of
Middle English
Middle English (abbreviated to ME) is a form of the English language that was spoken after the Norman conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century. The English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old English ...
– a style he used throughout his career – over the more genteel latinate sounds.
The couple moved to America so that Plath could take a teaching position at her alma mater,
Smith College
Smith College is a private liberal arts women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smith and opened in 1875. It is the largest member of the historic Seven Sisters colleges, a group of elite women's c ...
; during this time, Hughes taught at the
University of Massachusetts
The University of Massachusetts is the five-campus public university system and the only public research system in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The university system includes five campuses (Amherst, Boston, Dartmouth, Lowell, and a medi ...
, Amherst. In 1958, they met
Leonard Baskin, who would later illustrate many of Hughes's books, including ''Crow''.
The couple returned to England, staying for a short while back in
Heptonstall and then finding a small flat in
Primrose Hill, London. They were both writing, Hughes working on programmes for the BBC as well as producing essays, articles, reviews, and talks.
[Bell, Charlie (2002) ''Ted Hughes'' Hodder and Stoughton, p. 7.] During this time, he wrote the poems that would be published in ''Wodwo'' (1967) and ''Recklings'' (1966). In March 1960, ''Lupercal'' came out and won the
Hawthornden Prize. He found he was being labelled as the poet of the wild, writing only about animals.
He began to seriously explore myth and esoteric practices including shamanism, alchemy and Buddhism with
The Tibetan Book of the Dead
The ''Bardo Thodol'' (, "Liberation Through Hearing During the Intermediate State"), commonly known in the West as ''The Tibetan Book of the Dead'', is a terma text from a larger corpus of teachings, the ''Profound Dharma of Self-Liberation t ...
being a particular focus in the early 1960s. He believed that imagination could heal dualistic splits in the human psyche and poetry was the language of that work.
Hughes and Plath had two children,
Frieda Rebecca (b. 1960) and
Nicholas Farrar (1962–2009) and, in 1961, bought the house
Court Green, in
North Tawton,
Devon
Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devon is ...
. In the summer of 1962, Hughes began an affair with
Assia Wevill
Assia Esther Wevill ( Gutmann; 15 May 1927 – 23 March 1969) was a German Jewish woman who escaped the Nazis at the beginning of World War II and emigrated to Palestine, via Italy, then later the United Kingdom, where she had an affair wi ...
who had been subletting the Primrose Hill flat with her husband. Under the cloud of his affair, Hughes and Plath separated in the autumn of 1962 and she set up life in a new flat with the children.
Letters written by Plath between 18 February 1960 and 4 February 1963, unseen until 2017, accuse Hughes of physically abusing her only days before she miscarried their second child in 1961.
Death of Sylvia Plath
Beset by depression made worse by her husband's affair and with a history of suicide attempts, Plath took her own life on 11 February 1963.
[Bell, Charlie (2002) ]
Ted Hughes
' Hodder and Stoughton p8 Hughes dramatically wrote in a letter to an old friend of Plath's from Smith College, "That's the end of my life. The rest is posthumous." Some people argued that Hughes had driven Plath to suicide.
Plath's gravestone in
Heptonstall was repeatedly vandalized by those aggrieved that "Hughes" is written on the stone and attempted to chisel it off, leaving only the name "Sylvia Plath".
Plath's poem "The Jailer", in which the speaker condemns her husband's brutality, was included in the 1970 anthology ''
Sisterhood Is Powerful: An Anthology of Writings from the Women's Liberation Movement''. Radical
feminist poet Robin Morgan published the poem "Arraignment", in which she openly accused Hughes of the battery and murder of Plath.
There were lawsuits, Morgan's 1972 book ''Monster'' which contained that poem was banned, and underground, pirated editions of it were published.
Other radical feminists threatened to kill Hughes in Plath's name.
[Rhyme, reason and depression]
. (16 February 1993). ''The Guardian''. Retrieved 9 July 2010. In 1989, with Hughes under public attack, a battle raged in the letters pages of ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper
A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background.
Newspapers can cover a wide ...
'' and ''
The Independent
''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publishe ...
''. In ''The Guardian'' on 20 April 1989, Hughes wrote the article "The Place Where Sylvia Plath Should Rest in Peace":
In the years soon after lath'sdeath, when scholars approached me, I tried to take their apparently serious concern for the truth about Sylvia Plath seriously. But I learned my lesson early... If I tried too hard to tell them exactly how something happened, in the hope of correcting some fantasy, I was quite likely to be accused of trying to suppress Free Speech. In general, my refusal to have anything to do with the Plath Fantasia has been regarded as an attempt to suppress Free Speech... The Fantasia about Sylvia Plath is more needed than the facts. Where that leaves respect for the truth of her life (and of mine), or for her memory, or for the literary tradition, I do not know.
As Plath's widower, Hughes became the executor of Plath's personal and literary estates. He oversaw the publication of her manuscripts, including ''
Ariel'' (1965). Some critics were dissatisfied by his choice of poem order and omissions in the book
and some critics of Hughes argued that he had essentially driven her to suicide and therefore should not be responsible for her literary legacy.
He claimed to have destroyed the final volume of Plath's journal, detailing their last few months together. In his foreword to ''The Journals of Sylvia Plath'', he defends his actions as a consideration for the couple's young children.
Following Plath's suicide, he wrote two poems "The Howling of Wolves" and "Song of a Rat" and then did not write poetry again for three years. He broadcast extensively, wrote critical essays and became involved in running Poetry International with
Patrick Garland and
Charles Osborne in the hopes of connecting English poetry with the rest of the world. In 1966, he wrote poems to accompany
Leonard Baskin's illustrations of crows, which became the epic narrative ''
The Life and Songs of the Crow'', one of the works for which Hughes is best known.
In 1967, while living with Wevill, Hughes produced two sculptures of a jaguar, one of which he gave to his brother and one to his sister; Gerald Hughes' sculpture, branded with the letter 'A' on its forehead, was offered for sale in 2012.
On 23 March 1969, six years after Plath's suicide by asphyxiation from a gas stove, Assia Wevill died by suicide in the same way. Wevill also killed her child, Alexandra Tatiana Elise (nicknamed Shura), the four-year-old daughter of Hughes, born on 3 March 1965. Their deaths led to claims that Hughes had been abusive to both Plath and Wevill.
[''I failed her. I was 30 and stupid'' ''The Observer'' 19 March 2000](_blank)
Retrieved 9 July 2010 Hughes did not finish the ''Crow'' sequence until the work ''Cave Birds'' was published in 1975.
1970–1998
In August 1970, Hughes married Carol Orchard, a nurse, and they remained together until his death. He bought the house Lumb Bank near
Hebden Bridge
Hebden Bridge is a market town in the Upper Calder Valley in West Yorkshire, England. It is west of Halifax and 14 miles (21 km) north-east of Rochdale, at the confluence of the River Calder and the Hebden Water. The town is the largest ...
,
West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire is a metropolitan and ceremonial county in the Yorkshire and Humber Region of England. It is an inland and upland county having eastward-draining valleys while taking in the moors of the Pennines. West Yorkshire came into exis ...
, and maintained the property at
Court Green. He began cultivating a small farm near
Winkleigh,
Devon
Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devon is ...
called ''Moortown'', a name which became embedded in the title of one of his poetry collections. He later became President of the charity
Farms for City Children, established by his friend
Michael Morpurgo
Sir Michael Andrew Bridge Morpurgo ('' né'' Bridge; 5 October 1943) is an English book author, poet, playwright, and librettist who is known best for children's novels such as '' War Horse'' (1982). His work is noted for its "magical storyte ...
in
Iddesleigh.
[ In October 1970, ''Crow'' was published.
In 1970, he and his sister, Olwyn (26 August 1928 – 3 January 2016), set up the Rainbow Press, which published sixteen titles between 1971 and 1981, comprising poems by Sylvia Plath, Ted Hughes, Ruth Fainlight, ]Thom Gunn
Thomson William "Thom" Gunn (29 August 1929 – 25 April 2004) was an English poet who was praised for his early verses in England, where he was associated with The Movement, and his later poetry in America, even after moving towards a looser, ...
, and Seamus Heaney
Seamus Justin Heaney (; 13 April 1939 – 30 August 2013) was an Irish poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature. , printed by Daedalus Press, Rampant Lions Press and the John Roberts Press.
Hughes was appointed Poet Laureate in December 1984, following Sir John Betjeman
Sir John Betjeman (; 28 August 190619 May 1984) was an English poet, writer, and broadcaster. He was Poet Laureate from 1972 until his death. He was a founding member of The Victorian Society and a passionate defender of Victorian architectu ...
. A collection of animal poems for children had been published by Faber earlier that year, ''What is the Truth?'', illustrated by R. J. Lloyd. For that work he won the annual Guardian Children's Fiction Prize, a once-in-a-lifetime book award.[ Hughes wrote many works for children and collaborated closely with ]Peter Brook
Peter Stephen Paul Brook (21 March 1925 – 2 July 2022) was an English theatre and film director. He worked first in England, from 1945 at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre, from 1947 at the Royal Opera House, and from 1962 for the Royal Shak ...
and the National Theatre Company. He dedicated himself to the Arvon Foundation which promotes writing education and runs residential writing courses at Hughes's home at Lumb Bank, West Yorkshire.[Bell, Charlie (2002) ''Ted Hughes'' Hodder and Stoughton, p. 10.] In 1993, he made a rare television appearance for Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...
, which included him reading passages from his 1968 novel ''The Iron Man''. He also featured in the 1994 documentary ''Seven Crows A Secret''.
In early 1994, Hughes became increasingly alarmed by the decline of fish in rivers local to his Devonshire home. This concern inspired him to become one of the original trustees of the Westcountry Rivers Trust
The Westcountry Rivers Trust is a waterway society and a registered charity No. 1135007 in the West Country of England, United Kingdom. The Trust was founded in 1995 and aims to protect and enhance the West Country's rivers and streams, and ...
, a charity set up to restore rivers through catchment-scale management and a close relationship with local landowners and riparian owners.
Hughes was appointed a member of the Order of Merit
The Order of Merit (french: link=no, Ordre du Mérite) is an order of merit for the Commonwealth realms, recognising distinguished service in the armed forces, science, art, literature, or for the promotion of culture. Established in 1902 by ...
by Queen Elizabeth II
Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until her death in 2022. She was queen regnant of 32 sovereign states during ...
just before he died. He continued to live at the house in Devon, until suffering a fatal heart attack
A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which m ...
on 28 October 1998 while undergoing hospital treatment for colon cancer
Colorectal cancer (CRC), also known as bowel cancer, colon cancer, or rectal cancer, is the development of cancer from the colon or rectum (parts of the large intestine). Signs and symptoms may include blood in the stool, a change in bowel ...
in Southwark
Southwark ( ) is a district of Central London situated on the south bank of the River Thames, forming the north-western part of the wider modern London Borough of Southwark. The district, which is the oldest part of South London, developed ...
, London. His funeral was held on 3 November 1998, at North Tawton church, and he was cremated in Exeter
Exeter () is a city in Devon, South West England. It is situated on the River Exe, approximately northeast of Plymouth and southwest of Bristol.
In Roman Britain, Exeter was established as the base of Legio II Augusta under the personal c ...
. Speaking at the funeral, fellow poet Seamus Heaney
Seamus Justin Heaney (; 13 April 1939 – 30 August 2013) was an Irish poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature. , said: "No death outside my immediate family has left me feeling more bereft. No death in my lifetime has hurt poets more. He was a tower of tenderness and strength, a great arch under which the least of poetry's children could enter and feel secure. His creative powers were, as Shakespeare said, still crescent. By his death, the veil of poetry is rent and the walls of learning broken."
Nicholas Hughes, the son of Hughes and Plath, committed suicide in his home in Alaska
Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U.S ...
on 16 March 2009 after suffering from depression.
Carol Hughes announced in January 2013 that she would write a memoir of their marriage. ''The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ...
'' headlined its story "Hughes's widow breaks silence to defend his name" and observed that "for more than 40 years she has kept her silence, never once joining in the furious debate that has raged around the late Poet Laureate since the suicide of his first wife, the poet Sylvia Plath."
A memoir by Hughes's brother Gerald was published late in 2014, ''Ted and I: A Brother's Memoir'', which '' Kirkus Reviews'' calls "a warm recollection of a lauded poet".
Work
Hughes's first collection, ''The Hawk in the Rain
''The Hawk in the Rain'' is a collection of 40 poems by the British poet Ted Hughes. Published by Faber and Faber in 1957, it was Hughes's first book of poetry. The book received immediate acclaim in both England and America, where it won the ...
'' (1957), attracted considerable critical acclaim. In 1959 he won the Galbraith prize, which brought $5,000. His most significant work is perhaps ''Crow
A crow is a bird of the genus ''Corvus'', or more broadly a synonym for all of ''Corvus''. Crows are generally black in colour. The word "crow" is used as part of the common name of many species. The related term " raven" is not pinned scientifica ...
'' (1970), which whilst it has been widely praised also divided critics, combining an apocalyptic, bitter, cynical and surreal view of the universe with what sometimes appeared simple, childlike verse. Crow was edited several times across Hughes' career. Within its opus he created a cosmology of the totemic Crow who was simultaneously God, Nature and Hughes' alter ego. The publication of ''Crow'' shaped Hughes' poetic career as distinct from other forms of English Nature Poetry.
In a 1971 interview with '' The London Magazine'', Hughes cited his main influences as including Blake, Donne, Hopkins, and Eliot. He mentioned also Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer ( , ; 22 February 1788 – 21 September 1860) was a German philosopher. He is best known for his 1818 work '' The World as Will and Representation'' (expanded in 1844), which characterizes the phenomenal world as the p ...
, Robert Graves's book '' The White Goddess'', and ''The Tibetan Book of the Dead
The ''Bardo Thodol'' (, "Liberation Through Hearing During the Intermediate State"), commonly known in the West as ''The Tibetan Book of the Dead'', is a terma text from a larger corpus of teachings, the ''Profound Dharma of Self-Liberation t ...
''.[Bell (2002) p11]
Hughes worked for 10 years on a prose poem
Prose poetry is poetry written in prose form instead of verse form, while preserving poetic qualities such as heightened imagery, parataxis, and emotional effects.
Characteristics
Prose poetry is written as prose, without the line breaks associ ...
, "Gaudete", which he hoped to have made into a film. It tells the story of the vicar of an English village who is carried off by elemental spirits, and replaced in the village by his enantiodromic double, a changeling, fashioned from a log, who nevertheless has the same memories as the original vicar. The double is a force of nature who organises the women of the village into a "love coven" in order that he may father a new messiah. When the male members of the community discover what is going on, they murder him. The epilogue consists of a series of lyrics spoken by the restored priest in praise of a nature goddess, inspired by Robert Graves's ''White Goddess''. It was printed in 1977. Hughes was very interested in the relationship between his poetry and the book arts, and many of his books were produced by notable presses and in collaborative editions with artists, for instance with Leonard Baskin.
In addition to his own poetry, Hughes wrote a number of translations of European plays, mainly classical ones. His '' Tales from Ovid'' (1997) contains a selection of free verse
Free verse is an open form of poetry, which in its modern form arose through the French '' vers libre'' form. It does not use consistent meter patterns, rhyme, or any musical pattern. It thus tends to follow the rhythm of natural speech.
Defini ...
translations from Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the ...
's ''Metamorphoses
The ''Metamorphoses'' ( la, Metamorphōsēs, from grc, μεταμορφώσεις: "Transformations") is a Latin narrative poem from 8 CE by the Roman poet Ovid. It is considered his '' magnum opus''. The poem chronicles the history of the ...
''. He also wrote both poetry and prose for children, one of his most successful books being '' The Iron Man'', written to comfort his children after their mother Sylvia Plath's suicide. It later became the basis of Pete Townshend
Peter Dennis Blandford Townshend (; born 19 May 1945) is an English musician. He is co-founder, leader, guitarist, second lead vocalist and principal songwriter of the Who, one of the most influential rock bands of the 1960s and 1970s.
Towns ...
's 1989 rock opera
A rock opera is a collection of rock music songs with lyrics that relate to a common story. Rock operas are typically released as concept albums and are not scripted for acting, which distinguishes them from operas, although several have been ad ...
of the same name, and of the 1999 animated film '' The Iron Giant'', the latter of which is dedicated to his memory.
Hughes was appointed Poet Laureate
A poet laureate (plural: poets laureate) is a poet officially appointed by a government or conferring institution, typically expected to compose poems for special events and occasions. Albertino Mussato of Padua and Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch ...
in 1984 following the death of John Betjeman
Sir John Betjeman (; 28 August 190619 May 1984) was an English poet, writer, and broadcaster. He was Poet Laureate from 1972 until his death. He was a founding member of The Victorian Society and a passionate defender of Victorian architectu ...
. It was later known that Hughes was second choice for the appointment. Philip Larkin
Philip Arthur Larkin (9 August 1922 – 2 December 1985) was an English poet, novelist, and librarian. His first book of poetry, ''The North Ship'', was published in 1945, followed by two novels, ''Jill'' (1946) and ''A Girl in Winter'' (1947 ...
, the preferred nominee, had declined, because of ill health and a loss of creative momentum, dying a year later. Hughes served in this position until his death in 1998. In 1992 Hughes published '' Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being'', a monumental work inspired by Graves's '' The White Goddess''. The book, considered Hughes's key work of prose, had a mixed reception "divided between those who considered it an important and original appreciation of Shakespeare’s complete works, whilst others dismissed it as a lengthy and idiosyncratic appreciation of Shakespeare refracted by Hughes’s personal belief system". Hughes himself later suggested that the time spent writing prose was directly responsible for a decline in his health. Also in 1992, Hughes published ''Rain Charm for the Duchy'', collecting together for the first time his Laureate works, including poems celebrating important royal occasions. The book also contained a section of notes throwing light on the context and genesis of each poem.
In 1998, his '' Tales from Ovid'' won the Whitbread Book of the Year Award. In '' Birthday Letters'', his last collection, Hughes broke his silence on Plath, detailing aspects of their life together and his own behaviour at the time. The book, the cover artwork for which was by their daughter Frieda, won the 1999 Whitbread Prize for poetry.
Hughes's definitive 1,333-page ''Collected Poems'' (Faber & Faber) appeared (posthumously) in 2003. A poem discovered in October 2010, "Last letter", describes what happened during the three days leading up to Plath's suicide. It was published in ''New Statesman
The ''New Statesman'' is a British political and cultural magazine published in London. Founded as a weekly review of politics and literature on 12 April 1913, it was at first connected with Sidney and Beatrice Webb and other leading members o ...
'' on National Poetry Day, October 2010.
Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy
Dame Carol Ann Duffy (born 23 December 1955) is a Scottish poet and playwright. She is a professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University, and was appointed Poet Laureate in May 2009, resigning in 2019. She was the first ...
told Channel 4 News that the poem was "the darkest poem he has ever written" and said that for her it was "almost unbearable to read".
In 2011, several previously unpublished letters from Hughes to Craig Raine were published in the literary review Areté. They relate mainly to the process of editing ''Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being'', and also contain a sequence of drafts of letters in which Raine attempts to explain to Hughes his disinclination to publish Hughes's poem ''The Cast'' in an anthology he was editing, on the grounds that it might open Hughes to further attack on the subject of Sylvia Plath. "Dear Ted, Thanks for the poem. It is very interesting and would cause a minor sensation" (4 April 1997). The poem was eventually published in ''Birthday Letters'' and Hughes makes a passing reference to this then unpublished collection: "I have a whole pile of pieces that are all – one way or another – little bombs for the studious and earnest to throw at me" (5 April 1997).
Themes
Hughes's earlier poetic work is rooted in nature and, in particular, the innocent savagery of animals, an interest from an early age. He wrote frequently of the mixture of beauty and violence in the natural world.[Bell (2002) p1] Animals serve as a metaphor for his view on life: animals live out a struggle for the survival of the fittest in the same way that humans strive for ascendancy and success. Examples can be seen in the poems "Hawk Roosting" and "Jaguar".
The West Riding dialect of Hughes's childhood remained a staple of his poetry, his lexicon lending a texture that is concrete, terse, emphatic, economical yet powerful. The manner of speech renders the hard facts of things and wards off self-indulgence.[Sagar (1978) p. 7.]
Hughes's later work is deeply reliant upon myth and the British bardic tradition, heavily inflected with a modernist
Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...
, Jungian, and ecological viewpoint. He re-worked classical and archetypal myth working with a conception of the dark sub-conscious.
Translation
In 1965, he founded with Daniel Weissbort the journal '' Modern Poetry in Translation'', which involved bringing to the attention of the West the work of Czesław Miłosz
Czesław Miłosz (, also , ; 30 June 1911 – 14 August 2004) was a Polish-American poet, prose writer, translator, and diplomat. Regarded as one of the great poets of the 20th century, he won the 1980 Nobel Prize in Literature. In its citation, ...
, who would later go on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature
)
, image = Nobel Prize.png
, caption =
, awarded_for = Outstanding contributions in literature
, presenter = Swedish Academy
, holder = Annie Ernaux (2022)
, location = Stockholm, Sweden
, year = 1901 ...
. Weissbort and Hughes were instrumental in bringing to the English-speaking world the work of many poets who were hardly known, from such countries as Poland and Hungary, then controlled by the Soviet Union. Hughes wrote an introduction to a translation of '' Vasko Popa: Collected Poems'', in the "Persea Series of Poetry in Translation", edited by Weissbort. which was reviewed with favour by premiere literary critic John Bayley of Oxford University in ''The New York Review of Books''.
Commemoration and legacy
A memorial walk was inaugurated in 2005, leading from the Devon village of Belstone
Belstone is a small village and civil parish in the West Devon District of Devon, England.
Location
Lying on the northern side of Dartmoor, the western boundary of the parish is mostly formed by the East Okement River and the eastern by the ...
to Hughes's memorial stone above the River Taw, on Dartmoor
Dartmoor is an upland area in southern Devon, England. The moorland and surrounding land has been protected by National Park status since 1951. Dartmoor National Park covers .
The granite which forms the uplands dates from the Carboniferous ...
, and in 2006 a Ted Hughes poetry trail was built at Stover Country Park
Stover Country Park is an area of woodland park north of Newton Abbot in the parish of Teigngrace, Devon, within the former grounds of Stover House. The reserve is in size, and is managed by Devon County Council.
History
The park is a smal ...
, also in Devon.
On 28 April 2011, a memorial plaque for Hughes was unveiled at North Tawton by his widow Carol Hughes. At Lumb Bridge near Pecket Well, Calderdale
Calderdale is a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, England, whose population in 2020 was 211,439. It takes its name from the River Calder, and dale, a word for valley. The name Calderdale usually refers to the borough through which the up ...
is a plaque, installed by The Elmet Trust, commemorating Hughes's poem "Six Young Men", which was inspired by an old photograph of six young men taken at that spot. The photograph, taken just before the First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fig ...
, was of six young men who were all soon to lose their lives in the war. A Ted Hughes Festival is held each year in Mytholmroyd, led by the Elmet Trust, an educational body founded to support the work and legacy of Hughes.
In 2010, it was announced that Hughes would be commemorated with a memorial in Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an historic, mainly Gothic church in the City of Westminster, London, England, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the United ...
. On 6 December 2011, a slab of Kirkstone green slate was ceremonially placed at the foot of the memorial commemorating T. S. Eliot
Thomas Stearns Eliot (26 September 18884 January 1965) was a poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary critic and editor.Bush, Ronald. "T. S. Eliot's Life and Career", in John A Garraty and Mark C. Carnes (eds), ''American National Biogr ...
. Poet Seamus Heaney
Seamus Justin Heaney (; 13 April 1939 – 30 August 2013) was an Irish poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature. and actress Juliet Stevenson
Juliet Anne Virginia Stevenson, (born 30 October 1956) is an English actor of stage and screen. She is known for her role in the film '' Truly, Madly, Deeply'' (1991), for which she was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leadi ...
gave readings at the ceremony, which was also attended by Hughes's widow Carol and daughter Frieda, and by the poets Simon Armitage
Simon Robert Armitage (born 26 May 1963) is an English poet, playwright, musician and novelist. He was appointed Poet Laureate on 10 May 2019. He is professor of poetry at the University of Leeds.
He has published over 20 collections of poetr ...
, Blake Morrison
Philip Blake Morrison FRSL (born 8 October 1950) is an English poet and author who has published in a wide range of fiction and non-fiction genres. His greatest success came with the publication of his memoirs ''And When Did You Last See Your Fat ...
, Andrew Motion
Sir Andrew Motion (born 26 October 1952) is an English poet, novelist, and biographer, who was Poet Laureate from 1999 to 2009. During the period of his laureateship, Motion founded the Poetry Archive, an online resource of poems and audio re ...
and Michael Morpurgo
Sir Michael Andrew Bridge Morpurgo ('' né'' Bridge; 5 October 1943) is an English book author, poet, playwright, and librettist who is known best for children's novels such as '' War Horse'' (1982). His work is noted for its "magical storyte ...
. Motion paid tribute to Hughes as "one of the two great poets of the last half of the last century" (the other being Philip Larkin
Philip Arthur Larkin (9 August 1922 – 2 December 1985) was an English poet, novelist, and librarian. His first book of poetry, ''The North Ship'', was published in 1945, followed by two novels, ''Jill'' (1946) and ''A Girl in Winter'' (1947 ...
). Hughes's memorial stone bears lines from "That Morning", a poem recollecting the epiphany of a huge shoal of salmon flashing by as he and his son Nicholas waded a stream in Alaska:[ "So we found the end of our journey / So we stood alive in the river of light / Among the creatures of light, creatures of light."
In October 2015, the ]BBC Two
BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream ...
major documentary ''Ted Hughes: Stronger Than Death'' examined Hughes's life and work. The programme included contributions from poets Simon Armitage
Simon Robert Armitage (born 26 May 1963) is an English poet, playwright, musician and novelist. He was appointed Poet Laureate on 10 May 2019. He is professor of poetry at the University of Leeds.
He has published over 20 collections of poetr ...
and Ruth Fainlight, broadcaster Melvyn Bragg
Melvyn Bragg, Baron Bragg, (born 6 October 1939), is an English broadcaster, author and parliamentarian. He is best known for his work with ITV as editor and presenter of '' The South Bank Show'' (1978–2010), and for the BBC Radio 4 documen ...
, biographers Elaine Feinstein and Jonathan Bate
Sir Andrew Jonathan Bate, CBE, FBA, FRSL (born 26 June 1958), is a British academic, biographer, critic, broadcaster, poet, playwright, novelist and scholar. He specialises in Shakespeare, Romanticism and Ecocriticism. He is Foundation Pro ...
, activist Robin Morgan, critic Al Alvarez, publicist Jill Barber, friend Ehor Boyanowsky, patron Elizabeth Sigmund, friend Daniel Huws, Hughes's US editor Frances McCullough, and younger cousin Vicky Watling. His daughter Frieda spoke for the first time about her father and mother.
Archive
Hughes archival material is held by institutions such as Emory University
Emory University is a private research university in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1836 as "Emory College" by the Methodist Episcopal Church and named in honor of Methodist bishop John Emory, Emory is the second-oldest private institution of h ...
and Exeter University. In 2008, the British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the Briti ...
acquired a large collection comprising over 220 files containing manuscripts, letters, journals, personal diaries, and correspondence. The library archive is accessible through the British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the Briti ...
website.
There is also a Collection Guide available grouping together all of the Hughes material at the British Library with links to material held by other institutions. Inspired by Hughes's ''Crow'' the German painter Johannes Heisig created a large painting series in black and white which was presented to the public for the first time on the occasion of Berlin Museum Long Night in August 2011 at the SEZ Berlin
Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...
.
Ted Hughes Award
In 2009, the Ted Hughes Award for new work in poetry was established with the permission of Carol Hughes. The Poetry Society notes "the award is named in honour of Ted Hughes, Poet Laureate, and one of the greatest twentieth century poets for both children and adults”. Members of the Poetry Society
The Poetry Society is a membership organisation, open to all, whose stated aim is "to promote the study, use and enjoyment of poetry". The society was founded in London in February 1909 as the Poetry Recital Society, becoming the Poetry Society ...
and Poetry Book Society recommend a living UK poet who has completed the newest and most innovative work that year, "highlighting outstanding contributions made by poets to our cultural life". The £5,000 prize was previously funded from the annual honorarium that former Poet Laureate
A poet laureate (plural: poets laureate) is a poet officially appointed by a government or conferring institution, typically expected to compose poems for special events and occasions. Albertino Mussato of Padua and Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch ...
Carol Ann Duffy
Dame Carol Ann Duffy (born 23 December 1955) is a Scottish poet and playwright. She is a professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University, and was appointed Poet Laureate in May 2009, resigning in 2019. She was the first ...
received as Laureate from The Queen.
Ted Hughes Society
The Ted Hughes Society, founded in 2010, publishes a peer-reviewed on-line journal, which can be downloaded by members. Its website also publishes news, and has articles on all Hughes's major works for free access. The Society staged Hughes conferences in 2010 and 2012 at Pembroke College, Cambridge, and will continue to stage conferences elsewhere.
Ted Hughes Paper Trail
On 16 November 2013, Hughes's former hometown of Mexborough
Mexborough is a town in the City of Doncaster in South Yorkshire, England. Situated between Manvers and Denaby Main, it lies on the River Don close to where it joins the River Dearne, and the A6023 road runs through the town. It is contigu ...
held a special performance trail, as part of its "Right Up Our Street" project, celebrating the writer's connection with the town. The free event included a two-hour ramble through Mexborough following the route of young Hughes's paper round. Participants visited some of the important locations which influenced the poet, with the trail beginning at Hughes's former home, which is now a furniture shop.
Elmet Trust
The Elmet Trust, founded in 2006, celebrates the life and work of Ted Hughes. The Trust looks after Hughes's birthplace in Mytholmroyd, which is available as a holiday let and writer's retreat. The Trust also runs Hughes-related events, including an annual Ted Hughes Festival.
In other media
* Hughes's 1983 ''River'' anthology was the inspiration for the 2000 ''River'' cello concerto by British composer Sally Beamish.
* Selected stories from Hughes' ''How the Whale Became'' and ''The Dreamfighter'' were adapted into a family opera by composer Julian Philips and writer Edward Kemp, entitled ''How the Whale Became''. Commissioned by the Royal Opera House
The Royal Opera House (ROH) is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply Covent Garden, after a previous use of the site. It is the home of The Royal ...
, the opera was premiered in December 2013.
* Hughes was portrayed by Daniel Craig in the 2003 film '' Sylvia''.
Selected works
Poetry collections
* 1957 ''The Hawk in the Rain
''The Hawk in the Rain'' is a collection of 40 poems by the British poet Ted Hughes. Published by Faber and Faber in 1957, it was Hughes's first book of poetry. The book received immediate acclaim in both England and America, where it won the ...
''
* 1960 ''Lupercal''
* 1967 ''Wodwo''
* 1970 '' Crow: From the Life and the Songs of the Crow''
* 1972 ''Selected Poems 1957–1967''
* 1975 ''Cave Birds''
* 1977 ''Gaudete''
* 1979 ''Remains of Elmet
''Remains of Elmet'' is a collection of poems by Ted Hughes published in 1979. In this book Hughes has poetically covered the region of Elmet. The book contains black and white photographs by Fay Godwin, taken in the barren hill country of Wes ...
'' (with photographs by Fay Godwin)
* 1979 '' Moortown''
* 1983 ''River''
* 1986 ''Flowers and Insects''
* 1989 ''Wolfwatching
''Wolfwatching'' is a book of poems by former English Poet Laureate Ted Hughes, his fourteenth. It was first published in London by Faber and Faber in 1989.
Its dedication reads "For Hilda", and it contains twenty-one poems:
* "A Sparrow Haw ...
''
* 1992 ''Rain-charm for the Duchy
''Rain-charm for the Duchy'' is a book of poems by Ted Hughes. The book contains poems written by Hughes during his tenure as Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom, from 1984. The poems in the book celebrate royal occasions. The book was first p ...
''
* 1994 ''New Selected Poems 1957–1994''
* 1997 '' Tales from Ovid''
* 1998 '' Birthday Letters'' — winner of the 1998 Forward Poetry Prize for best collection, the 1998 T. S. Eliot Prize, and the 1999 British Book of the Year award.
* 2003 ''Collected Poems''
* 2016 ''A Ted Hughes Bestiary: Poems''
Volumes of translation
* '' Spring Awakening'' by Frank Wedekind
* '' Blood Wedding'' by Federico García Lorca
Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca (5 June 1898 – 19 August 1936), known as Federico García Lorca ( ), was a Spanish poet, playwright, and theatre director. García Lorca achieved international recognition as an emblemat ...
* 1968 ''Yehuda Amichai, Selected Poems'' by Yehuda Amichai, Cape Goliard Press (London, England), revised edition published as Poems, Harper (New York, NY), 1969.
* 1977 ''Amen'' by Yehuda Amichai, Amen, Harper (New York, NY)
* 1989 ''The Desert of Love: Selected Poems'' by János Pilinszky, Anvil Press Poetry (Greenwich, UK)
* 1997 ''Tales from Ovid'' by Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the ...
Farrar, Straus, and Giroux (New York, NY)
* 1999 ''The Oresteia'' by Aeschylus
Aeschylus (, ; grc-gre, Αἰσχύλος ; c. 525/524 – c. 456/455 BC) was an ancient Greek tragedian, and is often described as the father of tragedy. Academic knowledge of the genre begins with his work, and understanding of earlier Gree ...
, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux (New York, NY)
* 1999 ''Phèdre
''Phèdre'' (; originally ''Phèdre et Hippolyte'') is a French dramatic tragedy in five acts written in alexandrine verse by Jean Racine, first performed in 1677 at the theatre of the Hôtel de Bourgogne in Paris.
Composition and premiere
Wi ...
'' by Jean Racine
Jean-Baptiste Racine ( , ) (; 22 December 163921 April 1699) was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, along with Molière and Corneille as well as an important literary figure in the Western tradit ...
, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux (New York, NY)
* 1999 ''Alcestis'' by Euripides
Euripides (; grc, Εὐριπίδης, Eurīpídēs, ; ) was a tragedian of classical Athens. Along with Aeschylus and Sophocles, he is one of the three ancient Greek tragedians for whom any plays have survived in full. Some ancient scholars ...
, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux (New York, NY)
Anthologies edited by Hughes
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* 1965: '' Modern Poetry in Translation'' (literary magazine)
*
Short story collection
* 1995 ''The Dreamfighter, and Other Creation Tales'', Faber and Faber
Faber and Faber Limited, usually abbreviated to Faber, is an independent publishing house in London. Published authors and poets include T. S. Eliot (an early Faber editor and director), W. H. Auden, Margaret Storey, William Golding, Samuel ...
, London, England.
* 1995 ''Difficulties of a Bridegroom: Collected Short Stories'', Picador, New York, NY.
Prose
* 1967 ''Poetry Is'', Doubleday, New York.
* 1967 ''Poetry in the Making: An Anthology of Poems and Programmes from "Listening and Writing"'', Faber and Faber, London.
* 1992, revised and corrected 1993 ''Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being'', Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitzer ...
, New York.
* 1993 ''A Dancer to God Tributes to T. S. Eliot''. (Ed) Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, New York.
* 1994 ''Winter Pollen: Occasional Prose'', (essay collection) Edited by William Scammell, Faber and Faber (London), Picador USA (New York) 1995.
Books for children
* 1961 ''Meet my Folks!'' (illustrated by George Adamson
George Alexander Graham Adamson MBE (3 February 1906 – 20 August 1989), also known as the ''Baba ya Simba'' ("Father of Lions" in Swahili), was a Kenyan wildlife conservationist and author. He and his wife, Joy, were depicted in the film '' ...
)
* 1963 ''How the Whale Became'' (illustrated by George Adamson
George Alexander Graham Adamson MBE (3 February 1906 – 20 August 1989), also known as the ''Baba ya Simba'' ("Father of Lions" in Swahili), was a Kenyan wildlife conservationist and author. He and his wife, Joy, were depicted in the film '' ...
)
* 1963 ''The Earth-Owl and Other Moon-People'' (illustrated by R.A. Brandt)
* 1964 ''Nessie the Mannerless Monster'' (illustrated by Gerald Rose)
* 1967 ''Poetry in the Making''
* 1968 '' The Iron Man'' (first illustrated by George Adamson
George Alexander Graham Adamson MBE (3 February 1906 – 20 August 1989), also known as the ''Baba ya Simba'' ("Father of Lions" in Swahili), was a Kenyan wildlife conservationist and author. He and his wife, Joy, were depicted in the film '' ...
, in 1985 by Andrew Davidson and in 2019 by Chris Mould)
* 1970 ''Coming of the Kings and Other Plays''
* 1976 ''Season Songs
South Korean boy group Ateez have released four studio albums, eleven extended plays and twenty-four Single (music), singles. They debuted in October 2018 with ''Treasure EP.1: All to Zero'', marking the opening of the five-part Korean-language ' ...
'' (illustrated by Leonard Baskin)
* 1976 '' Moon-Whales and Other Moon Poems'' (illustrated by Leonard Baskin)
* 1978 '' Moon-Bells and Other Poems'' (illustrated by Felicity Roma Bowers)
* 1981 '' Under the North Star'' (illustrated by Leonard Baskin)
* 1984 ''What Is the Truth?'' (illustrated by R. J. Lloyd), for which Hughes won the Guardian Prize["Guardian children's fiction prize relaunched: Entry details and list of past winners"](_blank)
''The Guardian'' 12 March 2001. Retrieved 1 August 2012.
* 1986 '' Ffangs the Vampire Bat and the Kiss of Truth'' (illustrated by Chris Riddell)
* 1987 '' The Cat and the Cuckoo'' (illustrated by R. J. Lloyd)
* 1988 '' Tales of the Early World'' (illustrated by Andrew Davidson)
* 1993 ''The Iron Woman
''The Iron Woman'' is a science fiction novel by British writer Ted Hughes
Edward James "Ted" Hughes (17 August 1930 – 28 October 1998) was an English poet, translator, and children's writer. Critics frequently rank him as one ...
'' (illustrated by Andrew Davidson)
* 1993 '' The Mermaid's Purse'' (illustrated by R. J. Lloyd, Sunstone Press)
* 1995 ''Collected Animal Poems
Collected may refer to:
* Collected (Black 'n Blue album), ''Collected'' (Black 'n Blue album), 2005
* Collected (Demis Roussos album), ''Collected'' (Demis Roussos album), 2015
* Collected (Joe Jackson album), ''Collected'' (Joe Jackson album), 2 ...
'': Vols. 1–4, Faber & Faber
Plays
* ''The House of Aries'' (radio play), broadcast, 1960.
* ''The Calm'' produced in Boston, MA
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- most ...
, 1961.
* ''A Houseful of Women'' (radio play), broadcast, 1961.
* ''The Wound'' (radio play), broadcast, 1962.
* ''Difficulties of a Bridegroom'' (radio play), broadcast, 1963.
* ''Epithalamium'' produced in London, 1963.
* ''Dogs'' (radio play), broadcast, 1964.
* ''The House of Donkeys'' (radio play), broadcast, 1965.
* ''The Head of Gold'' (radio play), broadcast, 1967.
* ''The Coming of the Kings and Other Plays'' (based on juvenile work).
* ''The Price of a Bride (juvenile, radio play), broadcast, 1966.
* Adapted Seneca's ''Oedipus
Oedipus (, ; grc-gre, Οἰδίπους "swollen foot") was a mythical Greek king of Thebes. A tragic hero in Greek mythology, Oedipus accidentally fulfilled a prophecy that he would end up killing his father and marrying his mother, thereby ...
'', produced in London, 1968).
* '' Orghast'' (with Peter Brook
Peter Stephen Paul Brook (21 March 1925 – 2 July 2022) was an English theatre and film director. He worked first in England, from 1945 at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre, from 1947 at the Royal Opera House, and from 1962 for the Royal Shak ...
), produced in Persepolis
, native_name_lang =
, alternate_name =
, image = Gate of All Nations, Persepolis.jpg
, image_size =
, alt =
, caption = Ruins of the Gate of All Nations, Persepolis.
, map =
, map_type ...
, Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkm ...
, 1971.
* ''Eat Crow'', Rainbow Press, London, England, 1971.
* ''The Iron Man'', juvenile, televised, 1972.
* ''Orpheus'', 1973.
Limited editions
* ''The Burning of the Brothel'' (Turret Books, 1966)
* ''Recklings'' (Turret Books, 1967)
* ''Scapegoats and Rabies'' (Poet & Printer, 1967)
* ''Animal Poems'' (Richard Gilbertson, 1967)
* ''A Crow Hymn'' (Sceptre Press, 1970)
* ''The Martyrdom of Bishop Farrar'' (Richard Gilbertson, 1970)
* ''Crow Wakes'' (Poet & Printer, 1971)
* ''Shakespeare's Poem'' (Lexham Press, 1971)
* ''Eat Crow'' (Rainbow Press, 1971)
* ''Prometheus on His Crag'' (Rainbow Press, 1973)
* ''Crow: From the Life and the Songs of the Crow'' (Illustrated by Leonard Baskin, published by Faber & Faber, 1973)
* ''Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter'' (Rainbow Press,1974)
* ''Cave Birds'' (illustrated by Leonard Baskin, published by Scolar Press, 1975)
* ''Earth-Moon'' (illustrated by Ted Hughes, published by Rainbow Press, 1976)
* ''Eclipse'' (Sceptre Press, 1976)
* ''Sunstruck'' (Sceptre Press, 1977)
* ''A Solstice'' (Sceptre Press, 1978)
* ''Orts'' (Rainbow Press, 1978)
* ''Moortown Elegies ''(Rainbow Press, 1978)
* ''The Threshold'' (illustrated by Ralph Steadman, published by Steam Press, 1979)
* ''Adam and the Sacred Nine'' (Rainbow Press, 1979)
* ''Four Tales Told by an Idiot'' (Sceptre Press, 1979)
* ''The Cat and the Cuckoo'' (illustrated by R.J. Lloyd, published by Sunstone Press, 1987)
* ''A Primer of Birds: Poems'' (illustrated by Leonard Baskin, published by Gehenna Press, 1989)
* ''Capriccio'' (illustrated by Leonard Baskin, published by Gehenna Press, 1990)
* ''The Mermaid's Purse'' (illustrated by R.J. Lloyd, published by Sunstone Press, 1993)
* ''Howls and Whispers'' (illustrated by Leonard Baskin, published by Gehenna Press, 1998)
Many of Ted Hughes's poems have been published as limited-edition broadsides.[Keith Sagar & Stephen Tabor, ''Ted Hughes: A bibliography 1946–1980'' Mansell Publishing, 1983]
References
Citations
Sources
* Bate, Jonathan. ''Ted Hughes: the unauthorised life'' (2015. William Collins)
* Bell, Charlie. ''Ted Hughes'' (2002. Hodder and Stoughton)
* Carter, Sebastian. 'The Rainbow Press', in ''Parenthesis'', 12 (November 2006), pp. 32–35
* Dirda, Michael. ''Bound to Please'' (pp. 17–21). (2005. W. W. Norton)
* Feinstein, Elaine. ''Ted Hughes: the life of a poet''. (2001. W. W. Norton)
* Gammage, Nick (ed.) ''The Epic Poise: a celebration of Ted Hughes'' (1999. Faber and Faber)
* Hadley, Edward. ''The Elegies of Ted Hughes'' (2010. Palgrave Macmillan)
* Rees, Roger (ed.) ''Ted Hughes and the Classics'' (2009. Oxford University Press)
* Roberts, Neil. ''Ted Hughes: a literary life'' (2006. Palgrave Macmillan)
* Sagar, Keith. ''The Art of Ted Hughes'' (1978. Cambridge University Press)
* Sagar, Keith. ''The Laughter of Foxes: A Study of Ted Hughes'' (2000. Liverpool U.P.)
* Sagar, Keith. ''Ted Hughes and Nature: Terror and Exultation'' (2009. Fastprint)
* Sagar, Keith (ed.) ''The Achievement of Ted Hughes'' (1983. Manchester U.P.)
* Sagar, Keith (ed.) ''The Challenge of Ted Hughes'' (1994. Macmillan)
* Sagar, Keith and Stephen Tabor. ''Ted Hughes: A Bibliography 1946–1995'' (1998. Mansell)
* Skea, Ann. ''Ted Hughes: The Poetic Quest'' (1994. University of New England Press)
* Tennant, Emma. ''Burnt Diaries'' (1999. Canongate Books Ltd)
External links
Ted Hughes Society website
*
Retrieved: 22 February 2010
Ted Hughes archive at Emory University
Retrieved: 9 March 2012
Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath collection
at University of Victoria, Special Collections
Ted Hughes
at the British Library
Ted Hughes
at University of Exeter Special Collections
Finding aid to Ted Hughes papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hughes, Ted
1930 births
1998 deaths
20th-century English novelists
20th-century English poets
Alumni of Pembroke College, Cambridge
Deaths from cancer in England
Deaths from colorectal cancer
British writers
English children's writers
Guardian Children's Fiction Prize winners
Struga Poetry Evenings Golden Wreath laureates
Members of the Order of Merit
People from Mytholmroyd
People from Mexborough
Sylvia Plath
University of Massachusetts Amherst faculty
Greek–English translators
20th-century translators
Hungarian–English translators
Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature
Writers from Yorkshire
British Poets Laureate
T. S. Eliot Prize winners
Members of the Széchenyi Academy of Literature and Arts