Ted Hughes' conception of nature in his poetry is marked by a recognition of the violence and aggression that corresponds with the general mood of his era. His poems depict the darker, brutal aspects of nature that other poets like Wordsworth did not explore. Hughes was fascinated by different forms of violence found in nature, war, and human interactions. Many of his animal poems highlight the ferocity, brutality, and violence that is an inherent part of the natural world. His poetry provides a stark contrast to the idealized views of nature found in other poets by celebrating the macabre realities of the natural world.
Ted Hughes' conception of nature in his poetry is marked by a recognition of the violence and aggression that corresponds with the general mood of his era. His poems depict the darker, brutal aspects of nature that other poets like Wordsworth did not explore. Hughes was fascinated by different forms of violence found in nature, war, and human interactions. Many of his animal poems highlight the ferocity, brutality, and violence that is an inherent part of the natural world. His poetry provides a stark contrast to the idealized views of nature found in other poets by celebrating the macabre realities of the natural world.
Ted Hughes' conception of nature in his poetry is marked by a recognition of the violence and aggression that corresponds with the general mood of his era. His poems depict the darker, brutal aspects of nature that other poets like Wordsworth did not explore. Hughes was fascinated by different forms of violence found in nature, war, and human interactions. Many of his animal poems highlight the ferocity, brutality, and violence that is an inherent part of the natural world. His poetry provides a stark contrast to the idealized views of nature found in other poets by celebrating the macabre realities of the natural world.
is marked by recognition of violence and aggression that corresponds with the general mood of age. Discuss. 1 Ted Hughes was a poet Laureate of Great Britain. He was in a cusp of time Modern and Postmodern. He was a traditional poet as well as he moved away from traditional modes ofexpression. A newspaper headline in 1984 announced Ted Hughes a Poetic voice of blood andguts.In his writings Hughes has experimented with stylistic aspects of modern era like semanticdeviation, dramatic deviation, and condense imagery. He lived in the West Yorkshire which isthe area of untamed nature and area of laborers while Words Worths area is refined. Teddiscards the refined mannerism and refined intellectualism. Unlike other poets who have madepeople to find the ways of escapism and live an illusionary life through their poetry, he hasconfined the brutal, cruel and violent nature of his era in his poetry.His poetry is not easily understood like that of his popular predecessors who expressednature as a healer, nurse, and guardian. Hughes poetic version was of Pantheism; it is a realitythat reveals gods reality. Unlike Wordsworth, Hughes highlighted the darker aspects of nature.Wordsworths pantheism was of an ideal state; his poetry captures the beautiful aspects of naturebut Hughes celebrates the macabre realities of natural world.Violence and brutal aggression is certainly one of the dominant themes in the poetry of TedHughes. He is fascinated by violence; all kinds of violenceviolence in love as well as inhatred, violence in the arena, violence in the jungle, violence in a battle, and violence in theform of murder and sudden death. 2. The theme of violence and aggression can be located in the animal poems of Hughes. LikePike, depicts the brutality, ferocity and the violence which cannot be
separated from the naturalworld. In Pike, it has been told
that pike-fish are killers from the egg (L-3), they vital instinctof their nature is killing. A pike-fish kills and eat up one of its own tribe if it cannot get anythingelse to satisfy its hunger And indeed they spare nobody, (L-22), it really makes no distinctionin appetite. No poet like Hughes has incarcerated the murderousness of Nature with such effectin his poems. M.L. Rosenthal says, Hughess view of Nature is Nazi, not Words Worthian,Then another poem Bayonet Charge depicts nastiness and violence in the warfare. Thev erses like a green hedge that dazzled with rifle fire (L-3, 4) and bullets smacking the bellyout of the air (L-5) portrays that wars have a darker side to them. War is something gory. Ted has highlighted the natural fear of soldier in a war. Later in the poem a soldier has been visualized as He plunged past with his bayonet toward the green hedge, (L-19) and forgettingking, honour, human dignity, etcetera (L-20). Hughes unlike other poets demonstrates the unusual and ignored feelings of self preservation of a soldier. Self preservation has been shownas natural instinct to soldier like other humans. Wars have always been penned in the sense of glorification but Ted has portrayed the other side of picture. In the end of poem soldiers fear reached at such a climax which leads him to run. In this poem the death has been depicted as heroic as well as tragic; it arises pity, grief in the cover of violence, cruelty and aggression.One more aspect of violence in Teds poems is violence as an expression of identity. He has illustrated violence as a pure expression of spirit, violence as an assertion of identity. In this connection, the closing lines of the poem Pike are significant. The pond where the narrator in this poem fished was as deep as England (L-34). This pond assumed pikes too immense to stir(L-35), and its immense size, arouse the fear in fishers mind. A darkness released by the 3. darkness of the night seemed to him to be rising slowly towards him. In these lines, the darkness is expressed through the rapacious pike. The narrators dream here is a dream of violence. This is not without a basis because the England people have always been more
aggressive and war-lik.Hughess use of birds and fish to deal
with issues are as complex as the history and use of power, authority, and violence. In The Eagle the brutal nature of a hungry eagle has been portrayed which underlines the reality of Great Britains war-like nature. England like Eagle attacked at its prey with cruelty and meanness. In the poem as His spread fingers measure a heave (L-7) gave expression of aggressiveness of eagle apparently but hideously it is the portrayal of Britains behaviour in World wars. Hughes depiction of macabre and horrid realities in his poems is the result of Post-War depression and frustration. Teds subjective view of nature shows the aspect of alienation in the Post-War World. His use of wild animals shows his own depressed and disturbed nature as he was blamed by the people for his wifes death. He uses voracious animals as his subjects. These poems are to remind humans that nature is not always our friend no matter how much we try to help it by cutting pollution. Through the use of animal imagery Hughes has revealed the malignant nature of humans