I had only come across Hughes in anthologies and in reference to Sylvia Plath before, and so I had the idea that he was brutal, in two senses-- he wrote (nasty) poems about animals, and he was domestically a bad human being. This book was an astonishing little find. I don't know anything mitigating on the domesticity front-- in fact some of these poems probably explain something to do with the badness of that situation-- but as poems, these are remarkable (and with these as a representative samp...

The gentle reader in his silent roomLoss the words in mid-sentence--The world has burned away beneath his bookA tossing upside-down team drags him on fireAmong the monsters of the zodiac. I haven’t read much poetry since my college days, but recently I’ve been keeping a copy of Leaves of Grass close to hand to peruse whenever words stop flowing from my fingers. Whitman’s word choices have a way of opening the closed avenues in my mind and jump starting the thinking process. So I read poetry f

Ted Hughes’ poetry is carnal and earthy, placing a raw beauty on nature.The assonance and consonance of 'The Hawk in the Rain' poem is quite something.I drown in the drumming ploughland, I drag upHeel after heel from the swallowing of the earth’s mouth,From clay that clutches my each step to the ankleWith the habit of the dogged grave, but the hawkEffortlessly at height hangs his still eye.His wings hold all creation in a weightless quiet,Steady as a hallucination in the streaming air.While bang...

Recommended without hesitation. There is power and the pain of living mixed with hope and courage and rage.I read this twice. First time I absorbed the language. On the repeat I could understand the messages and completely absorbed myself in his world.It makes you think and feel, like all good poetry (or any writing) should.I can use the work as an inspiration to myself.

Uneven collection with a lot of filler, though that's forgivable when you get instant classics like 'The Thought-Fox', 'The Jaguar', and 'Wind'. I've always wished 'The Martyrdom of Bishop Farrar' was better known: 'The sullen-jowled watching Welsh townspeopleHear him crack in the fire's mouth; they see whatBlack oozing twist of stuff bubbles the smellThat tars and wretches their lungs: no pulpitOf his ever held their eyes so still,Never, as now his agony, his wit.'

While not quite up to the standard of some of his later work, Ted Hughes’ first collection of poetry is still a great read, full of powerful imagery and complex emotion.WindThe house has been far out at sea all night,The woods crashing through the darkness, the booming hills,Winds stampeding the fields under the windowFloundering black astride and blinding wetTill day rose; then under an orange skyThe hills had new places, and wind wieldedBlade-lights luminous black and emerald,Flexing like the

They all have to start somewhere, and for Ted Hughes this was the breakout work that made him a famous figure. It is a collection of poems composed on a wide range of subjects, mixing nature poems and those that deal with raw emotion and love, all closely associated with Hughes's early life. Somewhat obscure at times, only a few didn't worked for me, but most of the time he wrote these poems with gusto. Powerful and resounding. My Highlights, "The Thought-Fox""The Decay of Vanity""Soliloquy of a...

Raw, gruesome and animalistic. Best accompanied with the sounds of a cawing crow outside your window, or if you get lucky, a gliding red kite or common buzzard.

I'm giving it 3 rather than 2 stars because I probably didn't pay as close attention to the book as I usually like to with poetry. Nevertheless, this certainly reads like a debut collection; though Hughes' central fascinations - cosmic, inexplicable violence; the lives of animals; women-as-Muse-figures; &co&co - are present here, he hasn't quite figured how to handle them in any coherent way yet.There are a handful of poems here that register among his best (and most famous): "The Thought-Fox,"

As a debut collection, and the first poems I've read written by Ted Hughes, my enjoyment of the poems was erratic. Some poems were brilliant as they stood ("Song"; "Incompatibilities"; "Law in the Country of Cats" and "The Martyrdom of Bishop Farrar"); others appeared to have less emotion and more intellect, which made them somewhat obscure to me. I felt a flavour of TS Eliot in these poems when first dipping into the volume, and wasn't surprised by the interesting tidbit in the front of the boo...

I returned to this today because I'm currently trying to familiarize myself with the uses and abuses of alliterative meter, and since I haven't managed to get my hands on The Age of Anxiety yet, here we are. The unevenness here is quite striking for it is not enevenness just between poems or between different lines of a certain poem, but enevenness between form and content. Hughes's language is beautiful for the most part; the rhythms are there, and so is the alliterative musicality. They're gre...

It was alright. My partner and I took turns reading a poem aloud to each other and they didn't massively resonate with us.

Hughes is, I think, my favorite poet. This was his first collection, and it's just stunning. The eponymous first poem alone is amazing, absolutely mesmerising in the lyrical beauty, power and violence of its imagery. I remember the first time I read it, it was like a revelation. I know that sounds pretentious, but it really is an amazing poem, and this is a brilliant collection.

The title piece is exactly what I have been looking for in British poets. Ankle-deep in the muck and mire of the land and tradition the poet looks above and admires the freedom of flight in a hawk. Thoreau spoke of the same. "His wings hold all creation in a weightless quiet, steady as a hallucination in the streaming air." The poet is trapped by horizons and maybe the hawk is too - but not at this moment they are.Another surprise was the war poems at the end. I was under the impression Hughes w...

I need to read some of the poems again. I got the feeling that I did not get to the core of a lot of the poems. Still some of his words provocte feelings in me. It would be interesting to see how I feel about his poetry after I got into the whole poetry stuff a little pit more. The rating might change as well.

Hughes debut poetry collection released 1957. It certainly is an ambitious first work, but inconsistent despise having some his most well known poems and some great stuff. Highlights "The Thought Fox" "The Horses" "Soliloquy" "A Modest Proposal" "Incompatibilities" "The Decay Of Vanity" "Wind" "Childbirth" "Bayonet Charge" "Six Young Men" and "The Martyrdom of Bishop Farrar".

I climbed through woods in the hour-before-dawn dark. Evil air, a frost-making stillness, Not a leaf, not a bird - A world cast in frost. I came out above the wood Where my breath left tortuous statues in the iron light. But the valleys were draining the darkness Till the moorline - blackening dregs of the brightening grey - Halved the sky ahead. And I saw the horses: Huge in the dense grey - ten together - Megalith still. They breathed, making no move, With draper manes and tilted hind-hooves,

PhaetonsAngrier, angrier, suddenly the near-madmanIn mid-vehemence rolls back his eyeAnd lurches to his feet-Under each sense the other four hurtle and thunderUnder the skull's front the horses of the sunThe gentle reader in his silent roomLoses the words in mid-sentence-The world has burned away beneath his bookA tossing upside-down team drags him on fireAmong the monsters of the zodiac.

Ted Hughes may have been an abusive turdbag who influenced the suicides of two different women, but hoo doggy, can he write some evocative poetry. I thoroughly enjoyed the first few poems in this collection. The title poem, "The Jaguar," and "Macaw and Little Miss" are true gems. I have yet to read anything with such stark imagery and varied metaphors. These poems were definitely transporting and inspiring. Unfortunately, I believe Hughes' writing becomes more arcane and ambiguous throughout the...

Read this first in a college poetry class. It's stayed with me ever since, and I keep dipping into it over the years. Some lines are stuck in my head because of their cadence and music: * "I drown in the drumming ploughland..." * "But who runs like the rest past these..."And some just because I respond to animal imagery: * "There is no better way to know us/Than as two wolves, come separately to a wood" * "And at his stirrup the two great-eyed grayhounds/... Leap like one, making delighted sound...