The Ted Hughes Homepage

The Iron Man

The Iron Man, made for Peter Townshend's musical adaptation of the story, found resting in a barn at Moortown Farm in 1997. © Ann Skea




Old Crow
Flying your black bag of jewels
From chaos to chaos
Probe hard for those maggoty deaths
Which poison our lives.

Timeline: A chronological biography listing Ted Hughes' publications, interests and life events.

Notes and Queries: Some anwers to queries on copyright, poetry analysis, texts, and various aspects of Ted Hughes' work.

'Creatures of Light': Why and how did Ted Hughes use Magic in his poetry? An historical perspective.(Oct. 2006)

Poetry and Magic 1: Birthday Letters : An analysis of Birthday Letters and of Ted Hughes' use of Tarot and Cabbala in this sequence.

Poetry and Magic 2: Howls & Whispers : The Averse Sephiroth and the Spheres of the Qlippoth. More Cabbalistic magic.

Poetry and Magic 3: Capriccio : Capriccio and The Path of the Sword. Confronting and controlling the demons. Revised and updated: 17 October 2007.

Ted Hughes: The Critical Forum, Norwich Tapes. 1978. A transcript of Ted Hughes' discussion of poetry, magic, fishing and farming.

Ted Hughes at the Adelaide Festival, March 1976. A transcript of Ted Hughes' comments on fifteen of his early poems. This includes an outline of the Crow story.

Ted Hughes and Crow: A detailed discussion of Crow and of the role of Crow himself as a Trickster figure

Ted Hughes: Language and Culture (1982); and Ted Hughes: The Wound (1976). Transcripts of two ABC interviews with Ted Hughes.

'Ted Hughes and the British Bardic Tradition': Some reflections on a Poet Laureate's training, its Celtic origins and the traditional role of the bard.

'Wolf-Masks: From Hawk to Wolfwatching': Ted Hughes' use of the wolf as a symbol and a mask in his poetry.

'Regeneration in Remains of Elmet': A discussion of Ted Hughes' re-creation of his Yorkshire homeland, with close reference to many of the Elmet poems.

Ted Hughes: The Poetic Quest: An exploration of Ted Hughes use of myth, mysticism and alchemy in Cave Birds, Remains of Elmet and River, with detailed examination of many of the poems.

Difficulties of a Bridegroom.(Faber, 1995). A review of Ted Hughes' book of this title.

'Understanding Ted Hughes'. A brief introduction to the poetry of Ted Hughes, with reference to poems by both Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath.

Ted Hughes' Memorial Service. A personal record of the service held in Westminster Abbey on 13 May, 1999.

Links and book reviews.


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Maintained by Ann Skea Ph.D (ann@skea.com)