Title
Author(s)
Citation
Issue Date
URL
Ted Hughes and the Sequential Fallacy
Bradshaw, Graham
英文学評論 (1995), 68: 89-114
1995-11
https://dx.doi.org/10.14989/RevEL_68_89
Right
Type
Textversion
Departmental Bulletin Paper
publisher
Kyoto University
Ted Hughes
and the Sequential
Fallacy
Graham Bradshaw
There
their
is of course
compositional
rangement
of a collection
but
poems splay
Byzantium",
the
controversial
instance:
great
a sequence
order,
of great
Philip
are losses,
Larkin
as well
Thwaite's
arranges
chronological
the poems in their
poems which
publish.
Put simply,
Plath's
Ariel
riginal
volume
death.
Later,
cinating
Larkin
when Hughes
the
prepared
poems in their
and even revelatory
one poem generated
the next poem.
W. B. Yeats's
actually
reverses
sense when we see
To take
a more recent
and
arranged
as gains,
his volumes
when we read his High
edition,
sequence
where Thwaite
while
had evidently
also
including
preferred
not to
Windows as a work. Sylvia
sense, since
the
ar-
to
always
and arranged
the
from "Sailing
we lose the sense of High
were collected
poems in
directions,
collected
was never a "work" in that
poems and printed
makes
first.
Windows poems in Anthony
many uncollected
poems that
out, in different
since
their
importance.
decision
places
print
and for many poets
of great
that
poem Yeats
care there
should
order,
is a matter
with
compositional
how the dated
with
why poets
or chronological
The Tower begins
their
no reason
by Ted
the poems in the oHughes
collected
edition
compositional
order,
to see how often
a line
after
her
of Plath's
it was fasor image
in
90
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
Hughes's
different.
procedure,
Indeed,
longed
in publishing
that
critical
Wodwo are nihilistic.
between
poem, within
about
a sequence,
to this
counters,
sequence
or subsequece.
mined by that
"myth"
end of the
thinking,
sixties,
where
or significance
by their
since
new position
fable"
which
such reorderings
evidence
of shifting
creative
sequences
poems
significance
within
and
this
are shaped
or that
or deter-
Hughes had evolved
can look
is being
from
the poem itself.
his habit
the
of a
different
terms within
original
Crow or
the distinction
seems disquietingly
their
for the prolike
blur
point
through
or "symbolic
the poetic
arguments
in imaginative
Then,
sequences
the alleged
as though
can be redetermined
us to account
poetic
such
difficulty
meaning
the
often,
sometimes
or realised
contributes
like
too
whether
and achievement:
what is actualised
Hughes
even helps
about
All
intention
his own poems, has been strikingly
difference
argument
Fallacy
like
brought
by
wishful
or willful
into
with
line
the
"myth."
An example
of what is at issue
is provided
by the three
make up the sequence
"Gog" in the
British
by Faber
II and III did
not appear
Part
in 1967;
I is
a relatively
"God", first
later
later.
Parts
in the
whereas
Part
early
Observer
Part
published
was broadcast
before
ramme series
(which
on 16 April
II appeared
that,
poems"
"Ghost
from
1961,
1966
on 17 October
reading
Crabs"
the
play
Wodwo published
in the American
time
as
six days
in Wodwo, six years
as "The Knight."
issue
of Critical
1965,
in the
"The Knight"
in Wodwo) Hughes
Difficulties
edition.
published
and then in Nation
pre-"Gog" history
in the Spring
of
was originally
for the first
Poetry Now. Before
was retitled
"detachable
poem which
III has a complicated
poem was first
edition
poems which
Quarterly,
BBC Third
This
but
Prog-
and "Nightfall"
described
of a Bridegroom.
them as
Keith
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
Sagar
records
death
(presumably
on ll February
that
month,
play
from which
vaged)
on Hughes's
1963
Hughes
"Song of a Rat"
until
'Ghost
1966,
91
authority)
wrote
that
"The Howling
in March,
Crabs',
Fallacy
and "then
'Waking'
Plath's
of Wolves"
nothing
and Part
when he went to Ireland
after
III
(except
of 'Gog'
and started
later
with
a long
were sal-
'Gnat
Psalm'
had a quite
differ-
and 'Skylarks'."1
In other
ent
words,
creative
context,
bereavement.
history,
as "The
originally
called
obviously
belongs
"Fourth
of July"
Fable"
(Times
of
with
once they
more obviously
the original
like
"The
(Wodwo),
of
read
have been brought,
belongs
with
poem that
was
Perfect
1960:
we should
as in its
"Gog"
and the
9 September
how differently
period
respect,
the much earlier
poems
Supplement,
and in this
I
"Logos"
troubled
and "Song of a Rat" are among
Part
earlier
(Lupercal),
poems,
an intensely
"Gog"
than
"Gog." Similarly,
about
independent
III
Knight"
with
originally
has ever written,
Part
Literary
is a question
from
III
of Wolves"
poems Hughes
compositional
Part
issuing
"The Howling
the bleakest
them
the nightmarish
70).
what
or yoked,
more
Forms"
and
uncollected
Already,
"A
there
were originally
together
in a
sequence.
Moreover,
tory
of the
count,
III.
sault
through
Hughes
Part
control...
first
interview
I had
with
"actually
started
just
to set against
its
effects
Faas,
with
into
it with
own ac-
of the German as-
the dragon
the
control."2
his-
of how he came to write
me so much I wrote
under
Hughes's
as a description
but "turned
"alarmed
keeping
at odds
Ekbert
and this
Knight
we have on the compositional
is sharply
the Ardennes"
recalls,
Red Cross
information
"Gog" sequence
in his
Part
the limited
in Revelations,"
a poem about
idea
of keeping
This
account
the
it under
gives
the
92
Ted
misleading
impression
In another,
revealingly
independent
exist
Hughes
that
and the Sequential
Part
I and Part
different
poem, almost
"alarmed"
write
another
That
casually
as a creature
revealing
by the
about
what
Hughes
Part
III
might
are being
part
kept
Readers
rather
of bringing
sequence
tells
it, his
or thinks
extent
response
it, but to
"under control".
is
he can do, in his sequen-
the
when it takes
called
to
poems under "control"
who are less "alarmed"
ask to what
I as an
its own right
poems along the trajectory
"under control"
of a three-part
with
it" and keep the first
is doing,
different
fable."
or child
of Part
"Gog" poem was not to revise
conception
ces, when he positions
or "symbolic
first
from the first.
does think
for as Hughes
poem to "set against
revealed
III were linked
sense Hughes
once it had come into being
to being
Fallacy
of his "myth"
by Part
"effects"
I than
by
of "The Knight"
its new position
as the final
"Gog."
2
David
textual
that
Holbrook
issues,
Part
sponse
Phallus"
turning
III
shows no interest
and probably
presents
the
to a schizoid
nothing
life,
could
"dynamics
world"
just
in Crow shows Hughes
against
in these
shake
of hate
"giving
personal
nature
English
Poetry significantly
of Holbrook's
qualified
that
himself
by this
critical
or modify
go with
as he declares
in an orgy of nihilistic
startlingly
complex
that
and con-
his conviction
a schizoid
re-
the "Song
of a
up to ultimate
destructiveness."3
"diagnosis"
half-hearted
nullity,
a
Nor is the
in Lost Bearings
in
disclaimer:
It should be clear that in making a schizoid diagnosis I am not saying that
an artist is sick or mad: I am saying that he is expressing a characteristically modern problem of self and meaning, to do with weakness of identity,
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
and sometimes
false
(hate)
ing from the schizoid
Really,
this
analyses
offers
(and
alarmingly
that
amateur
images
fascistic,"
lessness,"
the
in the
gainst
(not
So, in Holbrook's
explicable
presents
Hughes's
in the
dead
resentation"),
which
ligible
is indeed
dissociated
kind
of hating.
loss
of
Holbrook
meaning:
of the
concludes
against
declares
[!]
and his ruththe human need
he is turning
since
weeping"
schizoid
cosmos"
of Jeremy
in Part
diagnosis,"
"Ted Hughes
a-
I is also
while
Part
will not allow
(113).
Bentham
("All
II
us to re-
After
identifying
poetry
is misrep-
in disgust:
the universe
of modern
world
as a kind
in Part
III
is a characteristic
the
in an
science,
of the Newtonian
ideal,
scientific
procedure
into "a mystic chant over an unintelBut Hughes makes poetry this kind of futile
chant^too:
concludes,
This
Holbrook
of Dasein-analysis
the "motherly
light
from the real
And so, Holbrook
Holbrook's
(122).
observes
has turned
universe."
aris-
from "poem" to "poet"
is "turning
In the light
that
Holbrook
Hughes's
poem)
universe
with
since
his horseman-hero
Cartesian-Newtonian
attitude
of morality
of "Gog" are "characteristically
with
reading
a malignant
deem the
the
a difference,
way. For example,
section
and love...
human meaning"
"only
naive
third
on an inversion
slide
by "identifying
"poet"
for dependence
without
psychoanalyses)
and
and that
based
93
(115)
a distinction
confident
the
solutions
problem.
Fallacy
dynamics
his astonishing
of encapsulated
rage. (115)
"we give way to the joys
of this
false
to the
of hate..."
attack
mental
solution
Nearly
by objecting
in our time,
forty
pages
later
to the publication
94
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
of such
"unjustifiable
of taste
at a high
at any level
of
obscenities";
level
leave
for this
us unable
against
debasement"
It isn't
difficult
to show that
bringing
these
presents
"a schizoid
offering
what
three
might
world" but of what
The terms
to defend
Holbrook
be described
or 'the people'
has misunderstood
world."
Graves's
White
that
III
For Hughes himself
is
not of a "schizoid
in Western
correspond
the point
Part
as a "diagnosis,"
exactly
new God claimed
ourselves
"Such lapses
when he argues
he sees as schizoid
near the end of Robert
censor,
(158).
to a schizoid
of his diagnosis
The
would-be
poems together,
response
Fallacy
culture
with
or civilization.
those
in a passage
Goddess:.
to be dominant
as Alpha
and Omega, the Beginning
and the End, pure Holiness,
pure Good, pure Logic, able to exist without
the
aid of woman; but it was natural
to identify
him with one of the original
rivals
ly
of the
against
Theme and to ally
him. The outcome
the
woman and the other
was philosophical
dualism
rivals
with
permanentall
the
tragi-
comic woes attendant
on spiritual
dichotomy.
If the True God, the God of
the Logos, was pure thought,
pure good, whence came evil and error?4
For Hughes
as for Graves,
attempt
isolate
to
identifying
Drive
abstract
"Good" with
Creation,
or Nature.
in a Circle",
a good
"Reveille"
spreading
fellow,
one catastrophic
This
conceptual
God as the
idea
principles
"Logos"
underlies
but
His
mother's
Nature
of Good and Evil
man from
"Logos" ends, "God is
Him";
becoming
by
Wodwo poems. In "You
is God";
against
of the idealistic
was to separate
various
"What is not the World
we see dispossessed
Creation:
consequence
and at the
the
serpent
end
of
and over-
Ted Hughes
out beyond
The black,
Glittered
Fallacy
95
presumptuous
cry of God as the
Eden
thickening
in giant
and the Sequential
loops
of his body
loops
Around desert mountains and away
Over the ashes of the future.
The
"Gog" sequence
Logos:
"I am Alpha
a different
effect
I presents
peacefully
with
the
and Omega." Each of the three
catastrophic
So, Part
bered
starts
of that
the first
That
presumptuous
abstracting
for
and
nonetheless
fill
drawal
the
rest
This
Creation
and releases
since
had slum-
to malevolence:
the problem
of Evil
is, as Hume perceived,
(with
of this
neither
its
peculiarly
in a God who is, somehow, both
the
abundant
pain
and horror
must be seen, somehow, as an absence
and an absence
of Creation:
which
and Omega.'
who believes
omnipotent,
consequence
and roused
problem
of God from material
... I ran,
Another
cry creates
the Christian
benevolent
on
own country...
capital).
pressing
when a Nature
for ages is demonised
Deep in their
concentrates
cry or claim.
effect,
I woke to a shout: 'I am Alpha
Rocks and a few trees trembled
parts
which
or with-
Nature:
bounded
perversion
beast
beside
me.
of reality
nor angel,
is man's isolation
he becomes
from
the hybrid,
96
straining
this
(like
poetic
serpent
St.
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
Fallacy
Paul)
the body
reworking
to be released
of Graves
but as the fabulous
the
giant
from
demonised
Nature
Gog, who cannot
of this
death.
In
is seen not as the
understand
what hor-
rors he commits:
What was my error?
I listen
My skull
to the song jarring
Where the skull-rooted
I am massive on earth.
Over the sounds
In Part
World
my mouth
of motherly
the
it out...
teeth are in possession.
My feetbones
beat on the earth
weeping...
II, the catastrophic
is God" is that
has sealed
world
effect
of believing
that
"What
which
is not God becomes
is not the
mere spiritless
matter:
The grass-head
waves day and night and will never know it exists.
The stones are as they were. And the creatures of earth
Are mere rainfall
The
Creation
consequent
which
an unanswered
Eliot's
situation
no longer
question,
"The Hollow
Then whose
Are these
Eyes,
rivulets,
Men":
in flood
of
man
or empty paths...
now unaccommodated
answers to his spiritual
which
is perhaps
needsa little
too
within
a
is conveyed
in
reminiscent
of
Ted Hughes
and the Sequential
Fallacy
97
eyesand
Dance of wants,
Of offering?
Ironically,
of
although
modern
Holbrook
this
science,
the
as the
on inner
"blood-crossed
of Nature,
ture
is the
inner
story
Christianity
of Western
Hughes
similarly
patron
saint,
is deeply
calls
Warrior,
story
of Christianity.
to
in Part
III,
iron"
gal-
apotheosized
to the fanatic
rejec-
man from Mother
Nature
of man exiled
essay,
the legend
since
with
view, the "subtly
Man."5 In his 1970
suspect
psycho-analysis
hooded
The story
that
insufficient,
turns to nightmare
has been to exile
observes
universe
preoccupations.
is proportionate
nature.
"the
is spiritually
to amateur
In Hughes's
and outer
tion,"
Hughes
the Holy
and the result
from both
ideal"
and outer nature
Knight,
of Reformed
Holbrook
to his own vitalist
"Out of the wound-gash."
misogyny
what
Newtonian
poem speaks
The assault
tion
that
was too busy subjecting
see how Hughes's
lops
suggests
from Na-
"Myth
and Educa-
of St. George,
it advocates
"the
England's
complete
suppres-
sion of the horror":
It
is the
symbolic
dynamics
presses
At least
imagination
two of Hughes's
lovely
fable
rect"
this
providing
of Christianity.
"How the
ugly
another
legend.7
It's
Christianity
the
key to the neurotic-making
in suppressing
and suppresses
vital
natural
best stories
for children,
the
devil,
in fact
The Iron Man and the
Bee Became," can be seen as attempts
In its
own unlovely
such "correction,"
by showing
sup-
life.6
way, Part
III
of
how the "spirituality"
to "cor"Gog" is
of
98
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
this
schizoid
St.
The knight's
George
weapons
are those
pass," the "gunsight,"
against
"the
Nature
of the
of iron,
on the horse
breaks
sleep"
In
created
mutilation
tionary
of this
error"
iterative
to find
there
"Out under
the
tense:
grail,"
rocking,
vaginas
that
the
"the
"com-
womb-wall,"
sinking
of iron"
"tireless
that
this
cry
"I am Alpha
cradle."
gallops
"over the
/ Whose
cry
"coil
is under
his
dragon's
and Omega" has
are inevitably
can be no end to the destruction
cultural
civilization
dynamic
is played
out.
archway,
gallops
attack
is based
selfand self-
until
the
"evolu-
Hence the use of an
when the poem ends the process
the blood-dark
The
mouth
and the consequence
"neurotic-making"
of Western
present
with
and knight,
save that
fanged
to silence
Nature,
dragon
destructive
and self-destructive.
and technology
and "the
shod
only
demonizing
both
"the
origins,"
makes no claim"
ribs."
of science
feminine:
womb that
his
murderous,
"The law and mercy of number" - andare turned
and the
root-blood
"rider
is denatured,
Fallacy
is still
going
on
bowed the horseman
of
iron."
In other
ing;
words,
to describe
grotesquely
the
he perceives
tions
of the
critic
sequence
impertinent
what
Holbrook's
Holbrook's
in both
as the
"dynamics
account
altogether
(and
Hughes)
senses,
historical,
of hate."
of the
misunderstands
as "schizoid"
since
Hughes
cultural
But
sequence
on a sustained
misread-
and "nihilist"
himself
is attacking
and psychological
here it is instructive
with
Hughes's
Keith
intentions
Sagar's,
is
foundato contrast
for if the
the other
gives
one
them
too much weight.
3
Characteristically,
in The Art of Ted Hughes Sagar
anchors
his read-
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
ing to another
and then
Hughesean
reads
whether
the
the
supposes.
plained
that
but
the
stood
devour
her child
recording,
"mouth
Sagar
therefore
"mother
by being
about
widens
beneath
its mouth
in adoration"
assumes that
II asks
in the
last
line
when we are told
had ex-
that's
"the
for to
12: 4); in the poem
"the
weeping"
Messiah
in Part
the Goddess
the
of
"woman as
Similarly,
of wants,"
be, the Goddess:
cry."
I is that
(74-75).
"eyes and / Dance
all created
text
to be delivered,
son to Gog," and that
that
his
the sun and moon, waiting
was ready
the answer must of course
Hughes
in Revelations
when he hears
"whose" are these
than
open." In the biblical
the "motherly
her
considering
and integrated
as soon as it was born" (Revelation,
who has lost
knows that
without
the dragon
the woman which
"Gog" poem,
as a poem about the psychology
mother" must be, in some sense or aspect,
when Part
terms,
The Poet Speaks,
is) began
with
99
of the first
coherent
I, that
the child
before
Gog's
the
In the 1962
in these
woman in heaven,
for her to deliver
dragon
sequence
be less
"ended
under
of the genesis
might
"Gog" (Part
of fascism
waiting
whole
sequence
reading
account
Fallacy
Sagar
"The clue comes
things
are 'her mirrors'"
(75).
Sagar
"weeping
does
mother
not "dancing"
observes,
"Part
dragon"
are
"dragon
keep
dragon
see
some difficulty
who has lost
"Only
III
is incarnation
the
cycle
without
going
destroying
us some help"
indistinguishable
and therefore
itself"
But then,
death
Sagar
since
who is "Woman, womanas mother, as fallen
mother
was
reassuringly
one another"
knight
same
how "woman and
and therefore
the
as the
that
by showing
from
Karma," while
life
"her"
her son to Gog," since
Gog was dancing."
gives
"virtually
in identifying
The
reincarnation
"cannot
the "dragon"
(75).
is the
destroy
to
the
"woman"
Eve, as Whore of Babylon,
100
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
as spurned
Venus, as revengeful
Medieval
England,"
ranean serpent
White
the "Celtic
goddess,"
Goddess,"
pre-Christian
goddess
the "Anathema
roll-call
might
she?"
of all
sensation
prompt
of natural
the "old
exasperated
who was weeping
of
Mediterand the
law and love, who
life."
woman who is the
same womanas the mother
deity
of the Old Testament,"
and organic
various
or "How could the
and is the "real
goddess,"
"Queen of Heaven who was the goddess
was the
Fallacy
This
(abbreviated)
questions,
like
"Who isn't
dragon
in Part
III be the
because
the
dragon
had
eaten her newborn son?"
Unfortunately,
system
Sagar's
as revelation.
and D)" exegesis
writes,
"the
interest
One danger
is that
exactly
White
that
But
predominantly
III
is then
negative
in his
with
his
misunderstands
horse-man
which
nihilistic
essay;
with an imaginative
a
in his
Christianity
unchanging
con-
"suppresses."
The
dynamics"
in Part
and even curative.
hymn of hate
Holbrook's
charge
hero and his ruthlessness"
represents.
and Hughes's
identification,
value
he sees the whole se-
of Hughes's
positive,
what the Knight
the poem's point
C
in The
is so secure
of "neurotic-making
that
own hate-filled
Hughes deplores
concerned
diagnosis
the poem isn't
"identifying
since
life"
why we should
of Nature,"
expression
seen as unproblematically
Certainly,
reviles
natural
by Graves
Because Sagar
as a "worshipper
"vital
described
Graves.
own sense of Hughes
that
B (and
Gog and woman on the one hand,
suggest
positive
in the
of "A is really
doesn't
refigures
cern with
kind
the battle
poem which "exactly"
quence as an integrated,
and concentrated
A as no more than B. "Thus," Sagar
between
God and man on the other,
(76).
in this
of seeing
poem is a battle
Goddess"
is apostolic
In this
intention;
not with
which
that
Holbrook
Hughes
is
is untenable,
sense Holbrook
yet Holbrook
the system,
is
where-
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
as Sagar
is
too
concerned
poem's diagnostic
drive
ergy too violent
with
might
indeed
and untender,
dragon
does not refute,
is beyond
ativity
remains
T. S. Eliot's
Tiresias
life
The
on the
his
poem
terms of theme
racing
in Crow which
der
to
"picks
in
intention,
"Crow's
hostile
terms,
the
the gluey
heart
number."
slaughters
"a horrible
scientist
St.
updating
by the
is a long
obvious
demons
poem)
until
oven of fangs":
He snatches from its mount on the wall a sword,
A ceremonial Japanese decapitator,
error."
in
misgivings.
The
is once
again
denatured
"decreates
cell"
for
parallel,
of Wordsworth's
squeaking
(it
premise
/ Is a track
out of an inaudibly
another
for
significance
George"
as yet another
as
of "Gog" are con-
similar
a silence,"
confronted
III
most
"makes
On being
one after
of
cre-
possibilities
as an "evolutionary
the
the
us too much of
an enabling
in the Universe
an answer." In this
dissect,"
to give
prompts
Account
what
in the poem. Just
the representative
provides
who "sees everything
towards
and feminine
in Part
civilization
about
Nature,
more than
on Western
human na-
that
and whatever
while
barely
and diagnostic
girl
energies
Knight,
is
in obviously
materialist
of
assaulting
George-figure
presented
hyacinth
en-
the objection
be said
the
its imaginative
a lot of quotations
and schematic
might
the imaginative
own assault
The
St.
of the
dragon-victim
Hughes's
Land
whether
our sense of "vital
way. Unloading
notional
Waste
she represents,
be too negative,
or even address,
limitingly
101
to consider
meant to represent
and too little
centrated
of
doubt
system
to engage
ture" in any more than notional
the Goddess
the
Fallacy
with
scientific
of numbers
"We murall,"
"tweezers
he has created,
he finally
and
confronts
he
102
Ted
And as hacking
The lopped
Hughes and the Sequential
a path
segments,
He stands
trousered
through
thicket
he scatters
the opposition
in blood
Fallacy
collapses.
and log-splits
The lolling
body, bifurcates
it
Top to bottom, kicks away the entrails
Steps
out of the blood-wallow.
Recovers
Drops the sword and runs dumb-faced
Where his wife
Once again,
intention:
heart
Sagar's
admiring
into
a nest
him" and mistaking
again,
(121-22).
concentrated
creativeness"
story
and
that
"the source
the
notional.
"brutal
to notice
territory.
in blood"
"Trousered
gore" in Macbeth,
and the log-splitting
of Macdonwald;
although
like
write
that.
Yet the horrifying
and looks
rips
rors,
throwing
which
adds
in
nothing
entrails
projects
imaginative
the
brings
is a weak
forward
the
a Samurai
Hughes
and blood-wallow
to our understanding
merely
it
in
the unseaming
weak, Hughes
can
wants something
unseaming
revelation
stockpiles
in a sensational
of "civilized
yet
of "breeched
of the Shakespearean
delivery;
and
in more familiar
recalls
act's
are, once
mother,"
reworking
is very
for
of vitality
in Hercules,
and evidently
to the final
onto those
energies
"source
"bifurcation"
to bottom"
"his
and creativeness"
how the poem poaches
violence
of a Caesarean
he then
of Tiamat,
"from the nave to th'chops"
not gratuitous,
untimely
"top
man," turning
of vitality
while
slaughter
on the diagnostic
is "civilized
poem's
Sagar
seems more instructive
hardly
this
on the horrors,
Marduk's
concentrates
whose shapes
Yet
remains
blood.
commentary
of monsters
"opposition"
from the house
lie in their
we are to understand
nearest
the
and children
man."
about
is
the
his hormanner
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
Fallacy
103
4
Hughes's
ing
tendency
them a place
redetermine
vided
content
three
so that,
or as chapters
of a single
and amplification.
cess to that
of Sylvia
Plath's
the
poems in
chronological
of the
vitation
to regard
with
three
venture"
Again
of the
a "single"
In
unified
Hughes's
varied
collection,
and a
But of course we do not have acwe do in reading
brings
constant
Hughes's
decision
in a single
revelations;
Hughes
while
adventure"
The
the in-
corresponds
"schema" relates
process
edi-
to print
as he uncovers Plath's.
mythologising
the "ad-
of the shaman's
initiation.
of two critics,
who both
to compare the responses
when they take
up the invitation
to regard
Wodwo as
structure.
Ted Hughes:
with
the poems are
of Wodwo is not chronological,
Hero to the tripartite
it is instructive
in the
Note" explains,
to which
as thoroughly
them as "chapters
get into difficulties
that,
tracks
the way in which
problematic
poems, where Hughes's
order
parts
is no less
most impressively
collected
covers his own creative
can retrospectively
Wodwo and Crow. Wodwois di-
in the way that
tion
giv-
(9)
in his development.
development
ordering
adventure
Hughes's
watershed
as though
in this book may be read as notes,
episodes of the events behind the poems,
commentary
Wodwo is probably
like
counters,
sequence
as the "Author's
The stories and the play
appendix
and unversified
creative
determined
of sequences
parts
like
and significance,
organisation
into
poems about
in a carefully
their
large-scale
to shift
the "single
The Unaccommodated
exception"
Universe,
of "Theology",
the
Ekbert
Faas
writes
Wodwo poems were
104
"all
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
written
record
after
the poet's
the death
descent
of Sylvia
spiritual
journey
"the broken
accents
of despair
life"
which
eventually
note of survival
poet-shaman's
British
order
in Part
since
retuning,
of
original
II if the
something
poems with
this
account
untenable.
publication.
are 21 poems in Part
There
sequences
are counted
separately.9
So, "Thistles,"
in print,
a few weeks before
its publication;
"Pibroch,"
the second
in print,
near
date.
A few poems, like
lished
nor broadcast
these
in square
likely
place
before
brackets
in the
their
II of
appearance
and guessed
rearranged
poem to appear
it was published
Part
(for
sequence.
the first
and was broadcast
Wodwo and is counted
before
I, and 23
which did not original-
to appear
the end of
in
the poems in the
poem in Wodwo, was also the first
broadcast
"double
of Wodwo as a
to rearrange
Wherever a poem was broadcast
for
to number the poems as they appear
poems in the three-part
is placed
their
Wodwo, and then
as sequences
like
by a new curiosity
and emergence is wholly
first
seem to
the volume shows how
have been retuned
and hope."8 Unfortunately,
edition
ly appear
of self-destruction";
emerges in the two final
descent,
of their
and under its impact
is in question,
To see why, it is enough
the
Plath,
into a Bardo
the shaman's
Fallacy
as poem 40.
I have given
the
"Gog,"
were neither
in Wodwo;
I have
included
is worth)
at their
what
that
The sequence
then
pub-
looks
like
this:
1961
1. THISTLES.
40.
PIBROCH.
22.
THEOLOGY.
3.
13.
Third
Critical
Programme
broadcast,
Quarterly,
Winter
London Magazine,
HER HUSBAND. Spectator,
SUGAR LOAF. Observer,
1960.
March 1961.
24 March
16 April
21 August
1961.
1961.
1960.
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
23.
GOG I. Observer,
16 April
1961:
15.
WINO.
Observer,
16 April
1961.
STILL
LIFE.
2.
44.
9.
18.
New Yorker,
THE
1961.
15 September
BAR T. V. New Statesman,
RESCUE.
105
"Gog.
15 July
WODWO. New Statesman,
PUBLIC
Fallacy
Observer,
1961.
28 September
29 October
1962.
1961.
1962
39.
MOUNTAINS.
27.
OUT I, II, III.
14.
BOWLED
29.
THE
Observer,
Third
5 August
Programme
broadcast,
OVER. New Statesman,
WARRIORS
1962.
24 August
28 September
OF THE NORTH.
Observer,
1962.
1962.
4 November
1962.
12.
VEGETARIAN.
Observer,
4 November
1962.
1963
28.
NEW
"Dark
20.
THE
43.
FULL
MOON
IN
JANUARY.
Observer,
6 January
1963:
Women".
GREEN
WOLF. Observer,
MOON AND LITTLE
6 January
FRIEDA.
1963.
Observer,
27 January
1963.
[31.
SONGOF
26.
A RAT I, II, III.]
KREUTZER
SONATA.
New Statesman,
23 August
1963.
1964
4. CADENZA.
New Yorker,
30 May 1964.
1965
41.
5.
THE
HOWLING
GHOST
1965:
"Nightfall".
CRABS.
OF WOLVES.
Third
Observer,
Programme
10 January
broadcast,
1965.
17 October
106
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
25.
GOG III.
Third
Programme
Fallacy
broadcast,
17 October
1965:
"The
Knight".
1966
19.
[24.
STATIONS.
Critical
Quarterly,
Spring
1966.
GOGIP]
7. LUDWIG'S
"Death
DEATH-MASK.
LOGOS.
21.
THE BEAR. Critical
42.
GNAT-PSALM.
Critical
SECOND
Quarterly,
1966:
Third
31 July
REVEILLE.
Summer 1966.
Quarterly,
GLANCE
broadcast,
17.
17 June
Mask".
16.
8.
New Statesman,
Summer 1966.
Programme
AT
broadcast,
A JAGUAR.
31 July
Third
1966.
Programme
1966.
Critical
Quarterly
Poetry
Supplement
Number
Seven, 1966.
39.
WINGS
Plays
III.
London
Magazine,
September
1966
("Einstein
Bach").
6. BOOM. New Statesman,
Critical
7 October
34.
SKYLARKS.
37.
WINGS
I. New York Review
38.
WINGS
II. New York Review
30.
KARMA. Critical
ll.
A WIND
FLASHES
Quarterly,
Quarterly,
1966.
Autumn 1966.
of Books,
3 November
of Books,
Winter
THE GRASS.
1966
Critical
3 November
("Public
1966.
1966.
Speech")
Quarterly,
Win-
ter1966.
[32.
HEPTONSTALL?]
[33.
BALLAD
FROM A FAIRY
TALE?]
1967
36.
YOU DRIVE
IN A CIRCLE.
New Yorker,
18 March
1967.
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
10.
FERN.
To read
might
indeed
through
1965
until
account
The claim
Sylvia
signs
before
the
"descent,"
About
half
the
death
stories
in Wodwo were in print
period,
and
destruction"
riginally
in the
"The
never pointed
The
these
and Faas,
of information
Leonard
count
of
Scigaj
in
the
in
careless
surrealist
at a high
but
not determine,
this
warning
level
of
moreover,
belong
on 1 February
1962.
of self-
poems were othat
Hughes
of Ted Hughes:
edition
jointly
signed
interviews,
critical
by
and the use
part
of the book,
imprimatur.
in this
way, and at the outset
of Ted Hughes he warns that
thought
the
in
to the Lupercal
appearance
in the main,
of the
of generalization,
paves
is
four of the five
from the "Bardo
a limited
works
the
the death
"Theology"
It seems curious
the
falls
Wodwo were already
of two absorbing
has the poet's
analogue,
etheless,
death.
by Hughes
isn't
after
or
enough
and "recovery"
and really
instead,
Wodwo in The Poetry
biography
does
Plath's
the presence
the critic
1963
in the year
poems in Wodwo, when these
Universe
supplied
all suggest
1963;
by 1960,
errors;
Unaccommodated
Hughes
poems in
to see Hughes emerging
before
out
February
energy
Wound" was broadcast
two last
published
creative
We
how few and
from
exception"
on ll February
absurd
period
Wodwo poems were "all written
false.
And it is clearly
when we notice
"retuning,"
"single
play
painful.
on 18 May 1967. But it is obvious
the
the
is extremely
in the
with
Plath's
order
of renewed
of the
that
107
1967.
descent
Plath,"
demonstrably
print
the
Wodwo was published
Faas's
apart.
of a harrowing
were the poems published
so before
that
18 March
Wodwo poems in this
speak
how bleak
of
the
New Yorker,
Fallacy
sixties
that
and contents
way for
another,
exists
influences
of his
ac-
"Personal
only
as an
and parallels,
of the poems."10 Nonsimilar
though
more
108
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
Orientalized,
developmental
three-stage
surrealistic,
ment of a healing
structure
ture"
story
of
heroic
power,
Wodwo" (91).
the
various
show the poet's
with
growing
the supposedly
in Joseph
peal
Campbell's
of Scigaj's
Wodwo encourages.
Wodwo also
wrenching,
So, for
drawal
peat
of the
Scigaj,
the poems in Part
dissolution"
psychodrama
(104),
the radio
II:
"The
also
ends
here,
allowing
within
the self to flower
logical
withdrawal"
in part
in Parts
ic moments of participation
at last
"look
upon life
leitmotif
III"
from
five
or
of with-
stories
"re-
and dissolution
adventure'
of Wodwo, the
to the
under-
body
is carried
back
to the underworld"
in Parts
I and
visit
of the conscious
of the
(107).
(87);
Finally,
"the
Western
development
the
I and II are succeeded
in nature"
of
The Wound also "presents
or the hero's
of the dissolution
the
parts
design."
II, the
The end of The Wound, when Ripley's
Wodwo leitmotif
to
in pulling,
withdrawal
'single
to camp, marks the end of the "voyage
Note"
a "psychodrama
play
of dismemberment,
the ap-
"Author's
own procedure
of surrealistic
while
respect
sense of the three
in Part
and
as described
in this
the
I present
of the shamanic/heroic
experience
what
which
"magic flight"
with the "single
(103);
advenconsistent
of the Hero-adventure
Hughes's
the
wrote in the sixties,
way of making
or doubles,
underlying
is certainly
Faces;
"A
achieve-
of the "single
the shaman's
it is just
poems into line
the second stage
(106).
with
individual
personality"
world"
Hughes
stages
Yet this
follows,
mythic
shaman's
fascination
is that
and personality
the
parts
Hero with a Thousand
reading
pattern
progression"
and reviews
as shaman" (89):
a visionary
formal
To see the three
analogous
poet
towards
central
structural
essays
"the
adventure,
is the
as a "shamanistic
with
about
Fallacy
personae
a newly won position
of the atman
"states
in Part
ego
of psycho-
III by "ecstatof part
of self-assurance
III"
can
and
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
self-control,
that
with
the
poems
plausible,
the
not
evidence
For
quence,
a calm
exercise
correspond
only
with
having
we might
already
well
pause
"poems placed
earlier
ulate
positions
of self-assurance
calm
judgment,"
do personae
disquiet
is
cient
attention.
the
If
dragon
III
Yet
developmental
chronology,
looked
rather
any argument
schema
but
seems less
when we consider
we
1-5,
over
Scigaj's
closely
"Only
of part
in
'Gog',
moods
part
III
return
explaining
that
it "is
Scigaj
all
that
and
exercising
in each
in the
the
a prayer
with
Scigaj's
poem with
to the
and
case
individual
case,
the
artic-
Moon in January',
reading
nations
claim
personae
as our test
he is not
who is to 'rule
Gog from heaven",
'New
"Gog" se-
Wodwo...usually
from
Wodwo],
to "Gog"
that
of
of agitation,
I [of
at the
remarkable
and self-control
suggests
After
12:
that
unlike
(114).
on Part
(110).
the
ordering
express
resolved,
of Revelations
cast
in the
and
'Karma'
mentary
this
109
poems.
example,
themselves"
of judgment"
when we recall
of the
Fallacy
unborn
a rod of iron'
the
poems
comsuffichild
and
comments:
In section III of "Gog" the persona advises the child to pierce the veil of
phenomenality.
Whereas Coriolanus relented from conquering Rome at his
mother Volumnia's request, the child quester should be even more nonviolent;
he should pierce with his awakened understanding
through the temporal world of maya and refrain from acting. He is exhorted rather to^follow his weapons toward the light, which in context is an alternative
to octopus maw, cradle, and womb wall of maya
perhaps the 'Dharma-Kaya
of Clear Light', the state of nirvanic illumination
in the Chikkai
Bardo. The
ending of section III, however, indicates
that the child is too blinded by his
cultural
givens to attain any liberation:
his compass is his "lance-blade,
the
gunsight",
and will only result in endlessly
recurring cycles of destruction.
(116)
110
Ted Hughes
So far as Coriolanus
that
and the Sequential
is concerned,
the relevant
"He" must be more unrelentingly
more nonviolent."
Moreover
unborn child
figures
(who
Nature
and the
womb).
clumsily
ambiguous,
Fallacy
lines
violent
of the poem suggest
than Coriolanus,
the "He" in question
as another
prospective
For although
the
not "even
is the Knight,
victim
reference
of this
not the
assault
on
of "He" is at first
"his weapons" are to be followed
"right
through"
the
"child":
The unborn child
He will
To follow
Unlike
on the womb-wall.
his weapons
Coriolanus,
And right
towards
follow
through
fury
That
child...
quester,"
is the wailing
the blades
why the "persona
in Scigaj's
heaven"
the light.
hopes
questionable
(151)
right
through
and
that
reading
be brought
to "the
order,/The
law and mercy of number." I take
rule,
order,
law, and mercy are, like
low
his
thinks
that
weapons
stitutes
"the
judgment",
the
but then
the "agitation"
poem, that
firm
towards
the contrary,
persona
and that
the
light",
"the
to a higher
quester"
will
"cast
ruled
of the
the "child
the
slab,
it that
blackly
in this
is in control
this
reference
his account
and "disquiet"
a penetration
Rome
the smile
That is the judge's
Nor is it clear
from
beats
need to be strong
dragon
the
these
octaves
of
references
to
to the "light"
ironic;
Scigaj
"single
design"
poem are "resolved"
of his subject
progression
of the
comprehension
matter,
three
of reality
Gog
in "folevidently
requires
within
exercising
sections"
based
the
"con-
upon an
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
Eastern
model"
thoroughgoing
(pll6).
One of us is evidently
think
it's
reproaches
me elsewhere
"modernist
standpoint"
ficult
Scigaj;
doubtless
in his book
(222).
is not merely
model which
our flat
Scigaj
takes
of a "shamanistic
the poem in a
disagreement
structural
count of whatever
development
in Scigaj's
takes
own "concept
place
the
but then what is in
of that
himself.
dif-
developmental
For if we think
is being
in these
namely,
of the poet
about
imposed
we need a different
account
me, and he
over how one particular
progression"
as the critic,
it's
"imperceptive"
must decide;
over from Hughes
as well
an advantage
for being
but the credibility
poems by the poet
Hughes's
misreading
he would think
The reader
poem is to be understood,
idea
111
way.
I naturally
question
Fallacy
the
on the
model
or ac-
poems. What seems
that
it keeps
as shaman"
so close
is then
to
a disadvan-
tage.
For
write
example,
on Wodwo, that
and creative
raphy"
of the
crisis.
exists
influences
vate
Wodwo
better
period
but
that
(86),
Scigaj
the
Hughes's
"surrealist
assumes
again,
indications
of crisis
"linked"
to the personal
from
in
Plath
critics
who
personal
"personal
biog-
of generalization,
the thought
the emotional
and analogous
separation
that
works
in his
the
of a painful
level
not determine,
more directly
of
maintains
at a high
formalism,
references
use scare-quotes)
after
the
all
evidence
Scigaj
does
that
abandons
"oblique
virtually
poems provide
as an analogue,
surfaces
of a Rat'"
like
although
poems," he argues
to
'Song
the
and parallels,
experience
refers
supposes,
And,
"only
how, "as Hughes
of
Scigaj
poetry"
that
and content
of the sixties"
content
(86).
show
of his-priSo,
when he
moods in the
torment
like
every
critic
Wodwo were (here
I had
and creative
in the
virtually
in August
crisis
1962
and
of
her
112
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
death
the
following
implausible,
counts
February.
although
it
and valuations.
lication
starkly
might
Listing
confirms
That
assumption
lead,
and has
that
there
and "Song of a Rat"
Hughes
wrote
this
own ordering
Scigaj's
account
"Gog III"
the
period.
Yet
of the
poems,
of the relevant
as an example
"tensions"
which
not
in "Song of a Rat,"
once the dying
individual
(pll7).
"a newly
won position
control."
He would be on firmer
"Full
with
Moon and Little
a new beatitude
dom"
Frieda,"
of spirit
were it not
that
ground
and before
Plath's
death.
are in this
context
thoroughly
misleading,
Scigaj
embraces
the
with
which
gression.
Plath's,
as Scigaj
I and
in
cites
Part
II of
"atman illumination"
himself
words,
with
severed
poems "resolve"
in Part
toward
by
his
by trusting
Scigaj
idea
to
is wrench-
of a sequential
of self-assurance
when he observes
and selfthat
"Moun-
published
much earlier,
to the "new" or "newly won"
and follow
from the eagerness
of a "shamanistic
structural
pro-
"
That
their
crisis,
by a newly won sense of free-
references
idea
pub-
obscured
Just
individual
poems were all
Such
first
and "Wodwo" all "view nature
transfigured
these
first
III.
In other
accordance
toward
ac-
and creative
effectively
"has freed
poems into
progress
tains,"
rat
different
of their
is
and then
progress
powers and self-reliance"
the
"link"
be resolved
a reassuring
ing
that
of the way in which
could
to quite
or
are among the very few poems
poems in Part
Wodwo, he discovers
inner
led,
was a personal
"Gog III"
Hughes's
is not unreasonable
the poems in the order
and that
in
Fallacy
idea
contrary
in their
a problematic
would
creative
seem more obviously
evidence,
chronological
if Hughes
order.
and even dangerous
imposed
on the poems, with
had published
his poems, like
Wodwo is very much a work, but in
sense. For the basic
problem,
and the
Ted Hughes
source
of what
I have called
formal
organisation
own independently
then
by critics
their
readings,
and the Sequential
Fallacy
the
fallacy,"
"sequential
is being
imposed
achieved
life
and
first
systematic
of questioning
the
which
"system"
is in turn
works
to readjust
poems. Then, because
written,
their
a "single
adventure,"
and the ordering
more plausible
and imposing
that
won" position
the "newly
but
turbing
poems in the volume. The alternative
radical
disagreement
of the
poems,
earlier
Hughes
adventure"
or "shamanistic
distorts
that
evidence.
In one sense this
is undeniably
"work", since the mythic
apostolic
critics,
the danger
and there
the
might
some of the most remarkable
an instructive
suggests
is another,
allow
or care,
involves
a
and disinvolves
a
the
of a
whenever it
and his more
of Wodwo and
of allowing
more positive
us to reclaim,
poems to be written
parallel,
seem
model
to Hughes
also
criticism
provides
itself
to our sense of Wodwo as a
organisation
to displace
Yeats
of
is to trust
progression"
the structural
gesis
system
to the idea
developmental
damaging
But "dictates"
too
the
structural
sequences.
rejecting
has
which
as well as his critics
later
which
of the
Hughes
the most disturbed
system is so important
and dictates
finest
course
of
so that
significance
adds weight
than
and to abandon
"single
poetic
"system,"
at the end of Wodwo actually
years
basis
of a "single
only if we do not notice,
to poems written
evidence
the
and
of Hughes's
makes the "system"
return
with
basis
some of the
power and authority
the
by the idea
or redetermine
their
Hughes,
reordering
by the mythic
the poems include
compelling
by
the assumptive
determined
the larger
on poems with
meaning
"myth" or "system." The sequence is determined
adventure,"
is that
from without
who make Hughes's
instead
113
sense in
and reappraise,
in our century.
if we refuse
exe-
to shackle
Here
our
114
Ted Hughes and the Sequential
sense of his poetic
achievement
take
a larger
admire
is
view, since
rooted
Graeco-Roman
engagement
2
Sagar,
Faas,
3
Sparrow
David
Ted
Holbrook,
usually
Christian
kind
of imaginative
share:
just
problems
of Ted Hughes
what
we read and
circumstances
of literary
(Cambridge:
or
is one of the
criticism.
Cambridge
University
Press,
p. 61.
Hughes:
1980),
Lost
assumptions
discussed
1975),
Press,
in English
in these
The Art
enlarged,
Ekbert
or
in A Vision. Or we could
literature
and proper
and least
edition,
Black
most of the
beliefs
is possible
Keith
2nd.
to the "system"
we can no longer
most important
1
in
Fallacy
The
p. 61;
Bearings
Unaccommodated
Hughes's
ellipses.
in English
Poetry
Universe
(London:
(Santa
Vision
Barbara:
Press,
1977),
p.
115.
4
Robert
5
Ted
Prose
Graves,
Hughes,
(London:
(Summer,
6
Ted
The White
"The
Faber,
Goddess
(London:
Environmental
1994),
p. 129;
Faber,
1971),
Revolution",
originally
in
p. 465..
Winter
published
in
Pollen:
Occasional
Your Environment
1970.)
Hughes,
"Myth
and Education",
The Art
of Ted Hughes,
Children's
Literature
in Education
1 (1970),
p.66.
7
See
8
Faas,p.92.
9
10
Sagar,
The exemplary
of first publication
Leonard
1986),
p. 87.
Scigaj,
bibliography
dates.
The Poetry
p. 230,
in Sagar's
for
a helpful
commentary.
The Art of Ted Hughes provides
of Ted Hughes (Iowa:
University
of Iowa
details
Press,
1