Page 394 - DENG405_BRITISH_POETRY

Unit 31: Hughes and T.S. Eliot

with the killer-instinct. The adjectives “bullet” and “automatic” exemplify how the act looks Notes
automated, mechanized and triggered. Further, it also portrays how objective the act is, without
depending on external considerations and extraneous factors. Mozart had this innate genius and
artistic drive for music that was not out of any ulterior motive. It existed in its own right. It was
unique, stemmed from his brain as an extended metaphor of his genius. It was not inclined towards
fame or appreciation. Likewise, the shark is unflinching in its act of preying, to the extent of smelling
out even a leak of its own blood. It is so proactive in its endeavor that it may devour itself if the
situation demands.

The poet concretizes its efficiency as a streamline that doubt cannot pluck at or likens it
to a streak of light that is not reflected on obstruction.

31.2.2 Ted Hughes as an Animal Poet

Ted Hughes’s ‘ nature poetry’ comprises mainly of his poems that explore man’s relation with ‘animal
life’ and ‘landscapes’-both constantly interacting with the elements of nature. His nature poetry
predominantly deals with the problem of modern man’s alienation from nature. It is also an attempt
to reunite man with nature.
In Hughes’s view, modern man has discarded his world of feelings, imagination and pure instincts
which is true to nature. But he has done so, at the cost of his own existence. So, Hughes’s nature
poems, on the one hand, hint at modern man’s present perilous existence and on the other, attempt
to redeem man from his own predicament.
However, Hughes attributes modern man’s alienation from nature to his self-consciousness or his
rational consciousness, to his religious compunctions and finally to his slavery to science and
technology.
In contradiction to modern man and his flaws Hughes’s animals are endowed with certain significant
qualities: they are distinctly non-rational in power, they are single minded in their action, self-
centered, devoid of fantasy and act instinctually so as to condemn duality in man. Unlike man, they
cope with elements perfectly to show their unity with nature and by innuendo, man’s alienation
from nature. Through these poems Hughes evokes the pre-historic world that was obviously
connected with the lost instinctual energies and attempts to put man in touch with those lost archaic
energies. P.R. King says that Hughes’s animals are not mere descriptions of creatures but are intended
as comments on aspects of human life.

31.2.3 Roles and Models of Animals
Thus Ted Hughes assumes a variety of roles as a fox, a hawk, a jaguar, an otter, a thrush, etc. Very
often he is the protagonist as perceiver registering some startling or terrifying quality like the energy
of the elemental energy, an immense pike, but making no claim to embody it in his own personality.
At times, he can be a mere passive on-looker involving in recording and recreation of a slow movement
in the midst of violence and suddenness. The voice or tone in almost all his poems is that of an omni
scent narrator, and since Hughes is a poet of experience, his poetry, in this sense, is subjective and
supremely and obsessively autobiographical. The following study of Hughes’ animal poems
exemplifies his attitude to nature and animals.

31.2.4 Animal Monologue—Glorification of Animal Totalitarianism

Hawk Roosting is a dramatic monologue, as told from the point of view of the hawk sitting on the top
of a tree in a trance. He is a monomaniac and a solipsist. He is single minded in his pursuit of his prey.

LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY 387