Hughes, Ted (Edward James Hughes): deposition and testimony in Boston libel case (1986), 1–2, 7–9, 11–12, 15, 550; interest in and practice of astrology, 2, 15, 27–8, 70, 100–1, 162, 188, 328, 373, 511; Yorkshire roots, 3; fishing, 4–5, 45–6, 58–60, 317, 383, 399, 406, 421, 449, 483, 509; view of poetry, 12, 44–5, 65–6, 93–4; inner life, 15–16, 18; poetic voice, 15; financial independence as writer, 16; journals and notebooks, 17–18, 224, 231, 241, 247, 255, 320, 359, 401–4, 555; letters, 17–18, 476; sells papers to Emory University, Atlanta, 17, 500; childhood at Mytholmroyd and Mexborough, 23–7, 35, 38, 47; birth and genealogy, 27–30; spiritual life, 31; catches and values animals, 37–8, 44, 58; radio broadcasts, 37, 44, 230; outdoor excursions, 38–40, 56–9; and fox experience on visit to Crisworth Dene, 41–3; moderate drinking, 41; schooling, 47, 49, 52–5; closeness to Olwyn, 48, 273, 492, 539; reading, 49, 53–4, 59, 62, 65, 449, 481; interest in typography and printing, 50; superstitions, 50; political views, 52, 230, 425, 482; attends Cambridge University, 55, 61, 65, 67, 69–73, 79–80; size and strength, 55; early writing and poetry, 56–7, 63; early girlfriends, 58–9, 62–3, 80, 84; early letters to Edna Wholey, 59, 62; national service in Royal Air Force, 61–4; wins exhibition to Cambridge, 61; relations with Edna Wholey, 62–3; gives up shooting, 68; dress, 69, 89, 158, 174; love of music, 70, 73, 114; religious views, 70; appearance, 72, 253, 302, 370, 388; changes studies at Cambridge to Archaeology and Anthropology, 75–8; drinking, 79; writes poems at Cambridge under pseudonyms, 79; applies to emigrate to Australia, 80–1, 83–4; considers mink-farming, 83–4; poaching, 84; returns to Cambridge, 84–5, 106; casual work and money-making schemes, 87, 87–8; restricted by Cambridge authorities, 87; abandons Australian scheme, 88; verse-speaking, 88; attachment to Shirley, 89–92, 97, 105; and supernatural, 92; as story editor for film company, 97; first meets SP, 98–104; SP visits in London, 105–7; in Rugby Street, Holborn, 107–9; in SP’s unfinished novel, 111; ends relationship with Shirley, 113; forms close relationship with SP, 113–15; cooking, 115, 120, 134, 244; marriage to SP, 116; in Spain, 119–22; auditions as reader of modern poetry at BBC, 123; temporarily separated from SP, 123; occupies flat near Cambridge with SP, 124; enters and wins Harper Brothers’ poetry competition, 125, 127; schoolteaching, 126, 128; leaves for USA with SP, 128–30; children’s stories, 130, 227; reads at New York launch of The Hawk in the Rain, 134–5; writer’s block in USA, 134; occult interests, 138–9, 143, 268, 364; teaches and reads poetry at University of Massachusetts, Amherst, 138–9; SP suspects of infidelity, 140–2; marriage relations with SP, 142–4, 172–3, 205; wins Guinness Poetry Award, 145; writes play (lost), 145, 155; photographed by Rollie McKenna, 146; wins Guggenheim award, 146; on American poets, 147; stays at Yaddo, 148–9, 154–6; road trip in America and Canada, 149–54; incomplete libretto for Chou Wen-chung’s oratorio, 155; Rogovin portrait, 155; in Chalcot Square flat, 160; invokes Creation myth, 165; fatherhood, 166, 171, 174, 224, 231; theatregoing, 168; minute observation, 171–2; visits to London zoo, 171; interviewed with SP on BBC radio, 172–3; visits SP in hospital, 173–4; wins Hawthornden Prize, 174; buys Devon house (Court Green), 175–8; Alvarez on, 180–1; published in The New Poetry, 180–1; life in Devon, 181–2; buys jaguar skin, 184; kisses Assia in Devon, 185–6; and myth, 189, 465–75, 505; affair with Assia, 190–1, 200, 209, 220–6, 248, 272, 296, 450–4; visits Murphy in Ireland, 192, 246–7; and marriage breakdown, 193, 195–200; Spanish holiday with Assia, 193; leaves Court Green and SP, 195, 469; heart problem, 199; affair and friendship with Susan Alliston, 203–6, 210, 214–15, 225–6, 241–2, 341, 511; finds flat in Fitzrovia (Cleveland Street), 203, 209; and SP’s emotional collapse, 206–7; visits SP in Fitzroy Road, 208–10; and SP’s death, 211–12; at SP’s funeral, 214; effect of SP’s suicide on poetic voice, 217, 250; praises Ariel, 219; publishes and promotes SP’s poems, 219, 234, 236–7; working method, 221; dreams, 223–4, 231–2, 241, 245, 254, 261, 270, 466, 487; writing limited after SP’s death, 226, 228; on England and the English, 228–30; voice and accent, 230–1; co-edits Modern Poetry in Translation, 233; earnings, 233, 497; reviewing, 233–4, 297; writes introduction to Keith Douglas poems, 234–5; edits SP’s Ariel, 236–8; child by Assia, 240; attends Spoleto Festival, 242–3; stays in Ireland with children, 244–5; appointment in Philosophy Department of Vienna University, 246; plans International Poetry Festival, 252–3, 289; collaborates with Peter Brook, 256–61, 277, 306–11, 318; relations with Brenda Hedden, 256, 266–7, 277, 280–1, 298–301, 378; version of Seneca’s Oedipus for Peter Brook, 256–9; adaptation of King Lear, 260–1; reorganizes relations with Assia, 265; simultaneous involvement with three women (A, B,C), 266–7, 270–1; attachment to Carol Orchard, 267, 277, 286, 298; falsely accused of improper behaviour in Exeter, 267–8; friendship with Heaney, 271; first TV appearance, 272–3; and deaths of Assia and Shura, 275–7, 279; and mother’s death, 278; visits dying Sue Alliston, 279–81; buys Lumb Bank (house), Heptonstall, 281–2, 286; wins City of Florence Prize for poetry, 282; considers shared purchase of Devon house with Gerald, 287; refuses to sell manuscripts, 287; misidentified as the ‘M1 sex murderer’, 295; environmental/ecological concerns, 297–8, 411, 415, 425–7, 475, 554; torn between Brenda and Carol, 298–9; marriage to Carol, 299, 423–4; visit to Israel, 301–2; campus readings in USA, 302; sexual potency, 302–3; invents language (Orghast), 307–12; presents play in Persia with Peter Brook, 307–12; writes play in invented language, 307–8; protests to Alvarez on writing of SP’s suicide, 312–14; money worries, 316, 324, 328–9, 381; farming, 318–19, 325, 328, 350, 362; self-examination and exhortation, 320, 402–3; translates Pilinszky, 320–2; haunted by SP, 322, 325–6; collecting, 324; receives Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry, 324–5, 418, 476; activities and interests, 325; devotion to Arvon Foundation, 325; capital assets, 326; creates trust for Frieda and Nick, 326; fear of throat cancer refuted, 326; avoids autobiographical voice, 331–2; exposed in Ariel, 332; verse drama, 332; openly addresses SP’s suicide, 338–9; feminist hostility to, 346; Robin Morgan accuses of murder of SP, 347–9; collaborates with Aurelia over publication of SP’s letters, 350; and editing and publication of SP’s letters, 351, 352; foreword to The Journals of Sylvia Plath, 354–5; visits Australia for Adelaide Festival, 359–62; affair with Jill Barber, 361, 363–6, 369–70; harassed by ‘libbers’, 361–2; relations with Emma Tennant, 370–1; view of women, 372–5; friends’ views of affairs, 373; champions women writers, 374; explains poetry in Dhaka, 375–7; confesses feelings for SP to Carolyne Wright, 378; appointed OBE, 384; displaces hip, 385; scheme to professionalise school poetry readings, 385; Fay Godwin photograph, 388; plans travels abroad, 399; travels to Alaska, 399, 405, 420–1, 494; character observation, 401–2; again injures hip, 402; trip to Mexico City, 403; visits Lake Victoria, 405; opposes new sewage works at Bideford, 410–11; foreword to The Complete Prints of Leonard Baskin, 415; honorary doctorate from Exeter University, 415; cruise on Nile, 417; poetry readings, 417; appointed Poet Laureate, 418–19; honours, 418; captures peacock at Court Green, 424–5; role as Laureate, 429; summoned to court in USA, 430–2, 434; attends Bell Jar libel case, 435–6, 439; and settlement of Bell Jar case, 438, 441; reluctance to sue, 439; SP’s harsh words on, 439; replies to accusation of neglecting SP’s grave, 441; sues Trevor Thomas, 442; acquires potter’s wheel, 449; library shipped to Atlanta, Georgia, 449; sequence of poems on Assia (‘A’ poems), 452–5; devotion to Shakespeare, 457–8; same-sex desire absent from works, 469; interest in London demi-monde, 472; public activities, 475–7; responds to questions about poems, 480; table talk, 481–2; joint anthology with Heaney, 483–4; socialises with royal family, 483–5; inscribes books for hosts, 484; Laureate poems published, 486–8; public criticisms of, 488–9; aims to make money for different life, 492–3; output in 1990s, 492, 495, 501; final illness, 493; last love affair, 493–4; theatre work, 495–500; translates Wedekind, 495, 497–9; translates Lorca, 499–500; cancer and chemotherapy, 502, 504, 509, 529; translates G
reek and Latin classics, 502, 527–34; breaks silence over life and suicide of SP with Birthday Letters, 503–9; reflects on blocked creativity, 505–6; translates Racine, 532; awarded Order of Merit, 538; death, 539–41; translates Pushkin, 539; funeral and cremation, 541–2, 546; memorial service in Westminster Abbey, 543; final will and value of estate, 546–8; depicted in Schaeffer’s Poison, 548–52; selected letters published, 553–5; archive, 555, 557; view of posthumous biography, 556–8
Hughes, William Henry (TH’s father): home life, 3, 27; marriage, 30, 33; occupation (carpenter), 30, 34; footballing, 33–4, 396; in Great War, 33, 40–1, 516; moves to work in South Wales, 35; takes over newsagents’ shop in Mexborough, 35–6, 47–8; moves to shop in Todmorden, 65; at SP’s funeral, 213; hostility to Assia, 246–7, 253; and wife’s death, 278; and fire at Lumb Bank, 305; grumpiness as widower, 317–18; stays at Court Green, 318; TH wishes to move to Devon, 328; visits Australia with TH, 359, 363; attempted infidelity, 381; difficulties in old age, 384, 399; hospitalised and death, 400, 560; alluded to in ‘October Salmon’, 410
Humperdinck, Engelbert (pop singer), 300
Hutchinson, Mary, 520
Huws, Daniel: at Cambridge with TH, 74, 86–7, 479; writes poetry at Cambridge, 79; TH stays in father’s London flat, 84, 123, 526; criticises SP’s poems, 99, 341, 522; TH writes to from New York, 135; marriage, 191; TH and SP stay with, 191; and TH’s need to give account of marriage to SP, 354; letter from TH on upheaval in late life, 536; Memories of Ted Hughes, 558
Huws, Helga, 191
‘Hypnotising Husband, The’ (SP; story), 120
‘I know well’ (TH; poem), 340
Ibstock Place (school, London), 301
Icarus (mythological figure), 473–4
Iceland, 383
‘Icon, An’ (TH; earlier ‘Portraits’; poem), 515
Ilkley Literature Festival, 323
Imlah, Mick, 429
‘Inscription, The’ (TH; poem), 210, 513, 523
‘Insomniac’ (SP; poem), 192
Ionesco, Eugène, 83
Iran see Persia
Ireland: TH idealizes, 91, 93, 276, 282, 301; TH and SP visit, 192–3; TH visits with children, 244–6; TH visits after Assia’s death, 276–7; TH visits with Brenda, 300; TH takes Jill Barber to meet Nick, 365; TH’s fishing trips in, 365, 375
Iron Man, The (The Iron Giant in USA; TH; children’s book), 261–3; adapted at Young Vic as musical, 489–90, 497
‘Iron Wolf, The’ (TH; poem), 382, 413
Iron Woman, The (TH; fable for children), 427, 489
Israel: TH visits with Carol, 301–2
Italy, 324
J. Arthur Rank (film company), 97
‘Jaguar, The’ (TH; poem), 94–6, 105, 135, 137
‘Jaguar Skin, The’ (TH; poem), 183
‘Jailor, The’ (SP; poem), 201, 237, 296, 346, 443
James and James (publishers), 407
Jay, Peter, 430
Jean (nanny), 219, 222
Jeff, Christine, 548
Jews: in TH’s poems for Assia, 452, 454–6
Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams (SP; stories), 354
Johnson, Alan, 55
Johnson, Samuel, 76, 402
Jones, Jeffrey, 432, 433
Jong, Erica, 302–3
Jonson, Ben, 462
Joseph, Rosemary, 88–9
Journals of Sylvia Plath, The: publication, 354–5, 522
Jung, C.G.: on synchronicity, 95; TH reads, 331, 351; SP reads, 351; Psychological Types, 54, 63–4, 67; Sacred Marriage, 231; Symbols of Transformation, 157; The Undiscovered Self, 146
Kane, Kathy, 237
Kane, Marvin, 184, 237
‘Karlsbad Caverns’ (TH; poem), 523
Kavanagh, Patrick, 252
Kayak (Oxford girl): claims to be TH’s daughter, 480–1
Keats, John, 405, 424, 460; letters, 554
Keen, Peter: provides photographs for River, 406–7, 410
Kennedy, John F., 179
Kent, Jonathan, 532, 537
Key, Percy and Rose, 184
‘Kindness’ (SP; poem), 240
King, John, Baron, 485
‘Kingfisher’ (TH; poem), 413
Kipling, Rudyard, 53, 411, 495
Knopf, Alfred, 174
Kopp, Jane Baltzell, 356
Kovner, Victor, 434, 437–9, 481
Kroll, Judith, 350–2, 355; Chapters in a Mythology: The Poetry of Sylvia Plath, 353
Krook, Dorothea, 126, 356
Kunitz, Stanley, 145, 167
‘Laburnum, The’ (TH; poem), 523
‘Lady Lazarus’ (SP; poem), 236, 239
Lameyer, Gordon, 103, 110, 356–8, 436–7, 442
Larkin, Philip: parodies Crow, 14; memorable lines, 15; as librarian, 16; style, 135; as Movement poet, 180, 320; and sexual experience, 206; as judge for Arvon International Poetry Competition, 385–6; as candidate for Poet Laureateship, 417–18; criticises TH’s Wolfwatching, 428; TH disparages, 554; instructs executors to burn manuscripts, 555; ‘At Grass’ (poem), 180; ‘Aubade’ (poem), 386; ‘MCMXIV’ (poem), 137
Lasdun, James, 490, 495
‘Last, The’ (TH; poem), 513
‘Last Letter’ (TH; poem), 215, 524–6
‘Law in the Country of the Cats’ (TH; poem), 102
Lawrence, D.H., 52, 148, 180, 251, 389; Lady Chatterley’s Lover (trial), 169; The Rainbow, 181
‘Leaf Mould’ (TH; poem), 396, 428
‘Learning to Think’ (TH; talk), 44
Leavis, F.R., 69, 71, 74, 76, 86, 89, 181
Lee, Hermione, 488
Leeming, Owen, 173
‘Lesbos’ (SP; poem), 195, 237, 347
Lessing, Doris, 243, 349
Letters Home: Correspondence 1950–1963 (SP; edited Aurelia Plath), 19, 353, 552–3
Letters of Ted Hughes: serves as autobiography, 553–5
Levy, Laurie, 356
Lewis, Alun, 66
‘Life after Death’ (TH; poem), 227
‘Lily’ (TH; poem), 189
Lipsey, Dicky, 452
Listener, The (magazine), 14
Listening and Writing (BBC radio series), 37
Litle Gidding, 31
Little, Brown (publisher), 3
Little Missenden Harvest Festival (1968), 326
Lloyd, Reginald J., 414, 430, 489, 538
‘Lodger, The’ (TH; poem), 199
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth: Hiawatha, 59
Loren, Sophia, 477
‘Lovesong’ (earlier ‘Second Bedtime Story’; TH; poem), 270, 362
Lowell, Robert, 145, 179–80, 220, 239, 252, 347, 565–6; For the Union Dead, 239; ‘The Ghost’ (translation of Propertius), 565; Life Studies, 146–8, 156, 180–1, 216, 239, 331, 566; ‘The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket’ (poem), 185; ‘Waking in the blue’ (poem), 147
Lucas, F.W., 408
Lucie-Smith, Edward, 88, 275–6
Lukács, László: marriage to Frieda, 478, 480, 560; moves to England, 502
Lumb Bank (house), Heptonstall: TH puts in offer for, 222–3; TH buys, 281, 286; fire, 305–6, 559; renovated and leased to Arvon Foundation, 325; maintenance costs, 328; valuation, 329
‘Lumb Chimney’ (TH; poem), 392
Lupercal (earlier ‘Lupercalia’; TH; poetry collection): publication and reception, 153, 155, 163–4, 166–8, 200–1; awarded Hawthornden Prize, 174; writing, 186, 196; and Wodwo, 249–50; qualities, 271–2; Shakespeare allusions, 458
Lyde, Joe, 75, 98
Lyonesse (SP; poetry collection), 347
MacBeth, George, 18, 165
MacCaig, Norman, 167
McCall’s (magazine), 305
McCaughey, Revd Terence, 70, 74, 84, 466, 476, 542
McCullough, Fran, 173, 303–4, 352, 354
MacDiarmid, Hugh, 252
Macedo, Suzette, 186
McEnroe, John, 403
MacGibbon, James, 407
McKenna, Rollie, 146, 221
McKinley (game
keeper), 38, 74
Mackle, Joanna, 485, 503
MacLean, Sorley, 476
McLeod, Miss (schoolteacher), 52
MacNeice, Louis, 169
Maddux, Hilary, 348
Madge, Anna, 268
Madonna, 481
‘Magic Mirror, The’ (SP; undergraduate thesis), 11, 256
Mahabharata (Indian epic), 261
Mailer, Norman, 432
Major, John, 475
Malamud, Bernard, 20
Malcolm, Janet: The Silent Woman, 440
Malinowski, Bronisław, 77–8
‘Man in Black’ (SP; poem), 157
Manly, George, 183
Mann, Thomas, 224
‘March Calf, A’ (TH; poem), 327
Marowitz, Charles, 260
Mars (magazine), 364, 374
Marx, Karl, 389
‘Masque for Three Voices, A’ (TH; poem), 487
May, Derwent, 251
‘Mayday on Holderness’ (TH; poem), 163–4
Mayne, Pauline, 37, 43, 53
Mayo, Barbara, 295
Mead, Margaret, 77–8
‘Medusa’ (SP; poem), 10, 45, 350
Meet My Folks (TH; children’s poems), 45, 148
Menotti, Gian Carlo, 243
Merchant, Moelwyn, 299, 477
Mermaid’s Purse, The (TH; children’s poems), 489
Merwin, Dido, 136, 160–1, 163, 203, 206, 401–2, 542
Merwin, W.S.: reviews The Hawk in the Rain, 136; in London, 160–2, 169, 203; on CND march, 163; TH and SP visit in Dordogne, 175; separation from Dido, 401
Ted Hughes Page 80
