Examine the ways in which Ted Hughes writes about nature.

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                                                   8th April 2001

Examine the ways in which Ted Hughes writes

about nature.

For the purpose of this essay I have studied three poems written by Ted Hughes; “Roe Deer”, “The Thought Fox” and “The Horses”. They have a common theme of wild animals and the element of awe for them and their surrounding environment is evident in Hughes’ writing.

        Hughes tries to look deep into the minds of animals and wants the reader to share in the same experience that he had. He shows this in the “Thought Fox” by using delicate and inspiring language such as, “ delicately as the dark snow” he makes it seem so real that we feel that we were present at the moment he saw the fox.

        This is very similar in both “Roe-Deer” and “The Horses” along with the feeling that one of them is in the wrong place at the wrong time, “They had happened into my dimension”. There is always a feeling of unease confirmed by the desolation of their meeting place; “Roe-Deer”-“snow lonely fields”; “The Horses”-“Not a leaf, not a bird” and finally “ The thought fox”-“This midnight moment’s forest”. He always seems to believe that he is the one trespassing into their world, not the other way around. These occurrences help to distinguish between the normal and the abnormal, so that we too can acquire the same feelings for animals that Ted Hughes does. So helping us to envisage the wonder of the moment.

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Throughout “The Thought Fox” Hughes seems to be struggling for inspiration for one of his poems, “this blank page where my fingers move”, he then sees something out of the window and begins to describe it in great detail. It ends with a completed poem “the page is printed”. This form of poetry, with its irregular rhyme scheme helps us to imagine this encounter and build up a clear picture in our minds of this uncharacteristic situation.

        In “The Horses” we again see the way in which Ted Hughes views nature and all its creations. He feels small and meek ...

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