Add MS 78761

TED HUGHES CORRESPONDENCE. VOL. VI. (ff.170). Correspondence between Ted Hughes and Keith Sagar, and enclosed poems. Correspondence, undated envelopes, and poetry, typescript and autograph, including some photocopied folios. The correspondence includes a lengthy letter in which Hughes examines his own biography and in particular his relationship with Plath and its effect on Hughes’ work up to and including The Birthday Letters, and the influence of people and places on his literary and personal development (ff. 19-32). Also discussed are Phedre (ff.34-35); Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being, Hughes’ family biography, ‘The Elk’ (ff.61-63); Sagar’s essay ‘Ted Hughes: A Poet and a Critic’, for The Epic Poise: A Celebration of Ted Hughes ed. Nick Gammage (1999) (ff.61-63, 69-70); Remains of Elmet (ff.66-67). Works enclosed include: notes for Andrea Paluch und Robert Habeck, German translators of The Birthday Letters (ff.9-14); Howls, Cries and Whispers, photocopy of poems from printed volume (ff.36-57). The poems collected at the end of the volume are ordered chronologically according to Hughes’ own autograph in the first instance, and Sagar’s bibliography, in the second. They include: ‘The Little Boys and the Seasons’, ‘Quest’, ‘Lines to a Newborn Baby’, ‘O White Elite Lotus’, ‘Crow Wakes’, ‘Small Events’, ‘The Brother’s Dream’, ‘Birdsong’, ‘Fighting for Jerusalem’, ‘Song of Woe’, ‘Existential Song’, ‘Anecdote’, ‘Crow Fails’ (see also Add. 78757 f.62), ‘Crow Compromises’ (see also Add. 78757 f.64), ‘A Lucky Folly’, ‘A Crow Hymn’, ‘Bones’, ‘Song Against the White Owl’, ‘Snow Song’, ‘Crow’s Song about God’, ‘Crow’s Song about England’, ‘The New World’, ‘An Alchemy’, ‘The Lamentable History of the Human Calf’, ‘Your Mother’s Bones Wanted to Speak, They Could Not’, ‘Light’, ‘Skin’, ‘Two Dreams in the Cell’ (see also Add. 78756 f.93), ‘The Advocate’(see also Add. 78756 f.89), ‘She is the Rock’ (see also Add. 78756 f.103); and a draft of River (ff.149-170)

1. ff.1-70. Correspondence, including dated envelopes.

2. ff.71-110. Undated Envelopes.

3. ff.111-148. Miscellaneaous poems without identified correspondence.

4. ff.149-170. Draft of [italics]River[/italics].