| Description |
xx, 361 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages 345-350) and index. |
| Form |
Also issued online. |
| Contents |
Introduction: Becoming her husband -- Chapter 1. Meeting (1956) -- Ted Huge -- Flashy American -- The "diary I" -- Chapter 2. Romance (1956) -- The White Goddess: "song" -- Plath's idyll -- "To Ariadne, deserted by Theseus" -- Chapter 3. His family (1956) -- Leo -- William Henry Hughes (1894-1981) -- Edith Farrar Hughes (1898-1969) -- Gerald Hughes (1920- ) -- Chapter 4. Struggling (1956-1963) -- Rabbit stew -- Silent strangers -- Complicated animals -- Earth mother -- The luxury of solitude -- Chapter 5. Prospering (1957-1963) -- Money -- Portrait of the artist as a young woman -- Literary London -- Homemaking -- Literary lion -- Fertility -- Chapter 6. Separating (1962- ) -- "The rabbit catcher" -- He said, she said -- Chapter 7. Parting (1962-1963) -- Plath turns thirty: Ariel -- "Daddy" -- London on her own -- Doubletake -- Chapter 8. Husbandry (1963-1998) -- Hughes's tribe -- Hughes's Ariel -- the wodwo and the crow -- Stewardship -- Chapter 9. Curing himself (1967-1998) -- "Knot of obsessions" -- Sinking into folk-tale -- From "relic husband" to "her husband" -- Chapter 10. The magical dead (1984-1998) -- Poet of England -- The drama of completion -- Coda: Naked (1998- ) |
| Summary |
"Ted Hughes married Sylvia Plath in 1956, at the outset of their brilliant careers. Plath's suicide six and a half years later, for which many held Hughes accountable, changed his life, his closest relationships, his standing in the literary world, and brought new significance to his poetry." "In this new biography of their marriage, Diane Middlebrook presents a portrait of Hughes as a man, as a poet, and as a husband haunted - and nourished - his entire life by the aftermath of his first marriage. How marriages fail and how men fail in marriages is one of the book's central themes." "Drawing on a trove of newly available papers, Middlebrook presents Hughes as a complicated, conflicted figure: sexually magnetic, fiercely ambitious, immensely caring, and shrewd in business. She argues that Plath's suicide, though it devastated Hughes and made him vulnerable to the savage attacks of Plath's growing readership, ultimately gave him his true subject - re-creating himself for posterity through his marriage to Sylvia Plath and his struggles within his own historical circumstances."--BOOK JACKET. |
| Provenance |
Gift of Peter Budakian, Rider alumnus, class of 1954. |
| Subject |
Hughes, Ted, 1930-1998 -- Marriage.
|
|
Hughes, Ted, 1930-1998. |
|
Marriage. |
|
Plath, Sylvia -- Marriage.
|
|
Plath, Sylvia. |
|
Poets, English -- 20th century -- Biography.
|
|
Poets, English. |
| Chronological Term |
20th century |
| Genre/Form |
Biographies.
|
| Subject |
Poets, American -- 20th century -- Biography.
|
|
Poets, American. |
|
Married people -- Great Britain -- Biography.
|
|
Married people. |
|
Great Britain. |
|
Authors' spouses -- Great Britain -- Biography.
|
|
Authors' spouses. |
|
Hughes, Ted, 1930- -- Mariage. |
|
Plath, Sylvia -- Mariage. |
|
Married people. |
| Genre/Form |
Biographies.
|
| Other Form: |
Online version: Middlebrook, Diane Wood, 1939-2007. Her husband. New York : Viking, 2003 (OCoLC)606986937 |
| ISBN |
0670031879 acid-free paper |
|
9780670031870 acid-free paper |
|
