Ted Hughes's Expressionism: the Encyclopaedic Range and Maverick Utterance of England's Greatest Twentieth Century Poet
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Huddersfield
Department Name: School of Arts and Humanities
Abstract
Ted Hughes (1930-1998) is one of the most important English language poets of the twentieth century. He published over a hundred books, including collections of poetry, translations, plays, stories, libretti, collaborations with artists and experimental works. Within that range he adopted a variety of styles, modes and registers that have been variously identified as mythic, elegiac, narrative, autobiographical, confessional, devotional and formal. The range of content Hughes drew on, including myth, conflict, nature & landscape, religion, the occult, philosophy and autobiography), and themes he addressed (vitality/violence, ecology, male/female relationships, grief, guilt and bereavement and issues of meaning and purpose to name but a few) embody a similar catholicity.
The encyclopaedic diversity of Hughes's outputs has generated scholarly responses as varied as the work itself, but within that richness and plurality there is sometimes a sense that the essential Hughes is missing - what is it that is truly distinctive about Hughes's work, which marks him out as a major poet? Where does his main achievement lie? This research will answer that question by identifying Hughes's dominant mode as Expressionist and arguing that his best, most characteristic and most important work is written in the Expressionist mode. The research will present an understanding of Expressionism as a broad movement or tendency across the arts in which the artist is concerned to articulate the truth as he or she sees it under the influence of a strong, visionary subjectivity, rooted in an all important 'inner-life'. For the Expressionist artist, Naturalistic, Impressionistic or Realist representations of subject matter are inadequate, leading to the deployment of a range of techniques - hyperbole, distortion, symbolism, abstraction, typology - in the quest to express 'the truth'.
The identification of Hughes as an Expressionist poet will also allow a more precise identification of his secondary modes, giving a holistic overview of his achievement, and enabling a number of limiting interpretations or misconceptions about Hughes to be challenged. For example, although the research will take into account the importance of Hughes's relationship with his first wife Sylvia Plath and his subsequent partner Assia Wevill, and the traumatic impact of their suicides on his life and work, the research will eschew reductive biographical readings and use the identification of Expressionism as Hughes's dominant mode to critique the rather crude 'mythic'/'elegiac' binary ('mythic' = obscure, symbolic, arcane, 'bad'; 'elegiac' = personal, moving, accessible, 'good') that has recently begun to emerge in Hughes studies. The research will also catalyse new approaches to Hughes's animal and nature poetry, much of which (for example, 'Wind', 'Pike' and 'The Howling of Wolves') does not simply derive from the precise observations of an 'experienced countryman' as is often implied, but is characterised by the transformative and didactic subjectivity typical of Expressionism. The research will also challenge the common conception of Hughes as a parochial 'Little England' establishment figure, (obsequious poet laureate, tweedy fisherman and 'traditional' nature poet), demonstrating that he was a socially and culturally engaged, international artist of global stature.
Finally, the research will enable the development of pedagogical resources and related in-person and online seminars ('The Expressionist Poetry Workshop' (TEPW)), that will encourage poets in community, University and other contexts to write in the Expressionist mode, using Expressionistic techniques, challenging the current limiting dominance of the autobiographical mode and the 'relatable' first-person lyric. Associated with the workshop will be a national competition, with successful entries being published in an anthology: 'Visionary Subjectivity: Poems from the Expressionist Poetry Workshop'
The encyclopaedic diversity of Hughes's outputs has generated scholarly responses as varied as the work itself, but within that richness and plurality there is sometimes a sense that the essential Hughes is missing - what is it that is truly distinctive about Hughes's work, which marks him out as a major poet? Where does his main achievement lie? This research will answer that question by identifying Hughes's dominant mode as Expressionist and arguing that his best, most characteristic and most important work is written in the Expressionist mode. The research will present an understanding of Expressionism as a broad movement or tendency across the arts in which the artist is concerned to articulate the truth as he or she sees it under the influence of a strong, visionary subjectivity, rooted in an all important 'inner-life'. For the Expressionist artist, Naturalistic, Impressionistic or Realist representations of subject matter are inadequate, leading to the deployment of a range of techniques - hyperbole, distortion, symbolism, abstraction, typology - in the quest to express 'the truth'.
The identification of Hughes as an Expressionist poet will also allow a more precise identification of his secondary modes, giving a holistic overview of his achievement, and enabling a number of limiting interpretations or misconceptions about Hughes to be challenged. For example, although the research will take into account the importance of Hughes's relationship with his first wife Sylvia Plath and his subsequent partner Assia Wevill, and the traumatic impact of their suicides on his life and work, the research will eschew reductive biographical readings and use the identification of Expressionism as Hughes's dominant mode to critique the rather crude 'mythic'/'elegiac' binary ('mythic' = obscure, symbolic, arcane, 'bad'; 'elegiac' = personal, moving, accessible, 'good') that has recently begun to emerge in Hughes studies. The research will also catalyse new approaches to Hughes's animal and nature poetry, much of which (for example, 'Wind', 'Pike' and 'The Howling of Wolves') does not simply derive from the precise observations of an 'experienced countryman' as is often implied, but is characterised by the transformative and didactic subjectivity typical of Expressionism. The research will also challenge the common conception of Hughes as a parochial 'Little England' establishment figure, (obsequious poet laureate, tweedy fisherman and 'traditional' nature poet), demonstrating that he was a socially and culturally engaged, international artist of global stature.
Finally, the research will enable the development of pedagogical resources and related in-person and online seminars ('The Expressionist Poetry Workshop' (TEPW)), that will encourage poets in community, University and other contexts to write in the Expressionist mode, using Expressionistic techniques, challenging the current limiting dominance of the autobiographical mode and the 'relatable' first-person lyric. Associated with the workshop will be a national competition, with successful entries being published in an anthology: 'Visionary Subjectivity: Poems from the Expressionist Poetry Workshop'
People |
ORCID iD |
| Stephen Ely (Principal Investigator / Fellow) |
Publications
Ely, S
(2025)
The Expressionist Poetry Workshop: Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape
in Writing in Education
Steve Ely
(2024)
Article
| Title | Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape: the Expressionist Poetry Workshop |
| Description | The 'Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape' creative writing (poetry) workshops comprised/comprises several elements: a five session 'in person' sequences of workshops; a five session online iteration of the workshops; freely downloadable workshop materials; a poetry competition; the publication of an anthology (in September, 2024); and a number of opportunities for successful entrants to read their work at launches and events (2024/25). 18 attended the in person workshops, 54 the online iteration and around 200 (estimate) have downloaded the pedagogical materials. The contract with Valley Press for anthology publication is signed and a timeline for editing and book production has been established. The novel element of 'Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape' is the way in which course materials engage participants (poets at all levels of ability, from published poets to complete beginners) with Expressionist, experimental and avant-garde models, encouraging them to go 'beyond the lyric' and attempt more ambitious work. Participants' work produced during the workshops, and submissions to the poetry competition to date show real impact, and many participants have said that the course took them out of their comfort zones and encouraged them to explore their subjectivities in a way not typical of contemporary poetry workshops. |
| Type Of Art | Creative Writing |
| Year Produced | 2023 |
| Impact | An anthology will be published in September, 2024 and the course materials are now available for free download from the website. |
| URL | https://research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/tedhughes/expressionism/creativewriting/ |
| Description | The award had five main objectives: 1. To what extent can Expressionism be demonstrated to be Hughes's dominant mode?; 2. Can the identification of Hughes's dominant mode as Expressionist provide a hermeneutical key to providing a holistic understanding of the diversity of his oeuvre?; 3. What are the lines of influence that shaped Hughes's Expressionism?; 4. How does the identification of Hughes's dominant mode as Expressionist inform an understanding of his work in the context of international movements in art, as well as in the literary-historical and cultural context of modern and contemporary English poetry?; 5. To what extent can this research make an impact on the practice of contemporary poetry by developing pedagogical approaches that challenge the current dominance of the autobiographical mode and the 'relatable' first-person lyric and encourage developing poets to incorporate Expressionist subjectivity into their repertoires. In regard to (1), my research - as summarised in my 2023 British Library conference paper 'Ted Hughes's Expressionism: Visionary Subjectivity', my forthcoming (2026) book chapter 'Ted Hughes's Expressionism' and in my monograph-in-progress (now entitled 'Ted Hughes's Expressionism') has demonstrated that Hughes dominant mode, the mode in which is most celebrated, original and typical work is written, is essentially Expressionist. In doing so I placed Hughes in the context of broad currents in international art and defused the tendency to see him as a maverick. ' Through a cross-disciplinary review of understandings of the term 'Expressionism', I was able to come to a general definition of the term which has been well received by the various audiences encountering my research: 'Expressionism is an approach to creativity characterised by a rejection of objectivity in representation in favour of a visionary subjectivity that draws on inner life, imagination and strong feeling to transform and distort content, deploying abstraction, typologies, metaphors and symbols to create novel forms and shape presentations in a tendentious manner.' The identification of Hughes's dominant mode as Expressionist has also allowed a more precise and technical definition and description of his secondary modes (objective 2). Not all Hughes's best work was Expressionist by any means, and he has written excellent representational (naturalistic, realist) poetry as well as work that might be categorised as autobiographical or even confessional. However the technical language used to describe and categorise Hughes's work in recently scholarship has become dominated by two overarching broadbrush terms - 'mythic' and 'elegiac' that obscured as much as they revealed. My research has debunked this binary, and moved towards the development of a more technical and precise language to describe Hughes's work that also has the effect of allowing his achievement to be discussed in the context of international 'movements' in art and literature, allowing his key artistic relationships and affinities to be seen more clearly. In respect of (3), I have identified the Hughes's main lines of Expressionist influence in: his encounter with Expressionist-influenced, avant garde drama during the 1960s, in particular his extended collaboration with the experimental dramatist, director and filmmaker Peter Brook; his lifelong collaboration with the artist Leonard Baskin, who operated in a broadly Expressionist/Neo-Mannerist tradition; his encounter with the 'Eastern European' poets Vasko Popa, Zgigniew Herbert and Miroslav Holub, all of whom emerged from a European avant-garde tradition that was ultimately rooted in Expressionism. A fourth strand of influence, which has been more difficult to demonstrate, almost certainly lies in the Modernist tradition rooted in T.S. Eliot in particular and his visionary modernist successors in the Apocalyptic and Neo-Romantic 'movements' of from the mid 1930s to the mid 1950s. Although Eliot and Modernism are not often discussed in the context of Expressionism, there are considerable affinities between the two literary 'movements' as Herbert read recognised in his 'Form in Modern Poetry' (1932) when he applied the ideas of the major theorist of German Expressionism, Wilhelm Worringer to the organic forms developed by Eliot, Pound and the early Modernists. I am currently researching in the salient anthologies of the period to identify this influence - with some success. Objective four is perhaps the least developed aspect of the research. The aim was to explicitly discuss Hughes in a cross disciplinary context show the affinities of his Expressionist mode with work produced by other writers, visual artists, filmmakers, dramatists and composers. Although I have identified a range of artists with potential affinities with Hughes, I have not yet been able to research at the depth I need to, for the reasons given below. However, my provisional list of artists having affinities with Hughes includes: Alan Garner & William Golding (fiction) Peter Brook, Georg Kaiser & David Rudkin (drama); Robin Hardy and Nigel Kneale (film and television); Leonard Baskin, Kathe Kollwitz and Francis Bacon (visual and plastic arts). The research required to satisfy this objective is ongoing. Objective 5 has been very successfully met via the 'Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape' work (pedagogical materials, poetry competition, anthology and launches), with hundreds of poets at all levels of experience and expertise writing in the ambitious, visionary and subjective manner typical of Expressionism. I continue to develop this work further, in creative writing seminars and talks given at the Arvon Foundation, the Haworth Literary Festival and a number of other settings |
| Exploitation Route | There are three major ways in which this research might be taken forward: 1. In Hughes studies: by encouraging a greater focus on Hughes's art - the distinctiveness of his typical techniques, methods and approaches, his affinities and relationships with other artists across the genres. This would counter the recent tendency to evaluate Hughes based on the content of his poetry, particularly his recent identification as a 'nature' or 'ecopoet' (which is suspiciously like an argument based on imputed social relevancy), place tendentious biographical readings of Hughes's work on a sounder footing, and the debunk the tendency to 'read' Hughes as a maverick - when encountered in the wider context of international art and letters, Hughes's congeners, affinities and lines of artistic descent are much clearer. 2. In English Literature more generally, the research enables Hughes to be read as part of a much wider, and relatively neglected swathe of Visionary Modernist poets who emerged in the 1930s and 40s, and whose tendency persisted beyond that and emerged in the experimental and avant garde poetry of the 1960s and 1970s (the field and argument defined by James Leery in his 2020 anthology, 'Apocalypse'). This contributes to the 'demaverickisation' of Hughes and provides an counter to the biographically-derived understandings of him as artists and man which get in the way of a critical, readerly encounter with the work. 3. I am an experienced teacher of poetry in creative writing contexts in University, residential, community, school and other contexts. In those contexts I am often frustrated by the implicit expectations of the poetry community, which all too often focuses students short-lyric poems in quasi-received forms, with content derived from aspect of personal experience. Of course, good poetry can be generated in this way, and it is often appropriate for students. However, this method can lead to a privileging or craft over art, a suspicion of non-personal content and a levelling down conformity. The visionary subjectivity typical of Expressionism liberates ambition in writers and encourages them to break out of the lyric straightjacket and write freely & associatively, utilising the unconscious as much as the conscious, experimenting and improvising, shaping their work into organic forms and often writing at scale - in sequences rather than stand alone poems. They can express their own truth, freed from the tyranny of semantic transparency or representation. 'Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape' was very well received by participants, which encourages me that there is a a greater appetite for writin tpoetry in the Expressionist style in the poetry ecology. |
| Sectors | Communities and Social Services/Policy Creative Economy Education Environment Leisure Activities including Sports Recreation and Tourism Culture Heritage Museums and Collections |
| Description | Although the research has only just (31/12/2024) been completed, there is a sense that the creative writing aspect of the research is beginning to impact beyond academia. A number of non-academics have become aware of my research via the 'Ted Hughes's Expressionism' webpage, the British Library Conference and the 'Apocalyptic Landscape' workshops, competition and anthology. Consequently I have been invited by a number of individuals and organisations (Haworth Literary Festival, Arvon Foundation Lumb Bank, Garsdale Retreat and a number of writer's groups) to run explicitly Expressionist workshops. These workshops have included creative writing workshops and close readings of exemplary poems, including Sylvia Plath's 'The Swarm', Ted Hughes's 'Mayday on Holderness' and Peter Riley's, 'Truth, Justice and the Companionship of Owls', and without exception, were met with great enthusiasm by participants. This, combined with the traction developed by the Apocalyptic Landscape workshops and anthology have identified an appetite in the wider, non-academic poetry ecology for writing more ambitious poetry. I expect the work I have pioneered - and continue to pioneer - to proliferate more widely over the coming years, with the pedagogy being adopted and adapted by other teachers of poetry, including those who have participated in my research. I am currently thinking of writing a 'how-to' creative writing guide that might provide a synthesis that would function as a curriculum for writing in the Expressionist mode. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2024 |
| Sector | Creative Economy,Education,Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
| Impact Types | Cultural |
| Description | Ted Hughes's Expressionism: Ambition and Vision in Poetry Writing |
| Geographic Reach | Multiple continents/international |
| Policy Influence Type | Contribution to new or improved professional practice |
| URL | https://research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/tedhughes/expressionism/creativewriting/ |
| Description | British Library: Symposium |
| Organisation | The British Library |
| Department | Archives and Manuscripts |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
| PI Contribution | I organised, hosted a symposium, 'Ted Hughes's Expressionism: Visionary Subjectivity' in partnership with the BL's Helen Melody. I organised the conference - invited key speakers, led and managed the CfP process and organised the day. I also gave the keynote. |
| Collaborator Contribution | The BL provided the expertise of Helen Melody, venue, advertising & marketing, technical & administrative support and a small display of archival items. |
| Impact | Symposium, 15th September, 2023. |
| Start Year | 2023 |
| Description | 'Ted Hughes's Expressionism: Visionary Subjectivity'; British Library Conference (free to the general public) |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Around 90 members of the public attended the conference at the British Library. Around 20 accessed the recording of the event. Lively discussion punctuated the event after the panels and the whole event. The hitherto novel assertion that Ted Hughes is an Expressionist artist provoked much debate, and gained traction. Many attendees asked if there were plans for a publication including the conference papers, and some of the attendees subsequently attended the 'Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape' activities. I was particularly pleased that Ted Hughes's wife, Carol, attended and seemed very happy with proceedings. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| URL | https://research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/tedhughes/expressionism/symposium/ |
| Description | Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape (workshops, poetry competition, publication in anthology, showcasing work at readings) |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The process for creating the 'Apocalyptic Landscape: Poems from the Expressionist Poetry Workshop' was as follows. 1. I devised the pedagogical materials - designed to encourage participants to write in visionary, subjective, 'Expressionist' modes - in August/September 2023, and delivered them in a short-course of fortnightly, two hour, in-person workshops at the Birchcliffe Centre, Hebden Bridge, in October-January, 2023/24. Eighteen participants attended, ranging from published poets to complete beginners. Participants each wrote multiple poems. 12 submitted their work to the poetry competition (see below) and eleven were included in the anthology (see below). Nine of these poets performed their work at the launches and previews (see below). 2. I then widened access to the workshops by running an online (Teams) iteration of the course in January-February, 2024. 81 participants attended at least one of these sessions, with most of these attending a majority of sessions. Again, participants ranged from complete beginners to published poets. Poets from the British Isles, USA, Canada, Australia, Switzerland and France attended. Of these, 49 poets submitted to the poetry competition, with 19 being successful. In March 2024 I launched the poetry competition that was to provide the basis for the anthology 'Apocalyptic Landscape: Poems from the Expressionist Poetry Workshop'. At this point I made the pedagogical materials available to all (freely downloadable from the project webpage) and publicised the competition widely on social media and via my networks. This generated 172 entries (of a very high standard) from which the work of 45 poets was selected for inclusion. 'Apocalyptic Landscape: Poems from the Expressionist Poetry Workshop' was published in October, 2024. All poets included received a free copy of the anthology and were invited to read at three events: a 'preview' event held at the Leeds Library on 11th September (4 anthologised poets read - 22 in attendance); a launch & talk about the project at the Ilkley Poetry Festival (myself and six featured poets - 71 in attendance) and a bigger, carnivalesque launch featuring 19 poets at the Leeds Library on 23rd October - 33 in attendance. Many of the poets involved in these processes indicated that participation in the research had resulted in a permanent shift in their poetic practice to writing (variously) more ambitious, subjective, more visionary and more experimental work than they had been accustomed to, and several are developing the work they began on the various workshops into book-length sequences, for example, one developing a sequence about a difficult and at times feral childhood via the metaphorical and symbolic use of various forms of and understandings of 'meat', another presenting a vision of the M62 corridor, and another conflating autobiography with their encounter with Irish megalithic sites. Anthology publication was for several of the poets, the first time they had been published, and it was particularly pleasing to see their work featured alongside some established poets, and a swathe poets making their names in the small press and magazine world. Several poets who read at the launches were performing before an audience for the first time, and I was able, with the assistance of other, more experienced poets, to provide advice about how best to perform and project. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023,2024 |
| URL | https://research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/tedhughes/expressionism/ |
| Description | Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape: The Expressionist Poetry Workshop |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The 'Writing the Apocalyptic Landscape' creative writing (poetry) workshops comprised/comprises several elements: a five session 'in person' sequences of workshops; a five session online iteration of the workshops; freely downloadable workshop materials; a poetry competition; the publication of an anthology (in September, 2024); and a number of opportunities for successful entrants to read their work at launches and events (2024/25). 18 attended the in person workshops, 81 the online iteration and around 200 (estimate) have downloaded the pedagogical materials. The contract with Valley Press for anthology publication is signed and a timeline for editing and book production has been established. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023,2024 |
| URL | https://research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/tedhughes/expressionism/creativewriting/ |