Plath and Hughes Poetry

Plath’s poem is a defiant rejection of social convention, particularly the patriarchy and the male-gaze.

Though Hughes’ work similarly explores the passion with which Plath lived her life, it does so with a much gentler tone, and Hughes ultimately mourns for what is lost by a life of such destruction – innocence – whereas Plath celebrates it for that very reason: the ruin it causes. 

Both poems convey a tone of optimism, and affection, even if there is no clear outcome. Indeed, the audience is left to reflect on their own understanding of what happens after the poems end – we know that Plath gave birth to her son, Nick, and that her relationship with Hughes ended in pain and that Plath took her own life shortly after. 

The use of colour symbolism in Red allows the reader insight into Hughes’ struggle to grapple with Plath’s psychosis and the effect it had on their relationship. He ends the poem by saying that Plath would be better suited to the colour blue – representing innocence – but of course, we know that Plath was never able to achieve such liberation from her psychosis.

Fulbright Scholars is also an exercise in memory, as Hughes recalls the past with an affectionate tone. There is a mystery to the future, with a feeling that truth will be revealed with time. But again, we know that the story of Plath and Hughes is to end in tragedy. 

It must also be noted that Hughes makes no reference to the children he fathered with Plath.

The gift in A Birthday Present is death; that present is received in Lady Lazarus. 

Throughout ‘Birthday Letters’ Hughes avoids mentioning Plath’s death directly. But in A Picture of Otto, he explores Plath’s trauma through his descent into the underworld, by which he distances himself from responsibility for Plath’s death. 

The dissonance between the texts is thus that Plath directly confronts her death, while Hughes seeks to avoid it. 

In 'Daddy'Plath offers an unrestrained outpouring of emotion that is painful for both her and the target of her fury – Otto. In characterising her father as the epitome of evil, Plath disrupts social convention. But ultimately, we understand that the greatest trauma suffered by Plath was the loss of her father. 

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In 'The Shot' Hughes paints himself as a victim in Plath’s struggle to confront the trauma she suffered because of Otto’s death. He is simply something she uses to attempt to cope with that trauma. 

But ultimately, Hughes admits that he was unable to help Plath

The bees represent Plath’s psychosis: when they attack Hughes, Plath attempts to restrain them, to no avail. Hughes blames Otto for the attack. Hughes is once more the victim, caught in the middle of Plath’s relationship with Otto. 

The bees can also be understood to represent Otto. So, in a way, the poem depicts the grasp Otto now has on Hughes, through his daughter. 

Hughes reflects how he has assumed the role of a father-figure in Plath’s life, a development that he assumes Otto will be furious about. But, Hughes also suggests that the two men are now entangled, forever stuck together in Plath’s mind. Hughes is once more disempowered; he is simply a spectator. 

Both these poems are about the same event however while Plath recalls her illness with melodrama, Hughes instead approaches it from a position of practicality and realism. Another dissonance: Plath indicates that the source of some of her pain may be her husband’s infidelity, but Hughes is silent on the matter. This is especially significant considering that he was writing years after the event in question. 

Plath finds amusement in her father’s beekeeping hobby. Hughes, however, suggests that Plath’s father played the role of god in her life.While Plath expresses her power over the bees – an assertion that is undercut by the doubt created in the line ‘The box is only temporary’ (we know that it wasn’t), Hughes instead posits that the bees really were out of her control.