Birthday Letters

Birthday Letters is a deeply personal collection of 88 poems by Ted Hughes, published in 1998, written in catharsis following his wife Sylvia Plath’s suicide. 
 
It is believed that he was constructing his oeuvre over a period of at least 25 years, from around the time of Plath’s death in 1963 until its date of publication. After publishing his wife’s intimate and hugely successful poetry collection Ariel after her death, Hughes’ Birthday Letters was then released and widely viewed as a textual conversation given the couple’s famously turbulent marriage. His male perspective sheds a different light on the relationship, thereby highlighting the disparities arising from gendered voices in literature and in life.

Various meanings and interpretations can be extracted from Birthday Letters. A text that deal with topics such as mental illness, gender, sex, and relationships is always going to be controversial, irrespective of contextual differences. Hughes’ poetry confronts Plath’s confessions and can be viewed as his attempt to justify his actions as a negligent husband and ease his self- inflicted notoriety. He also refers on several occasions to Plath’s father, Otto, as either a plea or a source of blame for her mental state. Through his work, we as responders witness the initial love that Hughes felt for his wife, and follow his tumultuous journey through marriage and loss.

Depending on your opinions of Hughes, you may find his poems intimate and confessional, or indulgent and self-absorbed while appropriating or overshadowing Plath’s voice and pain. Through these works, Hughes portrays himself as both a grieving lover and a bewildered observer, wrestling with his responsibility in Plath’s tragic fate. The release of Birthday Letters sparked controversy in its day, reigniting debates over Hughes’ role in Plath’s life and death, and continues to be viewed as a controversial work. Critics have questioned whether the poems were acts of rewriting history or attempts to reclaim his narrative from decade of public vilification.

Timeline

• 17 Aug 1930: Born in Yorkshire, England to William Henry and Edith Hughes.
• 1949–1951: Completed two years of national service in the Royal Air Force; a time where he had nothing to do but read Shakespeare.
• 1952: Started studying English at Cambridge University, but later changed his major to Archaeology and Anthropology.
• 25 Feb 1956: Met Sylvia Plath at a literary party at the university.
• 16 June 1956: Married Plath, honeymooning in Benidorm, Spain.
• 1957: Won an award for his poetry collection The Hawk in the Rain, establishing an international reputation as a poet of stature. Plath and Hughes moved to Massachusetts, USA.
• 1960: The couple moved to Primrose Hill, London.
• 1 Apr 1960: Their daughter, Frieda Hughes, was born.
• 17 Jan 1962: Their son, Nicholas Hughes, was born.
• May 1962: Assia Wevill (German–Jewish poet) and her third husband, Canadian poet David Wevill, were invited to spend the evening dining with Plath and Hughes at their home. It is believed that soon after this Hughes began an affair with Assia.
• June 1962: Plath attempted suicide by driving off the road.
• July 1962: Hughes and Plath separated from their marriage. Hughes started dating Assia.
• 11 Feb 1963: Plath died by suicide.
• 1965: Hughes published Plath’s poetry collection, Ariel.
• 3 Mar 1965: Hughes’ daughter, Shura, was born with Assia.
• 1969: Hughes and Assia ended their affair.
• 23 Mar 1969: Assia died by suicide and also killed their child, Shura, aged 4.
• 1970: Hughes married Carol Orchard.
• 1998: Birthday Letters was published.
• 28 Oct 1998: Hughes suffered a heart attack and died.