Identity and Nature in Ted Hughes's Volume Wodwo

Abstract

In this essay my aim is to represent Ted Hughes’s thoughts about human life and nature in the volume Wodwo. I would like to illustrate how he portrays his characters’ inner world and how he describes their effort for harmony between the conscious and the subconscious mind. I endeavour to show how the characters in Hughes’s works achieve psychic wholeness or how they fail in their struggle. I try to expose the relationship between man and nature, including the power of nature, the modern man’s alienation from nature, the repression of ancient instincts and the liberating of repressed natural energies. I attempt to represent how Ted Hughes applies the healing power of poetry, how he uses the Shamanic journey and the patterns of Oriental mythology in his works, in order to help his protagonists reach the subconscious and find the opportunity for their inner balance and a healthy, harmonic life.