Ted Hughes and John Keats are two different poets with similar ideas for their poetry. They both write about nature and animals in their poetry but each have different views on nature and animals. Ted Hughes writes about nature as a dominant force but John Keats has more peaceful views on nature. In this piece of coursework I will compare and contrast the poems done by Ted Hughes, which are ‘The Wind’, ‘October Dawn’, ‘Hawk Roosting’ and ‘The Jaguar’, with the poems written by John Keats, which are ‘Ode to a Nightingale’ and ‘To Autumn’.
Each poet uses a selection of Alliteration, Assonance, Caesura, Similes, Metaphors, Oxymoron, Onomatopoeia, Enjambment and Personification to get their views across about nature and animals. Ted Hughes writes about nature as a very powerful and dominant force. To do this he portrayed it through the elements, and animals. In ‘The Wind’ he gives the poem a sense of the beauty of the wind. “The hills had new places, and wind wielded Blade-light, luminous black and emerald… ” And it also gives a very strong sense of violence of wind and the elements.
“Through the wind that dented the balls of my eyes. ” “The wind flung a magpie away and a black- Back gull bent like an iron bar slowly. ” The ‘brunt wind’ describing the wind as powerful and merciless. The metaphor ‘that dented the balls of my eyes’ is describing the wind as so strong you could feel your eyes being pushed by the might of the wind. Also the simile ‘… a black-back gull bent like a n iron bar slowly’ is describing the wind being strong enough to blow the birds off course. In October dawn he yet again gives the elements a sense of beauty. “First a skin, delicately here
Restraining a ripple from the air;” And it also gives a sense of power and dominance to the element involved in this poem, Ice. “… While a fist of cold Squeezes the fire at the core of the world” This last quotation from October Dawn is saying that the cold has power enough to freezes the fire at the centre of the earth. October, written by Ted Hughes, is a different view of autumn to John Keats. While Ted Hughes portrays a cold and icy view of autumn. “… While a fist of cold Squeezes the fire at the core of the world” Ted Hughes makes autumn be the beginning of winter.
John Keats, however, gives a warm and happy feeling of autumn, as if it is the end of summer. “For summer has o’er-brimmed their clammy Cells. ” John Keats gives nature a more tranquil and peaceful view of nature. “Dance, and Provencal song, and sunburnt mirth! ” (Ode to a Nightingale) “With a sweet kernel; to set budding more, And still more, later flowers for the bees. ” (To Autumn) But Ted Hughes gives the impression that nature is very powerful and renders man helpless. “In chairs, in front of the great fire, we grip Our hearts and cannot entertain book, thought Or each other” (Wind)
Man is feeble, frightened and trapped, while the wind is strong, dominant, and powerful. Man is at the mercy of the wind and the elements and nature. John Keats writes about how nature works to the benefit of mankind. “Conspiring with him how to load and bless With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run: To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,” (To Autumn) The sun conspires with autumn to produce the fruit, which supplies man with food and drink. In Hawk Roosting, Ted Hughes makes nature out to be selfish and that it has no care for anyone or anything but itself.
“The convenience of the high trees! The airs buoyancy and the sun’s ray Are of advantage to me: And the earth’s face upward for my inspection. ” Both poets make good use of alliteration, assonance, caesura, similes, metaphors, oxymoron, onomatopoeia and enjambment. In Wind, Ted Hughes uses much enjambment to add more dramatic effect. “Floundering black astride and blinding wet Till day rose;” “Our hearts and cannot entertain book, thought, Or each other. ” In the first one it is as if wind has carried on through the verse onto the next.
Ted Hughes also uses powerful metaphors, similes and personification. “Winds stampeding the fields… ” (Wind) “… Ice Has got its spearhead into place. ” (October Dawn) John Keats, however, uses a wide selection of everything, but does not use as much personification as Ted Hughes. I conclude that Ted Hughes has a quite different writing style to John Keats. Ted Hughes gives the impression of nature being a juggernaut that none can stand in its way and very powerful and often violent, where as John Keats offers the other personality of nature and how peaceful and gentle it can be.
