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* Ted Hughes, Thistles and the Origins of English
page 1

Apart from looking at an excellent poem, this section searches for answers to the question: Why study the development of language to look at C20th literature? How can looking at the origins of words help us talk about different styles of writing? Let the Ted Hughes poem speak first:

Read the poem aloud as you follow it on the screen, or read it aloud in class. The sounds of the words are important too.

Thistles, by Ted Hughes

Against the rubber tongues of cows and the hoeing hands of men
Thistles spike the summer air
Or crackle open under a blue-black pressure.

Every one a revengeful burst
Of resurrection, a grasped fistful
Of splintered weapons and Icelandic frost thrust up

From the underground stain of a decayed Viking.
They are like pale hair and the gutturals of dialects.
Every one manages a plume of blood.

Then they grow grey, like men.
Mown down, it is a feud. Their sons appear,
Stiff with weapons, fighting back over the same ground.

© Thistles from New Selected Poems by Ted Hughes published by Faber & Faber 1995

Bullet The title of this powerful poem may have led us into thinking it would be about wild flowers but how does it sound?
Bullet What kind of words does Hughes use?

Continue to the exercises on the next page.

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