Edward James Hughes, better known as Ted Hughes, was an English poet and writer of books for children. He served as Poet Laureate of Great Britain from 1984 until his death in 1998. In addition to his poetry, he remains known for the tragic circumstances surrounding the deaths of his first wife, poet Sylvia Plath, who died by suicide in 1963, and his partner Assia Wevill, who died by suicide in 1969 after killing their daughter, Shura. Plath made sure that her own children were safe before her death.
Hughes was born on August 17, 1930, in Mytholmroyd, Yorkshire. He spent his first six years on a farm before moving with his family to Mexborough, where his father opened a newspaper and tobacco shop. In 1945 he began writing poetry, and in 1946 some of his poems were published in the school magazine. In 1950 he began studying English at Cambridge University, later switching to Anthropology and Archaeology in 1953.
In 1957 his first poetry collection, The Hawk in the Rain, was published. Drawing heavily on the natural world and rural life, it received considerable critical acclaim and established Hughes as an important new poetic voice. In 1959 he won the Galbraith Award, worth $5,000.
Hughes met Sylvia Plath at Cambridge in 1956, and they married that same year. They separated in 1962, and Plath died by suicide in February 1963. After her death, Hughes became the executor of her literary estate and oversaw the publication of several of her works. He also acknowledged destroying the journal covering the final months of her life, explaining that he did so because he did not want their children to read it. His role in managing Plath's literary legacy remained controversial.
In 1970 his poetry collection Crow: From the Life and Songs of the Crow was published and became one of his most important and influential works. The same year he married Carol Orchard, his second wife. In 1974 he was awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry. Hughes was appointed Poet Laureate in 1984, a position he held until his death.
In 1998, shortly before his death, Hughes published Birthday Letters, a collection of eighty-eight poems dealing directly with his relationship with Sylvia Plath. It was the first time he had addressed their troubled marriage so openly, and the book attracted enormous public and critical attention.
Ted Hughes died on October 28, 1998, in Devon, at the age of 68, after suffering from cancer.
