Rain Charm for the Duchy: And Other Laureate Poems

Description

In 1984 Ted Hughes was made Poet Laureate. Since then, he has fulfilled his duties by writing a number of poems celebrating important royal occasions. These are major works, calling on the Laureate's full powers and embodying a complete vision of royalty and nationhood. Rain-Charm for the Duchy collects these poems for the first time. It also contains a section of notes, throwing light on the context and genesis of each poem.

Ted Hughes was born on 17 August 1930 in Mytholmroyd, a small mill town in West Yorkshire. His father made portable wooden buildings. The family moved to Mexborough, a coal-mining town in South Yorkshire, when Hughes was seven. His parents took over a newsagent and tobacconist shop, and eventually he went to the local grammar school.In 1948 Hughes won an Open Exhibition to Pembroke College, Cambridge. Before going there, he served two years National Service in the Royal Air Force. Between leaving Cambridge and becoming a teacher, he worked at various jobs, finally as a script-reader for Rank at their Pinewood Studios.In 1956 Hughes married the American poet Sylvia Plath, who died in 1963, and they had two children. He remarried in 1970. He was awarded the OBE in 1977, created Poet Laureate in December 1984 and appointed to the Order of Merit in 1998. He died in October 1998.Ted Hughes's first book, The Hawk in the Rain, was published by Fabe