The raw intensity of Ted Hughes

This week’s Tuesday Book Club pick is something different—Birthday Letters by Ted Hughes, a poetry collection that feels as personal as it gets. These poems, written over decades but only published in 1998, give us an intimate, unfiltered glimpse into Hughes’s relationship with Sylvia Plath, one of the most famous and tragic literary figures of the 20th century.

If you’ve ever been drawn to poetry that feels like someone handing you their heart, this is that kind of book.

What’s Birthday Letters about?

For over 35 years after Sylvia Plath’s death, Ted Hughes remained almost completely silent about their relationship. Then, in Birthday Letters, he broke that silence with 88 poems that trace their time together—from the electric spark of their first meeting to the tangled, painful years that followed.

Hughes writes with rawness and reflection, sometimes with tenderness, sometimes with regret. These poems don’t try to explain or justify, but they do tell a story—of love, of creative energy, of misunderstanding, of grief.

Why read Birthday Letters?

Even if you’re not usually a poetry reader, this collection pulls you in. Hughes’s writing is vivid, immediate and deeply emotional. Some poems feel like conversations with Plath, others like letters never sent. They make you feel the weight of memory, the way a single moment can linger for a lifetime.

And then there’s the bigger picture—what happens when two powerful creative forces collide? How does love survive under that kind of intensity? Birthday Letters doesn’t give easy answers, but it does open a door into one of literature’s most complex relationships.

Let’s talk about it
Do you have a favourite poem from Birthday Letters? How do you feel about Hughes finally breaking his silence after so many years? And do these poems change the way you see Plath, Hughes, or their work?

Jump into the conversation using #TuesdayBookClub and #BirthdayLetters on X (formerly Twitter) and Bluesky. Whether you’ve read it before or are just discovering it, we’d love to hear your thoughts.