Ted Hughes/Sylvia Plath and 3/23 class

Because Plath is one of my favorite poets - and Hughes one of my least favorite - I was interested in their son's suicide. Intrigued because I had read that Hughes' second wife also killed herself, and their daughter. I read a couple on-line newspaper articles about Nicholas Hughes' suicide, hoping to find details about second wife's death. As it turns out, one article said she was his wife - the other, his lover. In any case, Hughes left Plath in 1962 for Assia Gutmann Wevill - Plath killed herself in 1963, Wevill and Hughes had a daughter in 1965 - Wevill killed herself and their 4 yr. old daughter in 1969 in a "copycat" suicide - gassing them both. This certainly has the components of a tragedy - the death of a child, and 46 years after his mother killed herself, the son committed suicide too. Hughes had 2 out of 3 of his wives/lovers commit suicide, and 2 out of 3 of his children deaths related to suicide. Personally, I think it has something to do with Hughes. Pictures of Plath, Hughes, their children and his widow are at:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1164077/Ted-Hughes-Sylvia-Plath


Disturbing painting, "The Flaying of Marsyas" @:
www.artchive.com/artchive/T/titian/flaying_marsyas

Guess I'm all about embracing tragedy, pain, and suffering tonight.

Found some interesting backstory to Ovid and his banishment to Tomi in 8 a.d. by Roman Emperor Augustus. Augustus was trying to give the Romans the sense of a morally upright state - he had laws passed regulating activities such as premarital sex, and enforced economic measures that penalized people for avoiding marriage and reproduction. His daughter, Julia the Elder was caught in an affair with Marc Anthony and was banished. When his granddaughter, Julia the Younger, was caught in similar circumstances, she was also banished. It seems Ovid "playfully" criticized Augustus's attempts at legislating morality, especially in his first book "Loves" (or Amores), and coincidentially he was banished the same year as Julia, the Younger.

In a critical overview of Ovid and "Metamorphoses" - it was said his "influence on Western art, music, drama, poetry, and literature cannot be overstated." There was Ovidian graffiti on the walls of Pompeii, the 12th century was called the Ovidian age because so many poets wrote imitations of Ovidian hexameters and used themes from the Metamorphoses. Ovid was the most influential of the classical poets during the Renaissance with painters, sculptors, poets, and dramatists.

Last interesting note - "In the relation to the Judeo-Christian tradition, the gods of the Metamorphoses are very much like the God of the Old Testament: their anger is profound, and they do not hesitate to take revenge upon humankind as a means of teaching lessons never to be forgotten."