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Telegraph Wires
humanity is still beholden to the whims of nature.
SUMMARY Further reminding people of their own smallness and fragility,
Set up telegraph wires over a big tract of uncultivated land, and the speaker envisions "a bright face" looking down on humanity
you've made something that seems alive when you listen to it. from "the revolving ballroom of space" and using these same
wires to “Draw[] out the tones / That empty human bones.” This
These wires let people in different towns talk to each other,
face might represent God, the moon, or the universe itself
their messages traveling across the grasses between them. Of
personified
personified, while those “tones” likely refer to life-shattering
course, these wires are still exposed to the elements.
messages (informing someone of the death of a loved one,
It's so strange and fragile, this device that gets picked up and perhaps).
played like an instrument.
Basically, the speaker suggests that receiving devastating
The ear hears the wires' unnatural songs and then shrinks messages via telegraph wire, a remarkable piece of human
away. technology, is the universe’s way of putting humanity back in its
In the spinning dancefloor of space, floating above this swath of place. Technology can't change the basic terms of life, including
wild land, there's a shining face that pulls devastating sounds the stark, inescapable reality that everyone will die. The
(i.e., messages) from the telegraph wires that utterly hollow reference to space makes human achievements seem especially
people out. fleeting and insignificant, asking the reader to consider the true
meaning of humankind's relationship with the tools it creates.

THEMES Where this theme appears in the poem:

• Lines 1-12
HUMANITY'S RELATIONSHIP WITH
TECHNOLOGY
"Telegraph Wires" explores the relationship between LINE-BY
LINE-BY-LINE
-LINE ANAL
ANALYSIS
YSIS
human beings and modern technology. On the one hand, the
poem seems to admire how technology allows for ever more LINES 1-2
far-reaching and efficient methods of communicating. Yet the
Take telegraph wires, ...
speaker also seems to find these strange, delicate, and
... in your ear.
decidedly nonhuman creations unsettling, in part because they
can so casually transmit the kind of devastating messages that The poem starts by asking the reader to "Take" telegraph wires
“empty human bones”—that is, that remind people of their own and combine them with a moor (an uncultivated and usually
mortality and fragility. The poem implies that modern rather unforgiving area of land typical of the English
technology is not as miraculous as it appears and that human countryside).
beings don’t always understand all the implications of the These wires might transmit actual telegraph signals, but it's just
things they create. as likely that the speaker is talking about telephone
At first, the telegraph wires in the poem seem like a testament conversations; when telephones came along they sometimes
to human ingenuity and dominance over the world. For one repurposed the older technology. In any case, these wires are
thing, they can link places and people together across sending signals over a big, empty, wild plot of land.
previously uncrossable distances. The speaker specifically asks Without the wires overhead directing conversations this way
the reader to imagine the effect that telegraph wires have on a and that, the moor is a quiet, "lonely" place. The arrival of this
"lonely moor," a vast expanse of uncultivated land. The wires new technology, however, extends communication (and,
help humanity cross pieces of the land that it hasn’t yet tamed implicitly, community) across this desolate moor, making it
and make quiet scenes “come alive in your ear.” Wires in place, metaphorically "come[] alive in your ear" (in the sense that you
"towns whisper" to each other in conversation, a seemingly can now pick up the phone to listen to the message transmitted
miraculous achievement. across these wires).
This technology is more delicate than people think, however. The caesur
caesuraa after "together" creates a dramatic pause before
While the wires can overcome the restrictions of distance, they the following sentence: "The thing comes alive in your ear"—the
can't "hide from the bad weather"; one strong storm could take new creature, the telephone system, suddenly lives! These
them out, suggesting that for all its technological prowess, opening lines sound like a science experiment, one that speaks

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to both the wonders and weirdness of technology: "take this, communication they facilitate (again, the speaker is likely
mix it with that, and bam: it comes alive." Readers might even talking about telephone conversations).
think of the famous "He's alive! Alive!" line from the 1931 film There are a couple of possible interpretations for lines 5 and 6:
Frankenstein.
On that note, this notion of being alive subtly implies that So oddly, so daintily made
human beings can't fully control the things they create: It is picked up and played.
technologies take on a life and logic of their own.
This "It" here might refer to the telephone or the telegraph wire
LINES 3-4 itself. Perhaps it is the people of the towns who "pick[] up and
Towns whisper to ... play[]" the phone, dialing numbers like notes on a musical scale.
... the bad weather. Alternatively, these lines might refer to the "bad weather" of
The telegraph wires set up in the first stanza now allow "towns" line 4 toying with the wires (in the sense that the wind may
to "whisper" to each other "across the heather" (that is, across thrash them about).
the grass and vegetation of the "lonely moor"). In either interpretation, the poem once again stresses the
Each "town" here is a meton
metonym
ym: it represents the people who strangeness of this everyday technology. The phone (or wire) is
live in those towns and are physically separated by untamed "odd" and "daintily made," suggesting that it's fragile, weird, and
land. Now, that land is crossable—in the form of the perhaps even a little showy. The word order here is itself
disembodied voice at least! In a way, then, human technology strange, the subject "It" not appearing until the second line of
has dominated the restrictions of the natural world. It has the couplet
couplet. The sounds of the lines are also rather "dainty."
brought people together, something the poem's language itself Note the popping /p/ alliter
alliteration
ation ("ppicked," "pplayed"), the /d/ and
reflects with the swift diacope of "Towns" in line 3: /l/ consonance ("oddl
ddly," daintilly," "madde," pllayedd"), and the short
/ih/ assonance ("IIt is piicked").
Towns whisper to towns over the heather. The fourth stanza then describes the actual sounds transmitted
through the telegraph wires. If the telephone/telegraph wires
Interestingly, though, the speaker describes this are like a kind of instrument, this stanza describes their musical
communication as a "whisper," rather than, say, talk or style. The sounds, or "airs," from these wires are "unearthly."
conversation. A "whisper" suggests that this connection is The speaker feels that there's something alien and unnatural
weak, and it might also suggest that there's something ghostly about this technology and the way it transits disembodied
and spectral about it. Readers might get the sense that the voices to the "ear."
promise of the telephone (and technology more generally) is The word "ear" here is both literal and an example of
not quite what it appears to be. synecdoche
synecdoche: it stands in for the people listening to these
The speaker builds on that idea in the very next line: though the "unearthly airs." Reducing people to their "ears" might feel
telegraph wires do transform the terms of human interaction, strange and uncomfortable to the reader because it removes
the poem stresses that technology is more fragile than people people from one of their own senses. And that's what these
tend to think. As the speaker says in line 4: wires do too: separate voices from the people speaking.
Upon hearing the "unearthly airs" transmitted over the
But the wires cannot hide from the bad weather. telegraph wires, the "ear [...] withers"—that is, shrinks away,
perhaps in horror. That might be because the ear can sense that
The wires might allow people to chat across far distances, but there's something "unearthly" about this technology and
those wires are also exposed to the elements; one bad storm or distrusts it. Alternatively, the speaker is talking about what
strong gust of wind could take them out, meaning that happens when bad news gets transmitted across the
humanity's dominance over the natural world isn't all that wires—when the "ear hears" messages that it doesn't like.
secure. Even static from bad weather might sometimes cause
crackles on the lines, as if nature were intervening in a creepy LINES 9-12
voice to say, "don't forget about me." In the revolving ...
... empty human bones.
LINES 5-8
In the final two couplets
couplets, the poem takes an unsettling turn. The
So oddly, so ...
speaker metaphorically describes space as a "revolving
... hears, and withers!
ballroom" that's "Bowed over the moor." The speaker is talking
The third and fourth stanzas form a kind of pair: both comment about the night sky here, which revolves because of the earth's
on the strangeness of the telegraph wires and the type of rotation and looks like a glitzy "ballroom" thanks to the

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sparkling glitter of the stars. It's "bowed" in the sense that it
looks like a curved dome above the earth. POETIC DEVICES
A familiar character lurks in this "revolving ballroom": the ALLITERATION
moon. Its "bright face" presides over the sum of human activity,
watching people in various towns as they pick up their Alliter
Alliteration
ation adds subtle emphasis and lyricism to the poem.
telephones and make their calls. The poem even ascribes Note the crisp /t/ sounds of line 3, for example:
agency to this personified moon, presenting not as some
passive observer but as a kind of puppet master (in this sense, Towns whisper to towns over the heather.
the moon is effectively standing in for God or a personified
version of fate). The moon "draws out [...] tones" from the Those flitting consonants not only make the line more sonically
telegraph wires, as though orchestrating what's going on down interesting, but they also subtly evoke the connection being
below. described: the /t/ sound makes its way across the line, from one
"ttown" to the next, just as the signal from those wires moves
These aren't just any "tones," either: they're ones that "empty
from one place to another.
human bones." This chilling description might be a reference to
bad news traveling along the telegraph wires (say, about the Another interesting moment of alliteration comes in line 6,
death of a loved one). Even as human beings create technology where the sharp /p/ sound echoes in "p picked" and "pplayed" (as
that connects them across the earth, they can't evade the well as in the word "upp," which is an example of consonance
consonance).
reality of suffering and death. Such things will simply travel The speaker sees the telephone and/or the wires as being like a
along the wires like everything else. musical instrument, and this alliteration is itself playful and
musical. Later, the strong /b/ sounds of "b ballroom," "B
Bowed,"
and "b
bright" might evoke the weighty gaze of the moon as it
SYMBOLS looks down on human activities below.
Finally, alliteration joins the "ttelegraph wires" with the "ttones /
THE TELEGRAPH WIRES that Empty human bones" in the poem's closing coupletcouplet—a
flourish that adds emphasis to this disturbing statement about
In addition to being a literal presence in the poem, the relationship between people and the things they create.
the telegraph wires here also symbolize the
strangeness and ultimate frailty of human technology.
Where Alliter
Alliteration
ation appears in the poem:
At first, these wires seem pretty powerful: they join towns
across the "lonely moor," allowing for human communication • Line 1: “Take telegraph”
across a vast expanse of untamed land. In this way, they • Line 3: “Towns,” “to towns”
represent a new era of interconnectivity. They stand like tall • Line 6: “picked,” “played”
statues honoring technology's power to reduce distances and • Line 9: “ballroom”
bring people together. • Line 10: “Bowed,” “bright”
• Line 11: “telegraph,” “tones”
At the same time, the poem suggests that this connection is
somewhat superficial. The messages these wires pass are
CAESURA
"unearthly" and make ears "wither[]," or shrivel up and recoil.
This technology, then, hasn't necessarily led to positive Caesur
Caesurae
ae appear in three of the poem's five stanzas. Perhaps
progress for humanity. The fact that the wires are "daintily the most striking appears in the first stanza:
made" and can be taken out by "bad weather" also implies that
this new technological era is built on shifting sands and Take telegraph wires, a lonely moor,
nowhere near as powerful and permanent as it appears to be. And fit them together
together.. The thing comes alive in your
ear.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:
The full stop after together creates a dramatic pause that adds
• Lines 1-4: “Take telegraph wires, a lonely moor, / And fit a touch of suspense. It sounds almost like the speaker is
them together. The thing comes alive in your ear. / performing (or getting the reader to imagine) a magic trick or
Towns whisper to towns over the heather. / But the demonstrating an impressive chemical reaction: take the wires,
wires cannot hide from the bad weather. ” stick them together with the moor, and then bang! Something
new "comes alive."
The caesurae elsewhere in the poem (including in the poem's
first line) aren't quite as dramatic, but they're still evocative. In

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line 5, for example, the comma after "oddly" grants a pause as
the speaker revises the description of these wires. They're not • Line 1: “Take telegraph”
just odd, the speaker says, but "daintily made"—that is, delicate: • Line 3: “Towns,” “to towns”
• Line 5: “oddly,” “daintily made”
So oddly, so daintily made • Line 6: “picked up,” “played”
• Line 7: “unearthly airs ”
With that slight pause and the anaphor
anaphoraa of "so," readers might • Line 8: “ear hears,” “withers”
even feel that this stanza itself is "oddly" and "daintily made." • Line 9: “revolving ballroom”
• Line 10: “Bowed,” “bright”
There's another pause in the middle of line 8:
• Line 11: “telegraph,” “tones”
• Line 12: “empty human bones”
The ear hears, and withers!

That comma works a lot like the full stop in the poem's first
ENJAMBMENT
stanza: it creates a moment of tension and drama in which Enjambment adds momentum and moments of anticipation to
readers may wonder what happens to the ear after it "hears." the poem. In lines 7-8, for example, the poem swiftly moves
across the line break after "airs" and straight into "the ear
Where Caesur
Caesuraa appears in the poem: hears":

• Line 1: “wires, a” Such unearthly airs

• Line 2: “together. The” The ear hears, and withers!
• Line 5: “oddly, so”
• Line 8: “hears, and” The fluid motion here might evoke the movement of those
• Line 10: “moor, a” "airs" themselves across the telegraph wires and the speed
with which they can make an ear recoil.
CONSONANCE
The final two couplets then feature consistent enjambment
Consonance
Consonance, like alliter
alliteration
ation, adds some subtle music to the that pulls readers down the page without pause:
poem and also calls readers' attention to certain words and
phrases. For example, note the consonance in the third stanza: [...] of space
Bowed over the moor, a bright face
So oddl
ddly, so daintilly mad
de Dr
Draaws out of telegraph wires the tones
It is picked upp and played. That empty [...]

All this consonance slows the line down as readers chew over These lines suggest that human beings are subject to forces
these repeating /d/, /l/, and /p/ sounds. The poem calls attention beyond their control, represented here by the "bright face" of
to itself at this moment as something crafted—as something the moon looking down from space and pulling devastating
that's perhaps as "daintily," or delicately, made as those wires "tones" from those telegraph wires. The way that the poem
themselves. barrels toward its conclusion might evoke a loss of control, the
Another interesting moment of consonance comes in the sense of being pulled toward one's fate.
following stanza, with the repetition of the /r/ and /z/ sounds:
Where Enjambment appears in the poem:
Such unearrthly airs
rs
• Lines 5-6: “made / It”
The earr hears
rs, and withers
rs!
• Lines 7-8: “airs / The”
• Lines 9-10: “space / Bowed”
There's an internal rh
rhyme
yme here too ("ear hears"), and some near
• Lines 10-11: “face / Draws”
assonance
assonance; those /er/, /ear/, and /air/ sounds aren't exactly the
• Lines 11-12: “tones / That”
same, but they're pretty close! As a result, the lines again feel
carefully constructed, almost like a tongue twister. This
supports the idea of the telegraph wires as deliverers of a METAPHOR
strange, unnerving kind of human vocalization. Through personification
personification, the speaker imbues both the natural
world and technology with a sense of independent will and
Where Consonance appears in the poem: agency. At the same time, notice how the poem doesn't explicitly
mention actual human beings until its final line. This absence

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reflects the poem's main thematic ideas: that human beings This is an example of metonymy because it's not really the
aren't always in control of the technology they create, and also towns that do the whispering—it's their inhabitants. This device
that we're not all that powerful in the grand scheme of the has a few effects on the poem:
universe.
In the first line, the speaker describes the moor over which the • For one thing, using "towns" is stranger and more in
telegraph wires carry signals as "lonely." This is more keeping with the poem's tone than saying "people
specifically an example of pathetic fallacy
fallacy, with the speaker talk to people." The image of towns whispering is
casting human emotions onto an inanimate landscape. The intentionally spooky.
• It provides the reader with a sense of scale. These
speaker then highlights technology's ability to overcome the
telegraph wires represent a fundamental and wide-
loneliness of this landscape by saying that telegraph wires allow
reaching change in the way human beings interact,
towns to "whisper over the heather."
connecting entire regions that, not long before, one
Again, notice how the speaker imbues the human creations would need to walk for days to traverse!
with agency without mentioning people themselves: the • It suggests the sheer amount of users of the
telegraph wires create a "thing" that "comes alive" (evoking the telegraph wires. This is widespread technology,
way that human technology can take on a life of its own). And changing the very nature of communication. At the
the word "towns" here is technically a meton
metonym
ym: the towns same time, it dehumanizes communication in a way,
don't literally talk to each other, residents do. Yet the speaker parting people from their voices.
doesn't say residents! Instead, the poem treats the towns like
gossipy neighbors and removes actual human beings from the A related device, synecdoche
synecdoche, pops up in line 8:
poem. All this erasure might suggest that people are dealing
with forces beyond their understanding and control. The ear hears, and withers!
The personification continues in the next line as the speaker
says that "the wires cannot hide from bad weather," which Referring to human beings by a single body part adds to the
suggests that wires can feel fear (and also might suggest that poem's surreal tone. It's also in keeping with the general
nature is out to get humanity's creations). absence of people themselves in the poem. Referring to people
by their ears, separating them from their hearing, also mimics
Finally, the speaker personifies the moon as a kind of
the way that the telegraph wires separate people from their
orchestrator of "the tones / That empty human bones." Its
voices/messages.
"bright face" looks down from the "revolving ballroom of space"
(revolving from Earth's vantage point, that is). The moon here
might represent any number of things—God, fate, or some Where Meton
Metonym
ymyy appears in the poem:
other vague force of the universe, playing puppet master with • Line 3: “Towns whisper to towns”
human beings and using their own telegraph wires as the
strings. REPETITION
"Telegraph Wires" uses diacope in line 3, which describes the
Where Metaphor appears in the poem: effect of the telegraph wires on society:
• Line 1
• Line 2 Towns whisper to towns over the heather.
• Line 3
• Line 4 The direct repetition of "town"—as well as the chiming
• Line 6 alliter
alliteration
ation with "tto"—reflects the connection being described:
• Line 7 instead of just one town all by itself, there are two "towns" in
• Line 8 this line.
• Lines 9-12
The following stanza then uses anaphor
anaphoraa:
• Line 9
So oddly, so daintily made
METONYMY It is picked up and played.
Meton
Metonymymyy appears in line 3. Here, the speaker describes how
the telegraph wires change the lives of people nearby: "So" is an intensifier, and using it repetitively emphasizes the
"odd[ness]" and "daintiness" of what's being talked about. In
Towns whisper to towns over the heather. other words, the repetition of "so" here calls attention to just
how strange and delicate the speaker finds these telegraph

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wires. Withers (Line 8) - Shrinks away.
Ballroom (Line 9) - A hall for dancing.
Where Repetition appears in the poem:
Tones (Lines 11-12) - Signals/sounds.
• Line 3: “Towns,” “towns”
• Line 5: “So,” “so”
FORM, METER, & RHYME
SYNECDOCHE
FORM
The poem uses synecdoche in the fourth stanza:
"Telegraph Wires" has 12 lines broken up into six two-line
Such unearthly airs couplets. Each couplet forms a rhyming pair, and this makes the
The ear hears, and withers! poem feel uniform, steady, and predictable. The poem has a
sense of order and structure that might evoke humanity's
On the one hand, "ear" is meant literally. It is the ear that desire to control its environment—to tame those "lonely
moor[s]" by stringing wires across.
receives the sounds carried along the telegraph wires. But an
ear, of course, is just one part of hearing—it takes a whole METER
person to really receive these "unearthly airs." The ear, then,
"Telegraph Wires" doesn't use a regular meter
meter. It's not quite a
stands in the individuals using the telegraph wires.
free vverse
erse poem, however, given its steady form and rhrhyme
yme
This has a couple of effects. Firstly, it's surreal—disconnecting scheme
scheme. On one level, then, the poem feels distinctly controlled,
"the ear" from the rest of the body captures the fact these made up of quick rhyming couplets
couplets. And yet within these
telegraph wires themselves have a strange effect on people's couplets, the rhythm is unpredictable and lines vary widely in
lives. The same is true of other technologies, of course—think terms of syllable count. This subtle tension between control
about how much the computer screen demands of the eyes. and variation keeps the poem feeling surprising and strange. It
The synecdoche thus creates a sense of disembodiment, as might also evoke the tension between the way human
though this new technology changes what it means to be a technology grants people a sense of control over the world
human being. while also sometimes exceeding humanity's grasp.
"The ear" is also strangely impersonal. The reader wonders
whether this is someone's ear in particular, or a kind of general RHYME SCHEME
ear belonging to all the townsfolk that use these "Telegraph Wires" has a very regular rh
rhyme
yme scheme
scheme, with each
communication technologies. The notion of it "wither[ing]" is couplet forming a rhyming pair:
doubly strange. It's as though the ear senses that there's AA BB CC DD EE FF
something unnatural about how the telephone disconnects the
Most of these couplets feature perfect rhymes (i.e.,
voice from the body, transporting it to another ear far away.
"heather"/"weather"), though the first ("moor"/"ear") and
fourth ("airs"/"withers") use slant rh
rhyme
yme.
Where Synecdoche appears in the poem:
On one level, these rhymes remind readers that this is a poem: a
• Lines 7-8: “Such unearthly airs / The ear hears, and carefully crafted piece of writing. Rhyme connotes a certain
withers! ” control over language, which ties in with the fact that this is a
poem about a kind of communications technology—that is, a
piece of technology that allows people to talk to each other
VOCABULARY over vast distances. The quick, regular rhymes might also make
the poem sound a little sing-songy, perhaps even undermining
Telegraph wires (Line 1) - A network of cables initially for the seriousness of the technology at hand.
transmitting telegraph signals. Many of these wires were later
re-used when telephone technology came along.
Moor (Line 1, Line 10) - A vast tract of uncultivated land—often SPEAKER
very windy, flat, and uninviting!
The speaker doesn't reveal much about themselves in
Heather (Line 3) - A shrub commonly found on moors. "Telegraph Wires." In the beginning, they talk in general terms,
Daintily (Lines 5-6) - Delicately. perhaps addressing the reader directly in line 2's "your ear." But
"your" can also function as an indefinite pronoun (e.g., "one's").
Unearthly (Line 7) - Strange and alien.
Either way, the speaker wants the reader to see modern
Airs (Line 7) - Songs/sounds. technology with fresh eyes—to notice its strange, alien

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qualities. ambassador for poetry more generally. Hughes had acquired
On the one hand, the speaker seems awed by technology's considerable fame and notoriety by this time, in large part
ability to change a landscape. On the other, the pessimistic final because of his marriage to fellow poet Sylvia Plath.
image suggests that the speaker also feels there is something The poem asks the reader to look at "telegraph wires" with
deceptive and dark about this technology. fresh —to notice their strange, living quality. While telegraphs
are a communication technology distinct from telephones
(telegraphs use signal tones and codes, rather than
SETTING transmissions of the human voice), the speaker seems to be
talking about telephony here. Telephone lines did—and
It seems likely that the poem is set somewhere in the United
sometimes still do—use cabling systems initially put in place for
Kingdom, given the presence of telegraph wires, moorland,
telegraphs. By 1989, pretty much the entirety of the United
heather, and, of course, "bad weather!" Of course, it might be Kingdom was connected via telephone.
set anywhere with "telegraph wires" extending over a vast tract
of uncultivated land.
The poem particularly focuses on the way that technology MORE RESOUR
RESOURCES
CES
changes this setting, connecting distant towns for example. The
last lines then zoom out to consider things from the moon's EXTERNAL RESOURCES
perspective. Seen from outer space, humanity technology (and, • Ted Hughes and the Moors — View pages from Hughes's
indeed, humanity itself) seems fragile and even absurd. book of poetry published in collaboration with
photographer Fay Godwin, featuring Godwin's
photographs of the Yorkshire landscape.
CONTEXT (https:/
(https://www
/www.bl.uk/collection-items/remains-of-elmet-b
.bl.uk/collection-items/remains-of-elmet-by-
y-
ted-hughes-with-photogr
ted-hughes-with-photographs-b
aphs-by-fa
y-fay-godwin)
y-godwin)
LITERARY CONTEXT
• Fiv
Fivee Views of T
Ted
ed Hughes — Listen to a series of short
Ted Hughes was one of the foremost English writers of the radio documentaries exploring different aspects of
20th century. He produced numerous volumes of poetry, Hughes's life and work. (https:/
(https://www
/www.bbc.co.uk/
.bbc.co.uk/
translations, essays, and letters, even serving for a while as the progr
programmes/m0000tqz)
ammes/m0000tqz)
Poet Laureate of England. His first collection, The Hawk in the
Rain, had a seismic impact upon publication in 1957; it was seen • Hughes's Influence — Watch contemporary poet Alice
as a challenge to poets of the older generation, who often Oswald discussing Ted Hughes's work.
wrote with greater emphasis on formal structure and (https:/
(https://www
/www..youtube.com/watch?v=v
outube.com/watch?v=vop3NOGMExs)
op3NOGMExs)
emotional restraint. • Ted Hughes on Film — Watch a documentary about the
"Telegraph Wires" was published in Hughes's 1989 collection poet. (https:/
(https://www
/www..youtube.com/watch?v=XbA
outube.com/watch?v=XbAGbjXPCP8)
GbjXPCP8)
titled Wolfwatching. The poems in this collection feature themes
• Telecommunications — A short history of the telephone
common to Hughes's poetry, including the power of the natural (and telegraph). (https:/
(https://www
/www.elon.edu/u/imagining/time-
.elon.edu/u/imagining/time-
world. Hughes's poetry was also often inspired by the animal capsule/150-y
capsule/150-years/back-1870-1940/)
ears/back-1870-1940/)
kingdom and the Yorkshire moors of his childhood (see:
"Moors
Moors," Hughes's verse response to photographs by Fay LITCHARTS ON OTHER TED HUGHES POEMS
Godwin included in his collection Remains of Elmet.) • A Picture of Otto
In their focus on nature's at times overwhelming might, • Ba
Bayyonet Charge
Hughes's poems seem to draw on the tradition of Romantic • Cat and Mouse
poets like William Wordsworth and Percy Bysshe Shelley. But • Ha
Hawk
wk Roosting
while those earlier poets tended to express an awe-filled • The Jaguar
appreciation of nature's wonder and grandeur, Hughes's poetry • The Thought F Fo
ox
generally concentrates more on the primal, frightening • Wind
energies that exist within the natural world, as well as the
relationship between desire, survival, violence, and death.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT
"Telegraph Wires" poem was published in 1989, relatively late
in Hughes's career. By this time, he was serving as Poet
Laureate of England—essentially the Queen's official poet and

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HOW T
TO
O CITE
MLA
Howard, James. "Telegraph Wires." LitCharts. LitCharts LLC, 6 Dec
2021. Web. 15 Dec 2021.

CHICAGO MANUAL
Howard, James. "Telegraph Wires." LitCharts LLC, December 6,
2021. Retrieved December 15, 2021. https://www.litcharts.com/
poetry/ted-hughes/telegraph-wires.

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