Excellent! I read some Thom Gunn at uni too but I'd have loved to study him alongside Plath. I'm distressed that you felt your tutor hated you though!!
He wasn't particularly subtle about his feelings, and it was a shame that a lot of the things I was interested in, he was interested in enough to teach, so our paths crossed more than I would have liked, but I survived. x
I loved this. Thank you so much. It's many years since I read any Thom Gunn - I recall reading him for A level English (lumped together with Ted Hughes) and remember being one of only a couple of people who preferred Thom to Ted.
I'm very familiar with Plath but not at all with Thom Gunn and this makes me want to read more. (His mother's suicide must have been truly harrowing.) Really interesting piece and beautifully expressed, thanks, Katy.
“The tube his mouth enclosed / In an astonished O.” Such a disturbingly powerful image - as searing and harsh as Edvard Munch’s painting ‘The Scream’, or the agonised faces in Picasso’s ‘Guernica’.
thank you Katy. i feel like i just got a lovely seminar...and one with such depth.
Thank you for persevering with it! xx
Excellent! I read some Thom Gunn at uni too but I'd have loved to study him alongside Plath. I'm distressed that you felt your tutor hated you though!!
He wasn't particularly subtle about his feelings, and it was a shame that a lot of the things I was interested in, he was interested in enough to teach, so our paths crossed more than I would have liked, but I survived. x
I loved this. Thank you so much. It's many years since I read any Thom Gunn - I recall reading him for A level English (lumped together with Ted Hughes) and remember being one of only a couple of people who preferred Thom to Ted.
I love Ted, too, but I think Gunn is more funny and tender.
I'm very familiar with Plath but not at all with Thom Gunn and this makes me want to read more. (His mother's suicide must have been truly harrowing.) Really interesting piece and beautifully expressed, thanks, Katy.
Thanks. xx
“The tube his mouth enclosed / In an astonished O.” Such a disturbingly powerful image - as searing and harsh as Edvard Munch’s painting ‘The Scream’, or the agonised faces in Picasso’s ‘Guernica’.