To grime the sink and foul towels and let her
Learn with scrubbing brush and scrubbing board
The stubborn character of money.
And let her learn through what kind of dust
He has earned his thirst and the right to quench it
And what sweat he has exchanged for his money
And the blood-weight of money he'll humble her
With new light on her obligations
The fried, woody, chips, kept warm two hours in the
Oven
Are only part of her answer
Hearing the rest, he slams them to the fire back
And is away round the horse-end singing
Come back to sorrento in a voice
Of resounding corrugated iron
Her back has bunched into a hump as an insult
For they will have their rights
Their jurors are to be assembled
From the little crumbs of soot. Their brief
Goes straight up to heaven and nothing more is heard of it
_________________________
In this poem, Ted Hughes is writing about a man who comes home drunk after work
The wife seems to be a housewife, and we learn from reading the poem that the husband disrespects the wife
While reading this poem, only one could wonder if Ted Hughes was expressing his regret for not appreciating Sylvia plath like he should've
This was in the WODWO collection, so this was about 4 years after Plaths death
Hughes uses very formal words throughout the Poem, and as readers we see no sort of emotion expressed throughout the Poem. This could possibly show the coldness of the husband and wife's relationship
In the first two stanzas, he tells us that he "let her" learn which expresses a very harsh master/slave type of relationship
________________
The poem starts out telling us he "deliberately" or purposely comes home with coal dust, most likely all over his clothes and hands, and he takes no precautions to not get this in the house, or on things in the house
It tells us he grimes the sink so she can Learn to use a scrubbing brush, and he grimes the towels so she can use a scrubbing board
The final line in this stanza is "the stubborn character of money"
So quite possibly this husband feels in a sense, since he is the only one working an actual job, this excuses him from being emotionally supportive, respectful, and even from treating his wife like a human being
______________
"He let her learn through what kind of dust"
So he's possibly frustrated that she is not working, so earn any sort of money, he is going to make her work
This could quite possibly but the only sense of dominance he ever has, because obviously he is in the lower working class, when we learn he works in a coal mine in the first line, when we were told he comes home in coal dust
We are introduced to him excusing himself for being drunk in the second kind of the second stanza. "He has earned his thirst" ....from working, and the right to quench it
"And what sweat he has exchanged for his money and the blood weight of money"
So obviously he does hard physical labor at work
His inferiority at his job quite possibly makes him feel like less of a man because he has little to no power at all, so he establishes his superiority by treating his wife at home how he is tested at work.....an example of a reversal of roles
He is starting to become the very thing he resents
"He'll humble her with new light on her obligations"
So he is belittling the work that she is doing around the house because he feels like his job is much more important, so he is throwing the fact that he gets money....blood money at his job, and he's going to let it be known how hard he works, for the sake of his own pride, and male ego
But the reality is, if it was not for his wife, he wouldn't even have a place to come home to, so that he could feel dominant, so the questions
Then becomes, whose role is really more critical
In line 10, through the rest of the 3rd stanza, we read that she reminds her husband the things she does, like cooks him dinner, which is in the oven when he arrives, and has been in the oven for two hours
Side note: this implies he came home later than usual
And as she continues to list what she does, he slams his food back in the oven, and drunkenly going around the house singing. "Come back to sorrento"
Come back to sorrento is a Neapolitan song composed in the early 1900s written kn Italian , and became very popular...even frank Sinatra
, and Elvis had their own renditions
Sunlight dances on the sea
Tender thoughts occur to me
I have often seen your eyes
In the night time from when I dream
When I pass a garden fair
And the scent is in the air
In my mind a dream awakes
And my heart begins to break
But you said goodbye to me
Now all i can do is grieve
Can it be that you forgot
Darling forget me not
Please don't sat farewell
And leave this heart that's broken
Come back to sorrento
So I can mend
So one could see why the wife was insulted as he sung these lyrics, to seemed to be a form of mimicry, so Hughes tells in the last line of the 4th stanza, she has bunched her back into a hump as an insult
"For they will have their rights
Their jurors are to be assembled from the crumbs of soot"
It seems he feels the only rights she has are in the kitchen cleaning. He states the only people that will listen to her are the crumbs he made from "soot" which he himself tracks in the house from work
"Their brief goes straight up to heaven and nothing more is heard of it"
The "brief" he is referring to here is a brief from the field of law. A brief is a written document presented to a court arguing why one party in a particular case should prevail.
And he says their brief,,,,,,her brief goes to heaven, and nothing more is heard of it
The last stanza alone expresses how he felt, with her being a woman, she had no rights, which was the irony in this stanza. He basically tells her, if she has a problem, to talk to the mess he made for her, for that was the only thing listening to her.
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