‘Pike’ is one of the most celebrated poems by the English poet Ted Hughes (1930-98). First appearing in his second collection, Lupercal, published in 1960, this poem provides a vivid portrayal of the pike, a fish renowned for its predatory nature and lethal grace. Hughes masterfully conjures an image of the pike as a formidable force of nature, governed by primal instincts. Much like several of Hughes’ works, ‘Pike’ delves into the stark and often brutal realities of the natural world.
Let us explore this extraordinary poem in greater detail. Before we embark on a nuanced analysis of its language and themes, here’s a stanza-by-stanza summary that encapsulates the progression of the poem’s ‘argument’.
Summary
The poem commences with a depiction of the pike, a fish that is just three inches long yet perfect in form. Its green and gold stripes resemble the majestic markings of a tiger. From the moment they emerge from their eggs, pikes exhibit a sinister grin, suggesting a malevolence that seems inherited through generations. Their movement through the water is described as light and ethereal, akin to a fly dancing along the surface.
In the subsequent lines, the pike seem to astonish even themselves with their elegant gliding through the green depths, their silhouettes evoking both ‘delicacy’ and ‘horror’. Although they remain diminutive in size, within their own minds, they feel as if they could be a hundred feet long—giants of the aquatic world.
As we progress to the third and fourth stanzas, the speaker reflects on the ‘gloom’ that envelops the pike as they lie in wait in various aquatic locales. Their hooked jaws and sharp ‘fangs’ are the products of evolution, equipping them to be ruthless hunters, and it seems that this innate ferocity is unlikely to change.
From the fifth stanza onwards, the speaker shifts to personal anecdotes involving pikes. He recounts an experience where he kept three pike in a tank, feeding them on ‘fry’ (the hatchlings of young fish). Tragically, two of the pike turned on each other, highlighting the inherent danger of these creatures. The speaker notes that even in death, one of the fish retained an ‘iron’ glint in its eye, a haunting reminder of its predatory nature.
In the eighth stanza and continuing to the conclusion of ‘Pike’, the speaker recalls a pond where he used to fish. This pond, excavated by monks of a long-gone monastery, is described as ‘as deep as England’. Here, the pike are ‘immense’—a phrase the speaker repeats for emphasis. The speaker expresses fear at the thought of fishing there at night, apprehensive of the ominous ‘eye’ that might emerge from the depths.
Despite his trepidation, he ventures out, and as he fishes in the darkness, he becomes acutely aware of a dreamlike (or perhaps nightmarish) ‘darkness’ lurking beneath the night: the ominous movement of the pike beneath the water, silently observing him.
Analysis
‘Pike’ can be classified as a nature poem, but it is essential to avoid confining Ted Hughes’ poetry to this narrow category. While he often draws inspiration from the natural world, he elevates it to a heightened, almost mythic intensity. This technique aligns with T. S. Eliot’s praise for Charles Baudelaire’s ability to transmute the urban landscape into something profoundly significant.
The language of ‘Pike’ is strikingly straightforward and grounded, rendering the poem’s artistry almost unnoticeable at first glance. The transition from a factual exploration of the pike’s characteristics—its length, colors, and markings—to a more personal narrative about the speaker’s encounters with these fish is seamless.
Notably, the poem shifts from the relative safety of domesticity—where the speaker kept three pike in a tank—to the more foreboding world of their natural habitat. The cold, dark waters where the speaker fishes amplify the sense of unease inspired by these predatory creatures. This raises the question: was the speaker still a child during these fishing escapades? Hughes himself had a passion for fishing from a young age.
The poem employs numerous repetitions within individual lines, drawing attention to specific details: the pike in the pond are ‘too immense to stir, so immense and old’; the speaker anticipates ‘what might move, for what eye might move’; the ‘Darkness’ of the fish gliding through the pond is ‘beneath night’s darkness’, both a part of it and yet distinct.
Additionally, Hughes uses oxymoronic details to highlight the strange, almost alien power of these fish: for instance, the description of ‘still splashes’ on the pond (can a splash truly occur without movement?). The word ‘still’ has already been intriguingly employed in the line that describes the fish as having ‘Stilled legendary depth’.
Overall, the pike, with their ‘aged grin’ and ‘watching’ eyes, seem to have outlasted the monasteries and the religious transformations that have swept across England. They are likely to endure through countless historical events and transitions yet to come.
This pond, inhabited by the pike, serves as a microcosm of England itself: a land of nature, populated not only by fish and lilies but also by the people who construct monasteries and fish in its waters. The pond is described as ‘as deep as England’ not only in a physical sense but also in a spiritual or metaphorical one: the realm of the pike holds profound depths of meaning.
Form
‘Pike’ is structured in quatrains, lacking a consistent rhyme scheme or regular meter. The poem features a significant amount of enjambment—run-on lines where the syntax flows into the next line—notably between stanzas three and four, five and six, and so forth. This stylistic choice contributes to a conversational, relaxed tone, which is fitting for a poem that seeks to portray the pike both in their natural state and, on a broader scale, as symbols of the untamed world of nature.