HUGHES, Ted. Gaudete. London: Faber. 1977.
8vo. Original black cloth with lettering in gilt and red to spine; unclipped pictorial dustjacket designed by Leonard Baskin; pp. 200; very minor evidence of foxing to upper edge, otherwise fine.
First edition with a humorous inscription to Nick Grant: "For Nick / Country life in the / mid seventies / with love / from Ted / 1997".
"An Anglican clergyman is abducted by spirits into the other world…" prefaces Hughes in his opening "Argument". Hughes's narrative poem channels both the religious and the magical. Originally intended as a film, it follows a clergyman - Lumb - as he is abducted by spirits and forced to reinterpret his role as a minister as a changeling.
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