Arrogance can lead to corruption of power and the destruction of identity.

In �Hawk
Roosting� Ted Hughes adopts the persona of a hawk and shows us the world from its
perspective. He uses personification to endow the hawk with a personality, though it is a
personality that is consistent with the �image� portrayed by a real hawk sitting �high in a
tree� apparently looking down arrogantly at all it surveys. Through this he adopts the persona
of a hawk and exploits the attitudes of the hawk. The hawk in the poem is so single-minded and
so arrogant that the poem becomes a parody of human authoritism. �The earth�s face upward
for my inspection� Ted Hughes reveals to the audience the hawks total utter disrespect to his
creator through his arrogance. As readers we find the hawk refer to himself as the most important
creature on earth and this power reminds us of the attitudes of the authoritarian political leaders
throughout history. Like the hawk, we regard ourselves as the pinnacle of creation and find
ourselves walking the path of destruction but Ted Hughes shows us the way to rectitude.

\The �Hawk Roosting� is a very powerful poem and there is more to the poem then first meets
the eye. Ted Hughes writes the poem putting himself into the body and mind of a hawk. The
hawk is portrayed as an arrogant megalomaniac and Hughes is very good at showing the way the
hawks mind works in a number of different situations and in different places. The themes
throughout most of the poem revolve around power, ignorance and self indulgence. The hawk
itself represents power and ignorance at the same time because he thinks that he is the most
important animal in the woods and he is ignorant to the fact that he cannot have everything, in
the poem Hughes shows this very well by using lots of emotive language and description about
how the hawk thinks.
The opening line, �I sit in the top of the wood, my eyes closed�, is referring to the hierarchy
of the wood. When Hughes says that the hawk is in the top of the wood he is working on a literal
level, the hawk is literally on the top of the wood and figuratively. The hawk thinks of itself as
the king of the woods, he is unchallenged and fearless. Hughes goes on to say that the hawk
wants or needs nothing, ��no falsifying dream�, his dreams are not something that he wants
� he already has everything he wants � his dreams are his reality. Hughes mentions the hawks
�hooked head and hooked feet� next; Hughes is describing these because they are his
weapons, his tools for killing, he is proud of them because they have helped him into the position
at the top of the food chain and, as the hawk thinks, to the top of the world. At the end of this
line, instead of just ending the sentence, Hughes has used a semi colon which helps this
penultimate line of the stanza run fluently into the last line. In the last line of this stanza Hughes
writes about the hawk �in sleep rehearse(ing) perfect kills and eat.� The hawk is remembering
his perfect kills and rehearsing for the next time he needs to eat, or just wants to kill. Hughes
writes kills then eats suggesting that, to the hawk, killing is more important then eating. Even is
the hawk did not have to eat to survive he would kill, just for the thrill.
The hawks perspective then shifts to his domain, he is saying how his surroundings are so
convenient for him and, �The convenience of the high trees!�, he sits at the top of the wood
using the high trees as an advantage to him so that he can see everything that is going on beneath
him, he is like a manager watching all his employees from a distance, though the hawk has very
different ideas about what he is going to do to his �employees�. Hughes ends the sentence
with an exclamation mark showing that the hawk is happy that he has secured such a good place
in the woods. In the next two lines he is again talking about the advantages of his surroundings.
This time he is talking about �The air�s buoyancy and the sun�s rays�. The air�s
buoyancy is an advantage because it means that he can easily glide over the wood and take a
look at what is happening beneath him and he has a great view of all his prey. The sun provides
light, so that the darkness of the wood is lifted, so he can see all his prey. The last line in this
stanza show that the hawk thinks it is more important then the Earth itself, the hawk seems to
think that the Earth is subservient to him.

"Hawk Roosting" represents to corruption that mankind experiences through the few people who
feel all powerful. The "hawk" feels as though he is God, able to do whatever he pleases because
the world was created for him. The "hawk" shows how survival of the fittest takes place within
the poem, as evolution continues. 

"text": "The key theme of this poem is the pride and arrogance of the hawk, which
believes itself to be the center of the universe, the product of \"the whole of Creation\" and now
the director of it. In the hawk's mind, every part of the natural kingdom is the way it is in order to
provide \"advantage to\" the hawk; the whole of creation belongs to it (\"mine\"), and the hawk
can decide what lives and what dies (\"I kill where I please\"). The final stanza of the poem, in
particular, underlines the hawk's believe that the world moves at its whim and according to its
direction: the hawk asserts that nothing has ever changed in its world under its leadership and
that it will keep everything \"like this,\" the way it is.\nWe can interpret the hawk in this poem as
a metaphor for humanity, too. While the poem could be read as simply a commentary on the
place of the hawk, the great predator, in nature, the implied criticism of the hawk's arrogant and
high-handed treatment of nature (and its belief that it is a godlike figure, with everything,
including the sun, \"behind\" it) could equally be applied to humans. Like the hawk, humanity
believes itself to be at the center of creation, with every part of nature serving its purposes.
Ultimately, however, this is hubristic\u2014we cannot hope to keep things \"like this\" and
expect to go unchallenged, because nature is not actually ours to command."

"text": "The poem presents a first person narration of the thoughts of this great
predator, the hawk. The main theme of the poem is revealed through the self-assured strength of
the monologue, as the bird asserts its dominance-\n\n\u00a0I sit in the top of the wood\n\nIts
supreme power \u2013\n\nI hold Creation in my foot\n\n\u00a0and its establishment as the
centre of its own world.\nThe main surprise to us as reader is the confidence of the hawk in its
belief that it is in control, and controls all. We realise that the bird\u2019s narrative is like our
own \u2013 so similar in the perceived arrogance of its self-belief. When we consider this view
from a bird we are sceptical, mocking even. It is when we begin to realise the parallels with our
own egotism that we see it is humanity that is held up as conceited -\n\n\u00a0Nothing has
changed since I began.My eye has permitted no change.I am going to keep things like
this.\n\n\u00a0"