Maurice Scully published Humming (2009), a single, self-contained work, after the completion of the monumental eight-book ‘set’ Things That Happen (1987–2008). Humming is an elegy, dedicated to the poet's brother, who died in 2004. This article explores Humming as a poem of mourning, assessing the extent to which it expresses and subverts some of the traditional characteristics and functions of elegy. Elegies often include pastoral motifs, repetitions (particularly repeated questions), an element of imprecation, multivocal performance, commentary on the elegist's ambition and achievement, and enact a general movement from grief to consolation; this essay considers the forms these take. For Scully, whose poetic practice advocates self-effacement, the egoistical nature of elegy, its emphasis on accomplishment and aspiration, presents a problem which is perhaps only partially overcome by the formal strategies discussed here. Poetry without designs upon its subjects or readers remains a goal to be achieved: 'it is hard/ work whichever way/ you look at it.' In conclusion, however, it might be said that Humming, like many elegies, enacts a transition between different phases of the poet's work.
