Poetry as a Weapon
Common Themes in Seamus
Heaney Poems
Seamus Heaney is considered one of the greatest poets
of the 20th and 21st centuries. He hails from Ireland and
lived throughout many of the hard times Ireland has
faced, and is still facing today. Because of this his work
deals with the issues of the Irish people and the search
for freedom and equality within their own country. In the
early seventeenth century Britian invaded Ireland and
occupied it. The British are masters at colonizing peoples,
but they were in for a ride with the perseverance of the
Irish people. From that point on the people of Ireland
became divided. Most wanted the British gone, but others
didn’t want to fight it. This is where the IRA comes in and
when Ireland split up into two parts. One part is the free
Irish republic, the other is still controlled by the British to
this day. All of these things combined lead to the diverse
themes throughout Heaney’s poems.
Nature
One of the most common themes I encountered while
reading Heaney’s poems was that of nature. It wasn’t
surprising that nature would be all throughout his poems
because Ireland is such a beautiful place, but the depth of
description was phenomenal.
From the very first poem of the selection Digging the
reader is introduced to Heaney’s rural upbringing on a
farm. The images of flowerbeds, his grandfather cutting
turf, and the smell of potato mold set a realistic scene of
farm life. All of these sorts of images are used in his
poems and to me it gives them a relatable feel. Because
he uses all this imagery that is realistic in nature and not
trying to sugar coat anything, it allows the reader to
understand the reality of the world they are reading about.
I also felt that it gave a nice image to the life of the
indigenous Irish population.
History
Heaney seemed to be fascinated with specific points in
the historical landscape of Ireland. The Tollund Man is
essentially a poem that Heaney wrote after seeing
photographs of ‘bog people’. These bog people were
pulled out from the bogs in the Irish farm lands and
usually found to be in some sort of ritualistic way (this fits
in later with the theme of violence). Anyway he goes on to
explore the historical background that these bog people
might have had within many other poems he goes on to
write. Another part of history is talked about
in Punishment. This poem is essentially about the
bombings that were happening in Ireland in the mid 70s
due to the IRA and British fighting. By making these
concrete references to historical moments and artifacts
Heaney pulls the reader into a realistic and believable
world.
Violence
As before mentioned Heaney was fascinated by these
‘bog people’ that were found. When these specimens
were extracted form the bog by archaeologists many of
them were found with there throats slit and in ritual
clothing. This is thought to maybe have been some sort of
fertility ritual for crops and such. There is also violence in
his poems referencing the bombings in the Irish pubs. In
the end of Punishment the man being talked about is said
to have been blown up by the bombs. As with the other
themes violence is used to relate people to a situation, or
shock them.
Nature, violence, and history seem to be common themes
throughout all types of literature but I think this is for good
reason. With these themes people can easily connect to a
work and analyze it for personal or educational meaning.
Heaney uses a strange metaphor to begin his first collection of
poems, the idea of poetry as a weapon. In the poem Digging he uses
the simile of a gun:
Between my finger and my thumb
The squat pen rests; snug as a gun.
Heaney makes a difficult choice, choosing poetry instead of
farming, and in the process, besides alienating himself from his family,
somewhere he alienates himself from his inspiration. Perhaps in
recognition of this paradox he opens his first collection with an image
that transforms the writer’s tool of communication into something
used only when communication breaks down—a weapon.
This note, so different from the rest of the collection,
immediately introduces a note of alienation into the poems. He puts
his ‘weapon’ to a number of uses: laying the ghosts of his past,
recording the ‘death’ of the ‘naturalist’ in him, and even breaking out
an impossible situation, a desperate measure. He is creating space for
himself, space to view things objectively, as a poet to be able to put
things in perspective. Ironically he uses the one technique which he
himself abhors in his later poems-violence. Though at the moment he
isn’t concerned with events around him, later he becomes a
spokesman against those very events and against violence.
Heaney as an Irish Poet
Some critics have placed Heaney in a difficult, no-win situation.
He has been accused of being too involved in the events in Ulster, and
taken to task for remaining aloof from it. However, some of his most
convincing elegies reminisce about friends and family he has lost to
the “troubles”. Casualty, a poem about a Catholic friend killed by the
Provisional IRA for defying a curfew, gives us another look at the tribal
warfare in Northern Ireland. His questioning of his friend’s
responsibility for his own death makes us realise the muddling of right
and wrong that grips Northern Ireland today. And yet, what is of
supreme importance is not placing blame, but recognising what
remains for those who live, burdened with memories and sadness.
Heaney’s work is filled with images of death and dying, but it is
also rooted firmly in this world. His tender elegies serve many
purposes: they mourn great losses, celebrate those who have gone
before us, and recall the solace that remains to us, their memories.
It is easy to get the impression that Heaney is a provincial poet,
concerned only with the happenings of his island and his memory.
That however, is misleading. He is not solely occupied by his
birthplace. Song illustrates his exploration of the poetic process. This
short lyric attends to his imagination. His descriptive powers are
similar to the great romantic poets, and his attention to detail and the
world around him projects this poem into a league of its own.
Language and Diction
In ‘Death of a Naturalist’ Heaney conveys his love for his
homeland through his unique use of language. Aside from being self-
conscious about using farming vocabulary, he proudly displays his
knowledge—”headrig”, “townland”, or “whisky muddler”.
He uses strong, decisive language, never hesitating or rambling.
His words take on the character of the setting, helping the reader
familiarise himself with the surroundings, as the poet weaves the
atmosphere.
The first collection of verse gives an impression of the poet
discovering a new world—a world of sights and sounds that can be
captured through the clever use of his pen. He uses devices like
alliteration, assonation and onomatopoeia, recapturing the noises and
silences of his home.
The range of sounds he is able to create is remarkable. “The
spade sinks into gravely ground”—the “clean rasping” noise the spade
makes is evoked by the alliteration of the “s” and “g”. The open vowel
sounds mirror the depth of the ground, while the “i” and “k” of the
“sink” contrasts with the sound of the spade biting into the earth.
Heaney always searches for the precise combination of sounds
that will capture the scene described by him. In Blackberry-Picking he
describes the “big dark blobs burned”, the sounds just like that of the
berries dropping into the collecting can. InChurning Day, the light
interplay of the alliterative letters recreates beautifully the action of
butter-making—”the pat and slap of small spades on wet lumps”.
Poet as Observer
As an observer, Heaney keeps a sense of distance from his
family, assuming a stance of remoteness and tight control in his
poems. In family poems like Follower, Digging and Mid-Term
Break, the carefully formal quatrains and triplets, and the measured
line-lengths echo the coldness of the son’s account of his father’s
ebbing strength, or the way in which the boy records his brother’s
funeral. In these and other family poems, the poet is always a passive
observer, sitting while his father digs, staring at his brother’s coffin,
“embarrassed” as his community closes ranks in grief. The nearest his
actions ever get to participating in the scene is to offer his grandfather
some milk, or shake hands with the men who have come to pay their
respects to the family.
He also takes the role of observer literally in these poems,
describing only what he sees in terse, emotionless sentences. The
mask only cracks to reveal his sense of embarrassment, otherwise he
maintains a passive veneer.
Heaney’s poems have a very visual effect; he lets the words
speak for him, conjuring up a series of images, like a motion picture.
The silence in the above poems enhances the scene-like effect. There
are very few words spoken, the remainder of the poem is given over
to description-reinforcing the idea of a mute witness.
Emotion in his Poems
One tends to expect certain things from a poet as a matter of
course, and topping this list is emotion. The traditional image of a
poet is a soppy person whose cup runneth over with a whole range of
emotions. Heaney however, is a different breed of poet, whose range
of emotions on paper, though extensive enough, doesn’t seem to
include love, that staple of the metaphoric poet.
In all of Heaney’s poems about family he remains aloof,
disconnected, as if he is an outsider. Not once do emotions such as
love, friendship, comradery appear in his poems. Even
in Casualty, where he mourns the loss of a friend to the ‘troubles’, he
talks of the friend in casual tones, discussing fishing, poetry, etc.
Even in works where Heaney portrays aspects of a married life,
love, lust, happiness do not make an appearance. Instead he fills his
poems with symbols of conflict, suffering, ritualised actions. The
poem Wedding Day is a series of surreal, nightmarish images and
frightened, internalised questions which culminate in confused flight.
He portrays the act of reconciliation in Summer Home, not as a
tender, intimate moment but as a formal ceremony.
Possibly the only love that can be detected in his writings is that
for his land, his home, his country. The joy he depicts in himself as a
child in his poems, the joy of nature and its habitat, is unparalleled,
and no emotion between humans come close. He writes about his
motherland with passion, deeply aware of the acute suffering of his
people. Even here however, he hesitates to allow his feelings to come
through. The words on the paper record happenings, raise questions
in the mind of the reader, but not once does it clearly show the mind
and heart of Heaney.
Attention to Detail
“Death of a Naturalist” is a detailed, rich portrait of Heaney’s
childhood world, Mossbawn. The poems are filled with colours,
smells, tastes and experiences. He describes everything, even the
frogspawn, vividly, with a child’s wide-eyed wonder, natural charm,
and even sometimes fear.
His attention to detail is remarkable, minutely observing the
people and their places of work, that he describes richly. He includes
even seemingly insignificant details—the way the milk is “corked
sloppily with paper” or tea is served in “bright canfuls”—and these
serve to bring the moment alive.
Like a photographer who zooms in and identifies the object,
often looking at the same object from different angles, Heaney zeroes
in on his target, examining it from all possible angles, recording vivid
details that transform his words into photographs. His keen eye seeks
out the signs of expertise—his father’s “coarse boot nestled on the
lug” of the spade, his grandfather “nicking and slicing neatly” at the
turf. Like a film-maker he covers the scene before and after the event,
leaving the reader with a fuller, more complete picture. We read
about how the blackberries rot later, or how the farmhouse “would
stink long after churning day”. The words leap up put of the page and
form a picture, and we transform from readers to audiences under
Heaney’s expert guide.
A Sense of Divided Loyalty
Till 1969, Heaney was writing of farm life, and issues that
intrigued him, and occasionally he contributed articles
in London magazines on the situation in Ulster. His writing in the latter
was on objective, if somewhat bemused, account of the events
unfolding in the area. This could perhaps be attributed to a certain
sense of embarrassment he felt, whilst writing for and circulating in
sophisticated London literary circles; he feared being associated with
the ‘ludicrously anachronistic’ happenings in Ireland.
This changed by 1972, where after seeing student politics
in Berkeley, he returned to Belfast. He finally moved to
the Irish Republic, a weary war-refugee, disillusioned and revulsed
with the political scene. The change had less to do with the evident
disparity between campaigning in Berkeley and the real events
inBelfast, and more to do with his own sense of confusion, and a
divided sense of loyalty.
He felt indebted to England, whose teachers taught him, whose
literature he taught, whose publishers printed his poems. England’s
poets had encouraged him, given him the impetus to write. He
couldn’t forget that.
On the other hand, these same people had conquered his
homeland, and culturally destroyed the native Catholic people’s sense
of place, of belonging. His birthright of the Gaelic poetic tradition was
denied to him. As an English speaker, and a writer of English, he felt a
sense of betrayal, even defeat, in speaking the enemy language.
A moral dilemma also plagued him. On the one hand he
couldn’t help sympathising with the school of thought that wanted to
destroy the Protestant supremacy. He felt that a sense of loyalty, of
patriotism, in siding with them. On the other hand, being a poet, a
man of letters and an educationist, he could not advocate violence, he
couldn’t condone the lack of humanity and reason. This dilemma tore
him apart, along with the guilt that his fellow Catholics were suffering,
and he wasn’t, simply due to an accident of circumstance.
A further point of contention he felt was the general
expectation that he should become “Poet of the Troubles”. As a poet
who firmly believed that the act of writing is a “kind of somnambulist
encounter”, who waited for inspiration to strike, much like
Hughes’ Thought-Fox, he couldn’t foresee himself picking up his pen
and dashing off political pieces as the situation around him changed.
He did write about his feelings or his experiences of the troubles,
probably with more feeling than a mere political poet may have, but
he carried with him a guilt for not taking up the mantle of a
campaigner through his work.
Bogland as a Poetic Metaphor
Ever since he played as a child in a moss-hole, Heaney realised
that the bog represented for him a repository of memories of his
childhood. He also recognised the bog as being literally a storage
place, which held objects preserved for decades beneath it.
He realised that the history of his country lay beneath the
boglands, as he writes in Feeling into Words:
I began to get an idea of bog as the memory of the landscape,
or as a landscape that remembered everything that happened in and
to it. In fact, if you go round the National Museum in Dublin, you will
realize that a great proportion of the most cherished material heritage
of Ireland was “found in a bog”.
The poem which contains all these ideas Bogland is placed last
in the volume “Door into the Dark”, but it acts as a key to the whole
collection, describing Heaney’s voyage of discovery.
He wrote several bog poems—Punishment, Tollund Man,
Bogland. In Tollund Man Heaney was attempting to find his own
solution to the problems in Ulster, in later poems he became more
pessimistic, and just presented his poems, in a way simply giving
‘birth’ to them. He uses the images of birth frequently in these
poems—the Grauballe Man emerges “bruised like a forceps baby”,
the Bog Queen rises out of the dark when her “slimy birthcord / of
bog” is cut. These creatures are almost like spirits, coming to Heaney’s
call for an answer in the time of violence.
Just as Heaney believed that Ireland’s history lay beneath the
bog, he also began to use the bog to project her future. The eerie,
almost nightmarish images described in his poems portend the
nightmare descending on the people. The bog people have now
become symbols of the violence in Ulster.
The poet seems to be mesmerised by these bog creatures, so
much so that he feels unable to shape these poems to any positive
outcome. He is instead only the holder of the pen, whilst someone or
something else is writing for him. He uses a reverential tone with the
bog people, “I almost love you”, and in a morbidly fascinated way
obsessively records every physical detail.
 Interestingly, the more Heaney attempts to escape from his
own feelings of guilt and divided loyalty, the more they force him to
contemplate and examine his feelings about the Ulster situation.
Almost like unwanted memories, they recur over and over. The result
is a deepening of the negative impulses haunting the poems. Heaney
writes brutally honest descriptions of his feelings about the situation,
having finally resolved it. The Catholic in him surges up, and almost
rejoices in the atrocities committed against the Protestants. In the
final lines of Punishment, he is chillingly honest, admitting that he
would do nothing, watching as the “artful voyeur”, while the Catholics
take their “tribal” revenge.
Heaney as a Non-
Political Poet
Heaney is a non-political poet. He, like Keats, is a pure
poet who believes in art for the sake of art, poetry for the sake of
poetry. He is committed to poetry. No doubt Heaney’s poems,
like The Tollund Man, Wedding Day and A Constable Calls,are
political poems but Heaney claims that there is no politics in
them. Heaney believes that poetry and politics are two different
subjects and they should remain separate.
Heaney belongs to Ireland and Ireland has been suffering
from the worst effects of politics. He has a deep attachment to
his country. He cannot bear the violence and cruelty from which
his people have been suffering for centuries. He, actually, wants
to share their hopes, worries and frustrations. Heaney cannot
ignore the grim realities of life. This has created a sense of guilt
and an oppressive fear in Heaney and it is very much visible in
his poetry.
In The Tollund Man, Wedding Day, A Constable Calls,
The Toome Road, Personal Helicon and Casting and
Gathering, we find Heaney both as a poet and as a citizen
of Ireland, who has great compassion for the Irish people. In
these poems, which are known as bog-poems, he discusses the
questions—whether one should be committed to poetry or to
life? Is life more important or art? Is life more important or
poetry? In these poems he seems to know his role in this human
tragedy. As a poet, he feels himself guilty because a number of
people, including his own relatives are dying and he is doing
poetry. It seems difficult for Heaney to remain detached with
this dilemma. This was the complexity and conflict in the mind
of Heaney. He finds it very hard to reconcile the two
contradictory approaches.
He goes to another approach which is the approach of
compromise. His compromise is to find some aesthetic approach
to politics. He believes in the aesthetics of politics, not in the
violence of politics. He wants to rise above party-politics.
Heaney wants to do. The poet must feel for all humanity.
He resolves this problem by creating a myth. The myth is that
strife and violence are the pattern of life. They are inevitable. No
body can stop them, but through the message of love and peace,
the poet can provide some consolation, some redress. It means
that the poet is only a mourner.
There had been two distinct attitudes towards the miseries
of life in the time of Heaney. One group believed that misery is
an essential part of life, and that miserieswere man’s destiny.
This is a pessimistic approach and the conservatives believe in
this concept. The conservatives believe that man is helpless
before the odd circumstances he faces. It is a negative approach.
The other group says that miseries are not his destiny, and that
man has the power to overcome his difficulties. These are,
actually, progressive or socialist people, who have confidence in
themselves. Heaney was caught in the mire of the ideological
war.
Similarly in modern literature, we find two distinct
approaches in relation to poetry. Some people, like conservative
writers, think that it is not the job of poets and poetry to
interfere in politics. They believe that poetry has nothing to do
with the realities and complexities of life. The poet can just
preach love, sympathy and humanity. But there are other people,
who believe in the power of man. They are much more
concerned with life. O’Neill, Hemingway, G.B. Shaw, Lorca and
Arthur Miller fall in this category. It is a group of what we call
progressives. They believe that man must find out the faults,
committed by men, responsible for his miseries, and that he
must try to remove these faults as far as he can.
They want to root out the problems disturbing the natural
phenomenon of life. O’Neill finds that Puritanism causes a
misapplication of the religious beliefs, which have made life
difficult to live. Man must try to fight them, rather than cry over
them and feel consolation in crying. To cry over the miseries of
life is not redress or consolation. It is false consolation, which is
destructive. There must be a constructive approach to life. This
is what the progressives do. They expose the foibles, mistakes,
follies and faults of men so that these can be removed. The
reason for this is that they want to make progress and they want
to make life progressive and prosperous as well. They cannot be
silent in the face of the miseries and cruelties created by the
wrong people of the society, as the conservatives do. The protest
should be positive, like the one made by the protagonists of
Arthur Miller.
So the concept the bog-poems, The
Man and Wedding Day give is that Heaney by nature is
a pure poet but he has feelings and sympathies for the Irish
Tollund
people who are being killed ruthlessly. So, Heaney accepts both
the realities, i.e., one must be committed to art, but he must also
think for life, because one cannot remain indifferent when
atrocities and sufferings are going up all the time. He must write
of the cruelties of the state which is a political matter. But
Heaney has done it in a detached manner. The impact of politics
on the psyche of the common man is the subject of his poems.
The poet has tried to project the mental state of the Irish people
who live in a perpetual state of fear and terror. The Blacks of
South Africa also used to live under this state of terror and they
were questioned when they sometimes occupied a room, seat or
place, reserved for the Whites.
So it is correct that Heaney writes about politics yet there
is no politics in his poetry. He has made politics a subject for
poetry in an emphatic way. Heaney is just giving the poetry of
these traumatic experiences. He, in fact, wants to redress the
people through his art without becoming a heckler. He finds a
middle way between the two extremes, between the idealist and
the escapist. He uses the myth for bringing politics into poetry.
Heaney’s approach is the approach of compromise. Heaney’s
compromise is to find some aesthetic approach to politics, in the
aesthetics of politics, not in the violence of politics.
Heaney’s Myth
Making
Myth means a story that is, although not true but believed
as a true story. Heaney belongs to Ireland and Ireland has been
suffering from the worst effects of politics. People
in Ireland have been a minority under the British control.
They have been living under perpetual fear. Heaney believes that
there is no connection between a poet and the circumstances
around a poet as he elaborates it in the poem ‘Personal Helicon’.
So Heaney wants to remain unconcerned with the social and
political disorder or his society but what makes him pragmatic,
is his deep attachment to his country. In this way he cannot
remain unconcerned with political, social and cultural disorder
in his county. Thus it was necessary for him to find a middle way
and that middle way he finds by creating a myth. The myth is
that strife and violence are a pattern of life. They are inevitable.
No body can stop them, but through the message of love arid
peace, the poet can provide some consolation, some redress. It
means that the poet is only mourner. The progressives demand
to fight against the causes of miseries that lie in politics. Heaney
sees violence and misery in the archetypal pattern of humanity.
He teaches people to accept miseries as their destiny. Heaney, in
this way, prefers stoicism to activism. This is a pessimistic and
an escapist approach of Heaney and he promotes this approach
in his poetry by creating a myth.
Heaney’s poems clearly show how Heaney reconciles
between poetry and politics with the help of creating a myth. The
poem The Tollund Man is the best example of Heaney’s myth
making in his poetry. He takes the title of his poem from Glob’s
book ‘The Bog Men’ which was about the archaeological
excavations inJutland, a marshy land in Denmark. The
researchers found a large number of dead bodies in Jutland.
These dead bodies were called bog men. They belonged to the
Iron Age or perhaps the Stone Age. The researchers concluded
and Glob agrees that those dead bodies were of the people who
were sacrificed in some sacred ritual. One head, which was
found separated from the body, had been kept in a museum,
calledAarhus. And the sacrificed man was given the name
of Tollund Man.
It was thought that the Tollund man was sacrificed to the
goddess of land, so that her fertility may insure the fertility of the
land in the next winter. This is a version of the myth of Adonis,
relating to Classical mythology. Adonis was the god of fertility
and he was supposed to die in autumn and again come to life in
the spring every year.
Heaney sees this sacrifice in the archetypal pattern which
he applies to Ireland. He thinks that the same myth is working
in Ireland also. The people of Ireland are sacrificing their lives
for their motherland. Heaney starts the poem, The Tollund
Man, with the idea of going to Aarhus, a museum, in order to see
the atrocities and cruelties committed at that place. In the
Tollund Man, he sees the fate of his fellow countrymen worst hit
by the Irish war.
Heaney further says that the people, who were sacrificed
for the mother goddess, were well fed before they were
sacrificed. And now after a long time the seeds of that crop seem
to ripen in the stomach of the Tollund Man. As Heaney says in
the poem:
His last gruel of winter seeds
Caked in his stomach
Heaney has also described the physical condition of the
man. His whole body was naked, except for a cap, a noose and
the girdle. Perhaps it was the requirement of the ritual. The
corpse that was planted in Julland has now sprouted in Ireland.
He inter-links the tragedy of Tollund man with the tragedy of the
people of Irelandespecially the working class of Ireland. As
Heaney says
Naked except for
The cap, noose and girdle
Thus by making the myth of the Tollund man, Heaney
makes way for bringing miseries of his people, caused by foreign
invasion, into poetry. He does not protest against these miseries
nor does he want to be a heckler by making his poetry
propaganda. He uses the myth, as other modern poets do, so
that he cannot be branded as communist or escapist. The myth is
only a device for the modern intellectuals to discuss the matters
of real life, as we observe in Mourning Becomes Electra, where
O’ Neill has used the two complexes: Electra complex and
Oedipus complex.
Wedding Day is also an example of the myth making
technique of Heaney. It is a much more political poem, but in a
disguised way because of the application of myth in the poem.
The title of the poem is symbolic, meaning the day of sacrifice,
the day of death. Heaney concludes that every day is a wedding
day in Ireland.
The Toome Road has also an echo of the suppressed minds
of the people ofIreland but the poet, as usually, doesn’t discuss it
as an attempt to instigate or rouse the people to protest against
it. He discusses the poem in his personal unique style. He talks
about the threat of state terrorism. The poem shows a sense of
state of war. The army has occupied the country and the citizens
are living in a state of scariness and fear. Human freedom has
been blocked and the individual feels oppressed. As Heaney
says:
How long were they approaching down my roads
As if they owned them?
In the poem ‘Casting and Gathering’ Heaney views the
conflict in the society in the context of process of cultivation.
Heaney is among those people who do not support the
participation of poets in revolutionary activities. He wants the
poet only to console the people through the message of universal
love. That is what he says also in his essay The Redress of
Poetry.
He discusses ‘the subject in a detached manner without
tempting the people to fight against their miseries. The reason
for this is that he does not want poetry to become propaganda.
Heaney, in fact, wants to redress the people through his art
without becoming a heckler. He finds a middle way between the
two extremes, between the idealist and the escapist. He uses the
myth for bringing politics into poetry. The myth is that strife and
violence are a pattern of life; they are inevitable, no body can
stop them. So he seeks a compromise and finds it in the making
of myth. No doubt, he can not keep himself detained from the
political, cultural and social disorder around him. And at the
same time he does not want to protest against them in his
poetry. So he finds a middle way between these two extremes by
making a myth in his poetry.
Seamus Heaney –
Poet of Silence, Poet
of Talk
Seamus Heaney and Howard Moss can stand, almost
allegorically, for two kinds of poet. One starts from silence, the
other from talk. Heaney’s slow, weighted monosyllables are
dredged up from darkness; Moss’s lines, in their lucidity, give us
conversation as it would be in Utopia, all light and feeling.
Heaney’s best poems go back to riddles, charms and ritual;
Moss’s to song, letters, social interchange. Heaney, all blind
sense, feels the heft and shape of things; Moss clarifies emotions
into interpretation. Both poets have, of course, the defects of
their virtues: Heaney is least interesting when most explicit,
Moss most predictable when he moralizes his apercus.
Heaney, to my mind the best poet now writing in Ireland,
seems the only one of his generation not in some way inhibited
by the shadow of Yeats. Though he shares Yeats’s love of the
archaic, with its combination of the civilized and the stark, he
unearths his archaism not in Celtic legends but in the bodies of
long-dead Vikings, buried and preserved in Irish and
Scandinavian bogs.
 For Heaney, things in their “opaque repose” can be
searched out only by divination, in a “somnambulist process of
search and surrender” (as Heaney described it in a lecture to the
Royal Society of Literature two years ago). When the diviner has
found out, as by instinct, a hoard in the nether darkness, he must
then gather words with “a binding secret” between them to lift
the treasure into view. The serpentine line of Norse art “like an
eel swallowed / in a basket of eels” becomes for Heaney a
metaphor for his own intertwining of national and personal
truth.
The autobiographical poems closing Heaney’s new
collection make explicit his meditation on the troubles of Ulster,
where he was born, but seem, paradoxically, less deep in their
reflections than the poems where meaning resists intellectual
reduction. History in these poems is as absorptive, mysterious,
and dark as the many-layered bog.
The seedtime of the soul and the dissolution of the flesh melt
equally into history, exhumed only temporarily in Heaney’s
penetrating vision, where gravity and preservation unite.
Howard Moss’s ironic and fluent narratives keep up the
memorably polished standard of earlier poems like “Menage a
Trois.” Here is the opening of “Shorelines,” a poem about “the
dreariness of things gone wrong for good”:
Someday I’ll wake
and hardly think of you;
You’ll be some abstract deity,
a myth —
Say Daphne, if you knew her
as a tree.
Don’t think I won’t be grateful.
I will be.
This mixture of tartness and pain animates the poem
which opens the volume and sets the tone for the whole: it is
called “Chekhov,” and remarks that under all the Babel of talk,
there exists one silent hell — “to lose the very ground you stand
on.” This abyss underlies even the most Arcadian of Moss’s
landscapes, but his genius lies in finding ways to describe it
which are instantly recognizable as our modern ways of masking
pain: “We hardly see each other any more”; “Not that you loved
me. Or I loved you”; “It’s fishy here, and an unhappy place/ Or
let’s say we are.” Though Auden is recognizably Moss’s master,
Moss has none of Auden’s preceptorial instructiveness and none
of Auden’s preoccupation with ideology. For Moss, if affections,
attachments and love go, there is no institution or philosophical
construct to flee to; instead, there is a soulless desiccation:
Bathed in the acid of truth,
all things
Become possible:
to be a cold snake
At an interview
to live on scraps of soap
To keep oneself warm,
to resemble a cat
Constantly stalking the
Shadow of nothing
In the most remarkable poem in this collection, “Tattoo,”
the indelible branding of the flesh becomes a grotesque allegory
for the soul’s yearning for “the ritual scarring/Of the Cupid of
wounds,” and the tattoo parlor by the docks a modern version of
the Spenserian masque of Cupid:
Think of these: rinses, makeup, ampules,
A dressing room blooded by Band-Aids of healing,
Eye-pencilled alphabets, ink blots of jungle,
A gypsy tearoom run by a surgeon,
A beaded curtain, a paintbox, a sudden
Movement of pain, the animal willfully
Formed at the end of a point, a child’s stencil . . .
All night the dye-needle branding its stories
Into the flesh to be told there forever.
When Moss is most absolute, he comes very near the
simplicity of song. Intellectuality is still present, in the form of
wit, but language empties itself of intellectual reference and of
ambiguous or equivocal diction. The course of love, that first
love which yields “the clearest of all sleeps, then nothing clear,”
is traced in Moss’s best lyric quatrain in this volume:
Starting out as love, it climbed the stairs,
And then came down as something else again;
I did not recognize its killing features
Until I saw they were my very own.
Both of these volumes by accomplished poets at once put
language in relief and, in another sense, make it disappear
before our eyes as we are given the illusion of a voice in the air
penetrating, without any medium at all, into our consciousness
and feelings. Such voices heard make our own voices less
anonymous, and compose that floor that Heaney speaks of into
which the rest of us, unheard, are destined to dissolve.
Poetry is as much
relevant as ever even
in this highly
industrialised age of
ours. Discuss with
reference to Seamus
Heaney. (P.U. 2006)
Poetry has always been a powerful medium throughout
human history; even in this industrialised and mechanised age,
poetry does have a function to play because where politics
divides, poetry unites. Seamus Heaney in his essay “Redress of
Poetry” defines the effectiveness and creative role of poetry in
society. He disagrees with the idea of PLATO in ‘The Republic’
who regards poets as an idle creature Heaney defends poetry by
explaining its functions in society. He also points of that the true
art of poetry is above all prejudices ad worldly considerations.
He says that art should not lose its effectiveness by representing
Culture and Politics.
Seamus Heaney sustains very clear notions about art in
general and poetry in particular. Coming from Irish background,
he closely observed the relationship between art and
politics. The first problem he faced due to the influence of
politics was of language. English was regarded as the language of
the enemy and English literature was unacceptable to Heaney’s
countrymen was, therefore, an unpatriotic act.
Heaney began to feel that Irish patriotism, particularly the
fanatic nationalism was poisonous rather than healthy. It only
served to narrow down the Irish thinking. Irish language and
tradition were a work of national identity but on the other hand
were chains binding free thinking. The study of English
literature, Heaney thought, exposed him to thought outside the
Irish culture and enlarged his mind. Heaney’s poetry, therefore,
looks within but also beyond the Irish.
Stevens and many others believe that poetry is not meant
just for aesthetic satisfaction. Their view was that poetry cannot
and should not be divorced from politics. Poetry must speak for
those who have been suppressed; Who cannot speak for
themselves. Poetry is the voice of redress Stevens disagrees with
those who only emphasise the aesthetic and artistic value of
poetry. According to this point, of view poetry creates a world of
art as opposed to the world of reality. Heaney does not feel
happy with this role of poetry. Poetry shall do more than just
reflect.
Heaney evaluates the dangers of the influence of politics
on poetry. He says that Politics damages the faculty of
rationality, therefore, the poets cannot serve society with utility
of poetry. He says poets should not narrow down their scope
by limiting poetry to certain dimensions of time and space. It
should be free from any restriction. Some demand that poets
should write against the common trend to shock the minds of
people. They should write revolutionary poetry. But the impact
of poetry is not practical; it is psychological. Poetry does not
forces man to go and fight. But the poetry shows that what is
wrong and what is right. It is the most important function of
poetry to create psychological effect rather than lead to violent
practically. If poetry becomes practical, according to Heaney, it
will not remain poetry, it will become propaganda.
Heaney explains that in time of practical tensions and
national disaster, there was common trend of generalising and
simplifying the situation in black and white. The real point is
that a political situation is never too simple as to be labelled into
opposite elements. Politics divides men, poetry promotes the
love of men. Poetry shows that all men are human beings and
they deserve sympathy. But politics tell us that some deserve our
wrath. If poetry becomes politics then it will not remain poetry,
it will divide humanity into friends and foes.
Heaney neither rejects the influence of politics an poetry
fully, nor accepts it totally. He seeks the ideal midway where
poetry serves its role of entertainment and providing needed
ideas for the betterment of humanity. To Heaney, poet is a
universal figure. He is a member of a community but he is also a
citizen of the world- a representative of humanity without
regarding religious, sexual, regional and social differences. He
considers poet an observer not a participant in political
movement and an observer must not take sides.
Political and industrial influences have always been in the
history of world; only 20thc is a little more prominent in this
case; but the we have seen that even the present age does
accommodates poetry because poetry is human and where there
are humans (however industrialised, politicised and
mechanised), there is poetry.
5454
Central themes identified in the poem
Uncertainty is a theme that we see throughout this poem. We can
recognise that almost all of the poem has a sense of ambiguity, this is
as Heaney can never be sure of what his emotions or his surroundings
are. A quote which suggests uncertainty in the poem is when Heaney
says "his cap was upside down." This is because it illustrates a sense of
turbulence running throughout Heaney's mind and advocates that he
cannot make sense of his surroundings. Upside down literally
describes the positioning of the policeman's cap, however
metaphorically this may imply Heaney too is upside-down and can't
seem to foreshadow what is to come. Perhaps this is because the
policeman was dangerous, or even because Heaney's view of
Protestants had been tainted by his parent as he grew up to see
Protestants as rancorous.
Perhaps the most central idea apparent in the poem is fear.
Constantly throughout the poem Heaney is fearful of the policeman.
This fear was brought about by the accessories of the policeman. For
example the quote "staring at the polished holster" signifies Heaney
was petrified at the sight of the holster- which holds guns. If the
constable had a holster then he had a gun and Heaney was worried
the policeman would turn violent if he didn't get what he wanted. We
also know how scared Heaney is, which is perceptible from the great
detail he talks about the gun. Despite the event happening several
years ago Heaney was still able to describe the policeman's items such
as the gun and his bike very vividly. He has never been able to evade
the fear of the event, similarly to Heaney's other poems including:
'Digging'; 'The Early Purges' and 'Blackberry picking'.
The third key theme identified is childhood memories.
In the poem above and in 'Follower' and 'Mid-term Break' they all
share the theme of childhood memories. These childhood memories
have shaped who Heaney is today. We can tell his poem has been
written from his childhood by the fact the policeman was never
described, yet all of his accessories were. It displays Heaney couldn't
remember much about the policeman because he was too petrified to
look, if he was scared of the policeman's bike, then how scared would
he be looking at the policeman himself? "He stood up, shifted the
baton case" suggests immediately has a sense of fear and adumbrates
the policeman turning violent because he had a baton. This was the
way Heaney's Catholic family and community influenced how he saw
Protestants such as the policeman.
Would the constable count as a theme?
This situation can be studied at from different perspectives. On one
side, the policeman cannot be considered a theme as he is a character
within the poem and therefore isn't representative of something else.
However on the other hand, he could, this is because a theme is a
topic or subject of talk. The policeman is most definitely a key talking
point when trying to decode the meaning of Heaney's poem. He could
also perhaps be considered a theme is the sense that he is not
mentioned within the poem; Heaney only talks about all of the objects
that belongs to the policeman. In this sense these objects are
representative of the constable and the law in Ireland.
I think that whether or not you would describe the police officer as a
theme is entirely down to what you believe it is or not. There are
many different reasons to suggest that actually the policeman isn't
even a policeman but rather just another one of Heaney's fears he
portrays through the policeman. In doing this we get an indication of
what this fear is if it is a metaphorical policeman - unsound and
daunting.
How does grief affect those family members and friends close to us? In Mid-
Term Break Seamus Heaney takes the reader right into the bosom of the
family and provides first hand observations of people present at home,
following the death of his young brother.
Interestingly, we don't know if this is a brother or not. It is a male but the
speaker informs us only of the 'corpse' which is delivered by ambulance.
From the start, there is a suggestion that something isn't quite right. The
speaker has to sit in a sick bay with little to do but listen to the ominous sound
of bells - foretelling of doom? The word knelling implies that the occasion is
solemn.
This is a little bit morbid, a touch ironic, because the title tells of a break, a
holiday away from responsibility and formality. When we are told the
neighbours, and not family, are the ones taking him home the intrigue
deepens.
Atmosphere and tension are building by the second stanza as we learn of the
father, the patriarch, being reduced to tears, and a family friend, Big Jim
Evans, affirming the difficulty of the occasion. Tough men are showing
emotion which is something the speaker isn't used to.
Heaney softens the mood slightly by introducing us to a baby in the third
stanza but this is countered when old men offer their hands to shake. Again,
you can picture the speaker, the eldest son, trying to take it all in as 'sorry for
your trouble' repeatedly hits home.
The eldest son is going through a rite of passage, in a sense this profoundly
sad death in the family is forcing him to grow up and he's finding it
understandably hard.
More Analysis Stanzas 5 - 7
It's the mother who takes on some of the grief in the form of anger as the
speaker holds her hand in a room of strangers and prepares himself for the
arrival of the body 'stanched and bandaged. Compare the role of father with
mother in this respect, at opposite ends of the grieving spectrum.
Heaneys use of "corpse" is clinical and a little cold, suggesting that the
speaker is too upset to mention the child's name. The next day however he
feels compelled to go upstairs to have one last personal meeting.
Snowdrops are the first flowers to show in winter, bursting through the cold
earth, sparked by the increasing light. They are a symbol of hope - even in the
depths of darkness life prevails. Candles are associated with prayer. The use
of the word soothed reflects the healing qualities of the peaceful room where
the body lies.
There is the dead child "wearing" a bruise, which implies it's not a part of him,
a temporary thing. Poppies are linked to peace and also are a source for
opiates which ease pain. Because the car hit the boy directly on the head
there are no unsightly scars; the boy reminds the speaker of when he was a
baby in his cot.
The last line is full of pathos, the four-foot box measuring out the life of the
victim in years. Note the full rhyming couplet which seals up the poem,
reminding us of how easy it is to die, from a single blow of a car bumper, but
how challenging becomes the grieving process that must inevitably follow.
Analyze the poem “ Mid Term Break” emphasizing how the poet has
described death and grief in the poem.
“Mid term break” was written by Seamus Heaney, an Irish poet who
lived together with nine siblings. Many of his works are about
everyday life, a testimony to his profound observations of even the
smallest things. This poem, “Mid term break”, was a reflection of his
brother, Christopher’s death.
Although it is entitled “Mid Term Break”, the poem is far from
cheerful. The ideas of death, trauma, grief and despair are explored
here. The tone of the poem is somber and solemn. The narrator may
seem a little detached as well. He does not show any outward sign
that he is grieving too much over the death of his brother, but traces
of his sadness could be seen in the times when he recalls memories of
his brother, “the baby cooed and rocked the pram” and “lay in the
four foot box as in his cot”.
Heaney delivered the poem shrouded in mystery. His introduction in
the first stanza does not give the audience a clue about what would
happen next. It had a relaxed, happy tone, and gives us the impression
that he had all the time in the world to spare. This was shown by the
act of “Counting bells knelling classes to a close”, making the first
stanza seem to last a long time.
These words supports the previous line, “waited all morning”. Also,
the allusion to “classes” and “college sick bay” suggests that the
narrator was still slightly naïve and youthful at the time. When the
“neighbors drove” him home, the sense of mystery begins to build up.
Upon arriving at his home, he “met his father crying”. Here, the
ideas of grief, trauma and the resulting disorientation are explored. A
father represents a strong pillar within the family, but here, the poet
showed how much the shock of the death of a close family member
could cause even the strongest pillar to collapse.
His father had “always taken funerals in his stride”, and could show
that deaths were quite common, however, they had never expected it
to hit so close to them. The mention of a “hard blow” had both a
physical and emotional meaning in the text. It could refer to the
physical impact of the accident on the poet’s brother, and it may also
refer to the immense emotional trauma experienced by the family
members.
Heany had also referred to his brother as a “baby”, and in line 18, it
was the “first time in six weeks” he was seeing him. This suggests that
the poet had only a fleeting memory of his brother, and most of his
memories were concerned with him when he was a baby, “cooing and
rocking the pram”. To me, I find that this part is the most tear jerking
part of all, as it describes the poet having a distanced relationship
with his brother that he would now never be able to repair.
As he entered the house, he was “embarrassed by old men who
stood up to shake” his hand. This could be a representation of him
suddenly assuming the responsibility of a mature adult. There were
many other strangers who became the spectator of the funeral, and
therefore the “Whispers informed strangers that (the poet) was the
eldest, away at school”. This also emphasized the difference between
being a spectator, and the actual family members of the victim.
The emotional blow caused his mother to “cough out angry tearless
sighs”. This could mean that the mother had cried too much until she
had no tears left, and also could mean that she blamed herself for not
being able to protect her child enough. Here, there is a contrast
between the conventional reaction of the father and mother. The
mother is angry and sad, while the father is tearful.
The narration is direct and simple, and this gives an innocent,
childlike view of the situation. There is a lot of visual images in the
poem, such as “snowdrops and candles soothed the bedside”. These
serve to soften the harsh image and make it more peaceful. “Wearing
a poppy bruise” and “no gaudy scars”, the poet’s descriptions of his
brother, also show the light injuries he saw, aiding to give a quiet,
peaceful atmosphere to the paragraph.
In losing his four year old brother, Heaney discovered the brutal
reality of the world. It was a time of transition from adolescence to
adulthood for him. The emotions of the poet are understated,
therefore it gives a clear picture of the situation that day. It also
reveals that the poet really misses his brother—he remembers every
event of that day.
The last line was left isolated. “A four foot box, a foot for every
year”. This gives a sense of the finality of death, and shows the
tragedy experienced by the entire family.
“Mid Term Break” gives a very vivid and blunt view of life, and how it
can all come to an abrupt end anytime. The descriptions and the
underlying meanings all make the reader feel the desolation and
dismal settings of the entire scene. The saddest part is that it was
based on a real life event. This poem indeed does show Seamus
Heaney’s skill at observation and ability to express and manipulate
reader’s feelings.
Mid-Term Break by Seamus Heaney: A
short commentary
The poem ‘Mid-Term Break’, by Seamus Heaney deals with a death of a young child,
possibly that of Heaney’s younger brother. In contrast to what the reader might associate
from the title and with a break from school, holidays being a time of fun and frolic for
children as they are away from the rigors of academia. However for the poet this particular
holiday could not have been more different. Through the use of vivid imagery, effective
choice of words that convey the somber mood and tone of the situation the poet finds himself
in, the poet creates a heart-wrenching, yet compelling and engaging poem. The poem
consists of 22 lines divided into eight stanzas, since the poem does not follow any particular
poetic form or rhyme scheme, it can be concluded that it is free verse.
The first stanza, though it does not directly imply what exactly the poem deals with, begins
with a certain solemnness, as the poet describes, himself sitting by the college sick bay
waiting for the classes to end. This, it can be considered almost forebodes the situation the
poet it to be faced with on his return to home, that of death. Yet despite this sense of
foreboding, it seems the poet is still unaware of what awaits him at home, there is a sense of
childish boredom the reader detects that conforms this viewpoint. The second stanza, rather
abruptly introduces the fact that there has been a death, as the poet describes his father crying
on the porch, surprisingly, enough as the poet states his father always took funerals in his
stride. Furthermore the fact that this particular funeral compelled his father to tears, suggests
the death of a close family member.
The third stanza describes a kind of ‘childish’ inability to act appropriately in such situations.
The baby laughs and coos in the pram conveying a sense of childish ignorance, it lack of the
understanding or worry about the troubles around it. While the poet feels embarrassed as the
adults convey their condolences to him, showing his inability to completely comprehend the
situation. There is a sense of quiet throughout as conveyed by the words, ‘whispers’ and
‘tearless sighs’, as if the somberness and grief of the situation has stripped all those present
as of their ability of speech. The reader however is still unaware who in fact has died even
with the arrival of the corpse in the fifth stanza. The proceeding scene seems rather
emotionless and clinical, as the poet, on seeing the corpse does not experience an outflow of
emotions, or at least no visible emotion, unlike his mother’s “angry tearless sighs”. The
poet’s seemingly direct and impassive description of the corpse “stanched and bandaged by
nurses”, further asserts his lack of comprehension, inability to react to such situation as a
child, the situation seems somewhat ‘matter of fact’ quite contrary to what the reader might
expect.
The tone changes, however, in the sixth stanza as Heaney goes up alone to see his brother’s
body the following morning. He describes the presence of snowdrops and candles as
soothing the bedside; the color white conveys a sense of purity, as would be appropriate in
retrospect, with the age of the dead individual. The poet uses enjambment to link this stanza
with the seventh, mentioning that his individual now looked paler than the last time he had
seen him six weeks previously. He uses the metaphor ‘Wearing a poppy bruise on his left
temple’, poppies being the colour of blood as well as a symbol of the dead. Interestingly the
poet uses the word “box” rather than coffin, suggests his lack of understanding, on the other
hand this description, could convey that given the age of his brother he is reminded, as he
looks upon the corpse of the way he saw him in his cot. The final line of the seventh stanza
tells us that the little boy had no ‘gaudy scars’ as the car knocked him to one side rather than narrator talks about "Big" Jim
running over him.
Evans makes it appear as if he
The poem ends with a single line in contrast to the previous stanzas. ‘A four foot box, a foot
for every year’ asserts the age of the dead boy, ‘driving home’ the tender age at which the
thinks he is either really
boy met his end. Interestingly the fact that the final stanza is merely nine words long could
also convey the boy’s age. The shortness of the stanza could in fact also convey the deep
fat, or really thin because
sense of grief and shock the poet feels due to the death of his brother. The closing lines
compels the reader, like the poet’s mother to feel a sense of anger, due the boy’s death. No
sometimes in nicknames irony
individual should have to die to so young, so tragically, and no parent should have to bury
their child.
is used. The word "funerals"
develops an idea hinted in
This poem is about a boy, that stanza one, sick bay, because
tells his experience when he sick bay gives an idea of
as picked up from school something going wrong, and
because of the death of his funerals, a death.In this
baby brother. This poem is stanza, the narrator is rather
possibly an autobiographical emotionless as well. In the
poem, as it is written in the first line of stanza three,
persona "I". It has seven the mood changes completely.
stanzas each of which has It has a much jollier feeling,
three lines, and the last line because the baby hasn't
of the poem is apart from the realised yet all that is
others. It has no rhyming happening around it because of
scheme. his innocence. Heaney manages
When reading the first stanza to make this contrast, by,
rather than a monotonous
of this poem, it gives a sad
feeling, because of it being description, pacing it up,
giving it a rhythm making it
emotionless; it is slow and
monotonous. By giving many have shorter, stronger sounds
references of time, it seems managed by the "ed" in the
past tense. In the next lines,
as if the boy is waiting for
something eagerly, and because the narrator is "embarrassed
by old men standing up to
he is "counting bells" he
seems to be bored, and is shake [his] hand" probably
because he doesn't know what
trying to distract himself. In
this stanza, there is an to do, or how to act.
impression that something bad In this stanza, the boy seems
has happened, because he is not to be preoccupied by the
sitting "in the college sick death; he seems to be much
bay", and his "neighbours more worried about what others
drove [him] home". There is an think of him. In the fourth
uncomfortable mood, and stanza, the narrator quotes
At the second stanza, the exactly what the old men are
saying, because he probably
sadness and tension builds up,
because his "father [is] doesn't think they really mean
crying" and this make us feel what they are saying. This
rather uncomfortable, because makes us feel that the
it makes us think that narrator has despise over
them, like in the next line
somebody he really cares about
has died, as men tend not to when he says "strangers",
because he probably feels that
be so sensitive and because
"he had always taken funerals shouldn't be there if they
aren't close to the family.
in his stride". The way the
When they offer their
condolences, the old men use a
euphemism because it would be
too harsh.
The word death is usually very
strong, and in this situation,
it will really be offensive.
In the next stanza, the
narrator is describing all
that is happening, still
without much emotions and
describing everything in
clinical words. Like in the
rest of the poem, he seems to
be more worried by what is
happening, rather than crying
himself; and this is
disturbing for the reader. In
the first line, the narrator's
mother "[coughs] out angry
tearless sighs" and this makes
the reader think that she is
really shocked, tearing apart
and about to collapse. It also
makes the reader feel shocked
itself.
In the next stanza, the
narrator is describing all
that is happening, still
without much emotions and
describing everything in
clinical words. Like in the
rest of the poem, he seems to
be more worried by what is
happening, rather than crying
himself; and this is
disturbing for the reader. In
the first line, the narrator's
mother "[coughs] out angry
tearless sighs" and this makes
the reader think that she is
really shocked, tearing apart
and about to collapse. It also
makes the reader feel shocked
itself. In the sixth stanza,
the words "snowdrops" and
"nurses" have a stronger
effect by being at the end of
the line.
These two words contrast,
because nurses makes you think
about illness and death, and
snowdrops, being white, and as
they flourish, make you think
of a new beginning. There is a
contrast between life and
death. When the boy "[sees]
him for the first time in
weeks, paler now", he starts
to have feelings; he seems to
be quite sad, and by using the
word "him" it seems as if he
doesn't want to talk about it
and is disturbed. The last
stanza is the one with the
most powerful effect. In the
first line, poppy bruise gives
a connotation that the wound
is very large, and red, by the
blood. It makes the reader
feel sad, because of how young
the boy as.
The baby "lay in his four foot
box as in his cot" and this
gives an image that the baby
as really small; so small he
still used a cot. This gives a
shocking effect on the reader,
as it makes you realise how
small he is. As the baby as is
"knocked clear", this shocks
the reader a lot, because it
gives the impression that he
as hit really hard, fast and
violently. The last line of
this stanza is apart from the
others. This makes it have a
stronger effect on the reader.
This line repeats what is said
before, because the narrator
is really shocked, as is the
reader when reading this,
because you realise how small
the baby is.
By the alliteration of the
letter "f", and short
syllables, it gives a even
stronger effect, as it makes
you feel the anger of the
narrator. In conclusion, we
can see that the title of the
poem, "Mid-Term Break" doesn't
relate at all with the poem;
because the title makes us
think of vacations and fun
when it is actually about
death. This is called tragic
irony. The overall effect this
poem had on me, as really
strong. It made me feel sad,
disturbed and shocked, but
despite this I believe it is
wonderfully written.
21212
The poem Person Helicon by Seamus
Heaney is a curious and thought-provoking
work about a childs fascination with wells.
On the surface, the poem is very straight
forward. The narrator is recalling a
childhood spent exploring wells and old
pumps however, like most poems; Personal
Helicon has a deeper meaning. A lot of the
depth in this poem can be seen just from
examining the title. Helicon, a mountain
situated in Boeotia, Greece, was celebrated
in Greek mythology because of the two
springs that were located there. The springs
were said to be the source of poetic
inspiration and they were very sacred to the
muses, the gods and goddesses who inspire
literature and art. This suggests that the
poem Personal Helicon is about Heaneys
own inspiration for his writing. The poem
talks about wells and mentions dark drops,
reflections, and echoes which could signify
that Heaney gets the inspiration for his
work from himself. His poems are a
reflection of himself and, by looking deep
into his soul just as the narrator of the
poem looks into wells; he is able to find the
motivation and vision necessary to create
his literary works. This meaning is furthered
through several lines in the poem. The
words When you dragged out long roots
from the soft mulch a white face hovered
over the bottom, for example, could be
referring to the narrator tracing back the
roots of his family tree to discover his own
identity. Another line others had echoes,
gave back your own call with a clean new
music in it could mean that Heaney sees
poetry as a way of restating his thoughts
and emotions in a more beautiful and
musical way. Even the last line of the poem,
I rhyme to see myself, to set the darkness
echoing, could be saying that the author
uses poetry as a way to discover himself
and to gain insight. The poem could also be
about coming of age and the transition for
childhood into adulthood. In the last few
lines of the poem the author mentions that
exploring wells is beneath all adult dignity
therefore the poem could be about
childhood innocence and how the simplicity
of youth is lost when a person grows up. Or
the meaning could be just as simple and
straightforward as meets the eye- a man
remembering a favourite childhood pastime
and reminiscing about the good old days.
Whatever the meaning Heaney intended for
the audience to take away, the poem
remains just as mysterious and intriguing. It
forces the audience to think and ask
questions and is captivating from start to
finish.
Seamus Heaney’s title choice for his poem “Personal Helicon” is
rooted in ancient Greek mythology. Helicon is the name of a
mountain in Greece. “In Greek mythology, two springs sacred to the
Muses were located here: the Aganippe and the
Hippocrene.”(Mount) The muses are goddesses of inspiration and
the source of knowledge. Mt. Helicon is also where the fable of
Narcissus takes place. Where Narcissus falls so in love with himself,
and becomes so despondent when he realizes that he cannot have
the object of his own desire, he takes his own life at the side of a
spring. Narcissus and the other elements ascribed to Mt. Helicon are
heavily used in his poem to help the reader grasp the meanings
behind the quatrains. While reading it is important to remember the
fables of Mt. Helicon, that the springs on the mountain were the
source of inspiration itself. Thus the title of the poem must be
specifically drawing parallels between the mountains springs and his
sources of inspiration while a child. Unlike the unchanging
mountain, Heaney’s inspiration undergoes a paradigm shift has as he
grows older. One of the voices in this poem goes over the
progression of this change, and tells the story about his inspirations.
“Personal Helicon” is dedicated to another poet, a contemporary of
Seamus’, Michael Longley from Belfast. It is unclear if Michael is the
inspiration for the creation of this poem, but the two had worked
together for some time during their careers. Before Seamus’ career,
he was given birth to, and grew up on a farm in Northern Ireland. If
the poem is taken literally, one can assume a good number of
springs were present around his family’s farm. As such it comes as
no surprise that they are a strong reoccurring theme of his
childhood, and poem.
In this poem, he with such elegance explains the world to himself,
and himself to the reader. It is no wonder he is considered one of
the greatest living poets. Likely he was compelled by others as much
as himself to revisit his journey of becoming poet. And of course this
can only be done through poem. Using wells and springs as a way of
personal reflection and understanding of the natural world, Seamus
begins the reader at his childhood.
Seamus uses simplistic language and grotesque imagery to bring
forth from the reader a sense of childhood. He is filled with curiosity
and naivety. In the first line it becomes established that wells are a
source fascination for him. Wells conveniently are a symbol of life.
Here is found the effective beginning of his, this new passion for
what he lives for. These strange doorways to underground worlds
held untold mysteries which were irresistible to the young child. As
so were the devices that brought forth the mysteries from the
depths of these worlds. The “old pumps with buckets and
windlasses” divinely attached devices that could cross the veil
between worlds, may as well have been huge light up neon signs.
Sirens who’s beckoning call could not be resisted. It is amazing he
survived childhood. Little Seamus couldn’t help himself though, he
“loved the dark drop, the trapped sky, the smells
of waterweed, fungus and dank moss.”
Not just full of synthesia, this bit is only synthesia. It pulls anyone
who has ever been outside right back there. It invites the reader to
experience the smells not of decay, but of the beginning of life. It
asks the reader to peer into the darkness and the unknown. In this
still primordial setting, the image of a young child staring into the
darkness comes easily. He stares into the unknown and wonders
how it got there, begging the reader to come explore with him.
What are the origins of this life here in the well? How can the sky,
something so big, get a bit of itself trapped in the well? And what
other wonders lay hidden in the darkness? Let us turn the
windlasses, and pull up the bucket. The empirical evidence brought
forth will illuminate us all, but answers will only be had after
repeated results.
Seamus brings us to another well, and another stage of his life. Here
he is older and wiser. Danger is starting to become apparent to him.
In this well he brings us to, he explicitly notes that there is “a rotted
board top.” The thirst for knowledge appears slated now. Here
novelty and entertainment is the main draw. Not much to do on a
farm, he spends time savoring
“the rich crash when a bucket
Plummeted down at the end of a rope.”
The well here is “so deep you saw no reflection in it.” Probably
because it is full of allegories, and not water. The well is deep, but
like all things it may be a symbol for, be it life, inspiration, or
knowledge, there is an end. There is a bottom to everything, and
Seamus is starting to get near to the end. However there is still
darkness, and in the darkness there are yet things for him to learn.
And from the description of the bucket, the hard sounds, the violent
action, these things will be learned the hard way.
Onto another well, and another stage of life. Heaney’s third quatrain
brings us to “a shallow one under a dry stone.” This well, though
drying up is still teaming with life. If the depth of the well is taken
his level ignorance about the world around him, then at this point
there is not much left. He describes himself as dragging “out long
roots from the soft mulch,” where he discovers “a white face
hovered over the bottom.” This transitions him from learning about
the world, to learning about himself. He no longer peers into the
darkness or back up into the sky, the world is no longer reflected,
and his time for introspection begins.
Roots are frequently a symbol of family and traditions. Here before
he can look at himself, he must clear them away. His doing so can be
considered an act of removing societal customs and traditions. To be
able to see who he is, to let the person underneath come out and
play, to experiment in being.
Described in playful ways, Seamus talks about his self-exploration
and experimentations in being by describing his activities with even
more wells. Using echoes he calls into the wells to listening to the
mutations. This is a direct parallel for his imagination. Playing out
“what if” scenarios in his mind to see how the changes play out. At
least until he received a fright.
When while peering deep into his reflection one day, “a rat slapped
across my[his] reflection” and scared him. It distorted his image into
something disfigured and horrible. As Nietzsche once said “when
you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into
you.”(Nietzsche, 146) Assuming his gazing into his reflection is him
taking an introspective look at things, then the rat is just a
convenient device used to explain how he found something inside
himself that was disturbing. As is often the case, one’s
conceptualization of themselves is not what one truly is. When the
difference is great, or goes against one’s own moral or social values
it can be frightening. This time, it seems to have been so freighting
as to put him off of it altogether.
No longer does he stare into wells. Seamus looks down upon
exploring the wonders of the world. “pry[ing] into the roots, to
finger slime” is unfitting the man he has become. He considers
looking into himself directly narcissistic. Having grown into an adult
other matters have taken precedence. His childhood activities are
now “beneath all adult dignity,” and he must find alternatives.
Summed up in the last, and arguably his best line we find salvation.
“I rhyme to see myself, to set the darkness echoing.” The echo in the
darkness much like the echo in the wells, we find the act of poetry
has taken the place of gazing into wells. And we find him once again
being able to live.
Q: Describe the FORM of the DIGGING and Discuss
why you think Heaney uses it?
The form of the poem is free verse poem and it’s written in first
person narrative, with eights stanzas containing two couplets. The
free structure of the poem give Heaney more room to express his
thought freely about digging his profession, his family, his roots,
even his country. There is not actual and regular rhyme and rhythm.
But there are some eye rhyme and alliteration in the poem. The eye
rhymes are “pen & gun”, “buried & bright”, “cold & mould” , “curt &
cuts” and so on. The using of eye rhymes makes the poem look
beautiful, neat and comfortable. Moreover, the alliterations are
“buried & bright”, “squelch & slap” and “curt & cut” and so on. Both
eye rhyme and alliteration are good for reading and memory. And
alliteration also creates beautiful rhyme, reading like music.
Especially, the using of “pen & gun” suggests a simile: the pen is
might be a gun; the pen might have the power to protect, save or
develop something. Secondly, the “buried & bright” makes the
description of the father’s hardworking in the field vivid and visual.
Therefore, we can know Heaney’s respect for his hardworking
father. Thirdly, the “cold & mould” and “squelch & slap” also have
important effect on the emotion expressing: because all of the four
words are negative, they may provoke our mind. It means those
situations awaken Heaney’s memory at this time.
Finally, there is a repetition in the poem, the first stanza and the last
stanza. The memory begins with the first “Between my finger and
my thumb” and ends with the similar one. It suggests that there are
an extended metaphor of digging and roots. It’s a clue in the poem
as well.
Q. Discuss the poet’s use of the following: SIMILE,
ALLITERATION, REPETITION?
Simile is that the pen is a spade or a gun and writing is
digging. From “The squat pen rests; snug as a gun.” and “The squat
pen rests. I’ll dig with it”, we can get the simile. The pen is a gun
suggests that he may want to protect and develop his new life as a
writer. From the poem, we know that the career of farmer may be a
family tradition, but Heanay breaks it and chooses to be a writer. So,
he needs a gun to protect his profession. The pen is a spade suggests
that Heaney realizes that his writing with the pen is comparable to
that of his forefathers with a spade. He also realizes that he can
continue his own new career with the land he is proud of through his
writing.
The alliterations are “buried & bright”, “squelch & slap” and “curt &
cut” and so on. The using of alliterations makes the poem looks
beautiful, neat and comfortable. They are good for reading and
memory. And alliteration also creates beautiful rhyme and makes it
read like music. The “buried & bright” makes the description of the
father’s hardworking in the field vivid and visual. So, we can know
Heaney’s respect for his hardworking father. Thirdly, the “cold &
mould” and “squelch & slap” also have important effect on the
emotion expressing: because all of the four words are negative, they
may provoke our mind. It means those situations awaken Heaney’s
memory at that time.
There is a repetition in the poem, the first stanza and the last stanza.
The memory begins with the first “Between my finger and my
thumb” and ends with the similar one. It emphasizes that there are
an extended metaphor of digging and roots. It’s a clue in the poem
as well.
Q: The poem uses an extended METAPHOR. Identify it
and discuss how it allows the poet to DEVELOP his THEMES.
Identify at least 2 themes.?
It’s apparent that there are an extended metaphor of digging and
roots from the “The squat pen rests. I’ll dig with it”. It’s the clue and
the key point of the poem. Firstly, we can identify the theme that
Heaney thinks his writing with the pen is comparable to that of his
forefathers with a spade. He respects his forefathers, for which we
can get the evidences like the lines “loving their cool hardness in our
hand”, “My grand cut more turf in a day than any other man on
Toner’s bog”, but he chooses a new field with his good skill and
“digging” the land through his writing. That’s digging his family,
especial the family tradition. Further, because his forefathers work
hard in digging, for which we can get the evidences like “Corked
sloppily with paper. He straightened up to drink it, then fell to right
away”, he gives an indication that he will follow his forefathers to
work hard to creates more good works. What’s more, from the lines
“Under my window” and “My father, digging. I look down” at the
second stanza, I guess that there may be a value distance between
Heaney and his forefathers. On the one hand, because he accepts
more education and work in writing, he “look down” his forefather’s
farm. On the other hand, he breaks the career chain in his family
tradition, so he isn’t accepted and supported by his forefathers.
That’s why his pen is a gun to protect something. But at the end of
the poem, according to the line “through living roots awaken in my
head” the gap disappears.
As for the second theme, he may dig the history of the country,
because of the mention of turf. Now Ireland is only one of the
countries left in Europe that still has turf bogs. For Heaney, he may
want to “digging” the historical past to give the meaning to the
present. As a writer, he wants to show he can transfer memories in
the paper and give the old thoughts the power to transcend time.
Heaney describes the production of farm-made butter witnessed as
a youngster. The poem reveals close observations of the technical
stages that accompany a ‘magical’ transformation. The process is
akin to alchemy: the family produces gold from base metal, butter
from milk! They are magicians.
The rising cream of the milk gradually formed a thick crust with the
texture and colour of building materials coarse-grained as limestone
rough-cast. The milk-containers are four crocks … large pottery
bombs, an analogy that forecasts the explosive transformation that
will ultimately take place, echoed, perhaps, in the later reference to
the suffocating sulphur mine.
On its journey to the butter-churn the milk underwent a radical
change, from its creation inside the cow’s hot brewery of gland, cud
and udder to fermentation in cool porous earthenware
In the Heaney kitchen cleanliness was paramount with a wooden
hooped churn to be purified: first abrasively sterilized, scoured By
plumping kettles (the water piping-hot) then with sounds of more
delicate human touch: busy scrubber echoing daintily.
An intense, manual process is launched: the contents of crocks
poured out like innards (spilled their heavy lip/ of cream, their white
insides) into the churn; the plunger resembling a great whisky-
muddler (a kind of cocktail mixer in the drinks’ trade) and
fashioned/ in deal wood was plunged in and the churn sealed.
Cleanliness is replaced by the need for intense energy and stamina;
the thudding reverberations echoed in onomatopoeic rhythms that
slugged and thumped for hours. Muscles, skin and clothes were all
affected: ached … blistered … spattered.
Gradually the milk began to thicken, turned flabby. Then, hours
later, the first veins of butter began to form (gold flecks began to
dance) triggering the preparation of what would be required for the
finished product: sterilized birchwood bowl/ and little corrugated
butter-spades.
Redoubled efforts pay dividends as suddenly/ a yellow curd was
weighting the churned up white, its properties and promise
altogether different: heavy and rich, coagulated sunlight. Skimming
extracts the bounty: butter fished, dripping like gold nuggets panned
from a river and heaped up like gilded gold
Heaney remembers equally the aftermath: the pungent odours
impacting on the senses (the house would stink…/acrid as a sulphur-
mine); the equipment set aside (ranged) for next time; the butter
neatly stored in soft printed slabs
The pace has slowed: fulfilled people move around with gravid ease,
their minds still reflecting every facet of recent activity ( our brains
turned crystals) … of newly cleansed equipment, of sounds (the plash
and gurgle) and smell of sour-breathed milk … of the final slab-
shaping stage in the process emanating from the scullery: the pat and
slap of small spades on wet lumps.