At a Potato Digging Monday 17th March
) Write four brief and simple paragraphs explaining the subject matter of each of the four sections of the poem.
In Section I a spinner (which is a machine once used for spinning the potatoes out of the ground) moves across the field. The labourers follow the machine, picking up the potatoes and putting them into baskets. It is cold; the worker's fingers are dead with cold. Every so often they take their full baskets back to the pit to empty them.
In Section II Heaney writes specifically about the potatoes. They lie on the ground; some of them are "flint-white" and some are "purple". Sometimes potato crops were blighted (by a fungus) making the whole crop fail, and in earlier days this resulted in famine as the population relied on the potato harvest for food. But in this case the crop is a "clean birth", and the potatoes are fine. The soil falls away from the potatoes as they are picked from the ground.
In Section III describes the misery and tragedy caused when the potato harvest in Ireland failed for five years in a row (The Great Potato Famine 1845-1849). The rural poor depended entirely on the potato crop for food, and many died of starvation or from diseases resulting from starvation. Many immigrated to places such as America and Britain. In 1844 Ireland's population was eight and a half million, but by 1851 it had fallen to six and a half million. The devastation caused by this famine is described in this section of the poem.
In Section IV returns to the present day harvesting of the potato crop introduced in Section I of the poem. It is lunch time, and the workers stop for their mid-day meal. They have brown bread and cans of tea. In modern Ireland they are no longer dependent on the potato crop for survival. They work for wages and buy the food that they want.
2) (a) Pick out the words and phrases from the first part of the poem which seem to you to be particularly effective in describing the scene.
* "Drill", in the first line, does not refer to a machine, but the row of potatoes - called a "drill" because the machine or person that plants the seed-potatoes (not really seeds, but sprouting tubers) drills a series of holes into which the seed-potatoes go.
* "Crumbled surf" shows that the waves of the sea mirror the shape of the fields because of the imprint left behind by the machines.
* "Black / Mother" implies that the earth was seen in different ways - it could give life and take life away, it could nourish people and it could starve people.
(b) Describe, as vividly as you can, the picture created by Heaney in the first section of the poem of the workers in the field following the machinery and picking up the potatoes.
* Fingers are described as getting very cold, so cold they "go dead". This shows that the workers will work regardless of the weather, demonstrating their diligence.
* In the first stanza, the labourers are said to "swarm" behind the machine. This is very impersonal, as it puts all of the workers in a group and takes away their individuality.
* A simile is used at the start of stanza two to describe the workers "like crows attacking crow-black fields". The image of birds likens the workers to the common sight of scavenger birds following a ...
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* Fingers are described as getting very cold, so cold they "go dead". This shows that the workers will work regardless of the weather, demonstrating their diligence.
* In the first stanza, the labourers are said to "swarm" behind the machine. This is very impersonal, as it puts all of the workers in a group and takes away their individuality.
* A simile is used at the start of stanza two to describe the workers "like crows attacking crow-black fields". The image of birds likens the workers to the common sight of scavenger birds following a plough around a field at harvest time to pick out all the grubs that have been unearthed. Here it is the people, probably wearing black, picking up the potatoes.
* The workers are able to stand upright for a moment, before stooping again. The image suggests the way in which people with natural dignity are forced to bow to their toil and humble themselves.
* There is also a religious feel to the image "processional stooping through the turf recurs mindlessly as autumn" there is no thought given to the process, it is merely a natural and habitual event, like autumn following summer.
* The fear of a "famine god" means that they kneel in reverence to the "altar of the sod". They worship the ground and the potatoes that come from it as without it they would starve, just as people worship god to help them through difficult times.
3) Write about each of the following phrases from Section II of the poem. Explain what Heaney says about the potatoes in each phrase. Concentrate on the words picked out in bold.
(i) "Flint-white, purple"
--> Heaney is saying that, when the potatoes were picked, they were hard and white in the centre and purple on the outside. The word "flint" is a metaphor, meaning that the potatoes were as hard as stone.
(ii) "like inflated pebbles"
--> Heaney uses this simile to create the image of large, pebble shaped objects, hard and cool to the touch and of a similar colour.
(iii) "Knobbed and slit-eyed tubers"
--> Heaney describes the potato almost as a growth - we imagine from the word "knobbed" that the potato has rounded lumps or parts projecting from its surface, and from the phrase "slit-eyed" we imagine the potatoes having long, straight cuts randomly on its outside surface.
(iv) "they show white as cream"
--> Heaney uses this simile to make the insides of the potatoes sound good and pleasing, as cream is something used as a treat on desserts.
4) How does Section II of the poem differ in form and poetic technique from Section I of the poem?
The first section of the poem contains the mechanical action of diggers and machines, and therefore is structured using regular rhyming schemes and monogamy. Section II, however, changes dramatically, as it becomes uncontrolled with no regular rhyme or structure. The structure of the second section is very random and unsystematic, which mirrors the way that memories come back to people in their heads - they are usually triggered accidentally by a certain image, smell or sound.
5) In Section III of the poem Heaney recalls the terrible famine of 1845. Write about the way he tries to make his readers aware of the devastating effects of hunger and famine.
"In 'forty-five" refers to the first year of the Irish Potato Famine - 1845. The significance of the date may depend on the reader. English readers may think of 1945 (the end of World War Two) and Scots may think of 1745 (the Jacobite uprising under Bonnie Prince Charlie). The omission of the first two digits also suggests the viewpoint of the people at the time who do not need to identify the century. By using the same form, Heaney suggests the way the memory has been passed on and kept alive in the oral tradition.
6) The rhythm of the poetry changes in Section III of the poem. What effect does this have?
Section III returns to a more regular rhythm; it has an almost jaunty rhythm, quite song-like, which helps to emphasise the grotesque imagery of the dancing skeletons. This initially seems incongruous because it does not fit in with the idea of death, but then it occurs to the reader that it is symbolic as the skeletons are being stripped of their dignity.
7) Write a paragraph explaining what happens in Section IV of the poem.
The final section brings us back to the present day. Heaney observes the people stop work for lunch. They are exhausted from their hard work and eat happily 'thankfully breaking their timeless fasts' as if they are eating after a period of fasting (something Catholics do during Lent, building up to Easter).
8) How are the workers in Section IV of the poem described? What is their working life like?
In the fourth and final section, the workers take their lunch break - they no longer depend on the potato for their own food (though they earn their pay by digging it). Instead they have "brown bread and tea", and their employer serves it, while there is no shortage, and they "take their fill". But they are not taking any chances - the earth is not to be trusted ("faithless ground"). As they throw away the dregs of the tea and their breadcrumbs, they make their offerings - "libations" - to this god whom they fear and must appease.
9) Think about the ways Seamus Heaney refers to the earth.
He calls it "the black / Mother". He refers to it as "the bitch earth" and "the faithless ground".
Write as much as you can about Heaney's changing feelings about the land.
To begin with, Heaney describes the ground as "the black / Mother", which conveys the idea that the ground is a source of goodness and that it is an essential provider for the people.
In the next section of the poem, the Earth is "piled in pits; live skulls, blind-eyed" which has a very sinister tone. This could mean that the land is something of evil and wickedness.
Section three portrays the ground in a menacing light, as it is described as the "bitch earth".
In the final section the land is described as "faithless", which obviously says that the earth is not to be trusted and can change from a provider to a killer without warning.
0) Write as much as you can about Heaney's use of alliteration and assonance in the poem. Find several examples of each and try to explain the effect these devices have on the reader. How do they add to the effectiveness of the poem?
(a) Alliteration
--> "higgledy" and "hedge" and "headland" -the important words are linked in the line, and the words convey the image that people were everywhere.
--> "Pits" and "pus" - when you read the words aloud, you almost hiss and spit when you say them. This makes the entire sentence that they are in seem harsh and irate.
(b) Assonance
--> "Birth" and "earth" - the important words are linked in the line, and it symbolises that the earth can give birth to good crops, or that it can give birth to bad crops.
--> "stop" and "flop" - the two words are connected because the reason that the workers "flop" down with exhaustion is because they have not stopped working for such a long time.
1) Write about the wide variety of images used by Heaney in this poem. Try to explain how they add to the feelings and ides that Heaney is trying to convey.
There is a sequence of semi-religious images in the poem, suggesting that the fear of famine is deep-rooted in the memories of the workers on the land, and that the gods need to be propitiated to ward off future famine. In the first section, for example, Heaney says that "heads bow, trunks bend". The actions of the potato pickers suggest reverential bowing to the altar. The workers were also said to stooping in a "processional" manner, suggesting the singing of hymns in a processional movement of clergy and choir in church. Furthermore, in the final section of the poem, the "Brown bread and tea" recall the act of communion, and the remaining cold tea is cast on the ground as a "libation" - an offering to the gods.
There are many images that suggest religious belief or ceremony - but no mention of the established Christian faith: "processional", "god" (note the small "g"), "homage", "altar", "thankfully", "fasts" and "libations" (liquid offerings, usually poured onto the ground or an altar, in many ancient religions)
Heaney uses natural metaphors - of rock ("flint", "pebbles" and "stone"), of bodies ("skulls" and "blind-eyed"), or of animals ("bird" and "bitch") - to describe things.
2) In much of his poetry Heaney tries to link the past and the present. How does he do this in this poem?
The poem deals with two different potato harvests. One is the harvest from the present day that goes successfully and which delivers a rich crop. The second potato harvest looks back to the famine of 1845 when the crop failed and many people starved. Whilst the famine is no longer a threat, its ongoing fear remains and this can be seen in the use of religious language throughout the poem. The first and last of the four sections depict the digging and gathering in of the potato crop today. The second section looks more closely at the potato, and the third is an account of the great Potato Famine of 1845-1850. At the end of the third section, Heaney likens this to the sharp beaks of birds snipping at people's guts. The people are shown as desperate and demoralized - "hungering from birth" - and cursing the ground, "the bitch earth". As this section moves back in time at the start, so it ends by returning to the present, where the "potato diggers are" and "you still smell the running sore" - as if the blight opened a wound that has never healed. I think this was a clever way of connecting the two sections.
3) Write as fully as you can about the parts of the poem which seems to you to be the most powerful.
I thought the most powerful part of the poem was section III because it tells the reader about the people who died in Ireland during the Potato Famine. The way that Heaney describes it so vividly makes it seem horrific and callous. There is repetition of 'live skulls, blind eyed' at the start of this section to link back to the second, but the link is now that these are 'balanced on wild higgledy skeletons', real people who lived in 1845, when the huge potato famine hit Ireland, killing a vast number of people. The skeletons almost seem unreal, not human, as they have all the life taken from them as they 'scoured the land' looking for food, eating the 'blighted' (diseased) potatoes and dying, as a result of this.
Also, the people are described in stanza three as desperate and lifeless 'eyes died hard', showing a lifelessness in people's eyes and 'faces chilled to a plucked bird' using a metaphor to make human faces seem pale and withered, as a bird looks when plucked of all its feathers. I thought this was similar to something that would be seen in a horror film, but as there is no visual image available when you read the poem, it is more frightening because the reader begins to imagine the idea in their heads.
Alex Mullan - Booklet Questions - Seamus Heaney Poetry
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