Summary of Digging

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The poem 'Digging' was written by Seamus Heany five years before the outbreak of violence in Northern Ireland, however, everyone was aware of the conflict that would occur. It was written in 1964 and it was the first poem where he felt he had really "let down a shaft into his real life".

Heany starts by saying, "the squat pen rests, snug as a gun." He treats the pen as his weapon, like a gun and he uses a very confident tone. His grandfather and father were both farmers they dug. The noise of the turf and the smell of potatoes brings back his memories and makes him aware of the vital link that binds him to his family. Heany's admiration for his forbears oozed out of the poem. He 's proud of them and knew their dedication to their job. He has several options of his career to choose from and he wasn't sure what he should choose.
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In the poem, Heany makes use of words to describe sights, smells, touch and hearing. He describes what he sees in great detail. "Nicking and slicing" was used to describe the sound of the sods being heaved up and down. The quotations "Loving their cool hardness in our hands" and "the cold smell of potato mould" were used by Heany to describe touch and the smells he recalls respectively. Heany creates the first two stanzas to have a perfect rhyme. The rhymes are "thumb" to "gun" and "sound" to "ground". Heany makes use of the rhymes to make ...

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