What do we learn about Seamus Heaneys childhood from blackberry picking, the early purges and the follower?

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What do we learn about Seamus Heaneys childhood from blackberry picking, the early purges and the follower

   Heaney begins the narrative of his poem by describing how the berries ripened in late august. It would cause great excitement in the children of his native Irish village.

   The blackberries would ripen very slowly;

 ‘At first just one’ Heaney highlights how the right berries stand out amongst the ‘other red green’ by comparing them to a ;

‘purple clot’ his use of a metaphor here explains how juicy and think the ripe berry looks.

   The poets use of a rhymed couplet makes the line stand out just like the berries do amongst the unripened ones.

By using personification Heaney makes the audience identify with the action in the poem when the berry is eaten is eaten the juice and flesh were;

  ‘like thickened wined’ by using this simile the poet compares the dark berry to an intoxicating drink he implies that the fruit makes the children ‘drunk’ with the blood of summer. Subsequently, when Heaney describes the berries as having ‘inked up’ he conveys an impression of darkness of the fruit –they turn as black as ink.

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   Although Heaney uses an effective piece of onomatopoeia when describing how the hard-unripened berries hit the ‘tinkling bottom’ of the metal can his simile when the ripe berries stare up from the bottom ;

‘Like a plate of eyes’ is a frightening image-that makes the darker berries seem scary and almost sinister. This links with the idea that the berry-pickers ‘hands look like blood covered hands of a mass-murder like bluebeard. There hands will be dripping with juice-like his would have been dripping with blood.

    Blackberry pickers is about a happy childhood Early Purges however reveals a ...

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