Seamus Heany - Death of a Naturalistand The Early Purges

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Miranda Fisher-Levine 10N

Seamus Heany -

Death of a Naturalist and The Early Purges

The poems of Seamus Heany can be seen to be similar in many ways, in language, style, subject and mood.  In this essay I shall compare two of his

poems - Death of a Naturalist and The Early Purges.

        The Early Purges is on the subject of a young boy learning about how kittens are drowned on a "well-run" farm.  Dan Taggart appears to be an older boy or man, obviously experienced in these matters, and his attitude to the "scraggy wee shits" is transferred to the Heany towards the end of the poem, when he realises the "pests have to be kept down".  This is a new attitude to him - at the beginning of the poem, the sound they made was "frail", their paws were "soft", both potential terms of endearment, but these turn out to be (in his eyes) "false sentiments", and he refers to puppies as "bloody pups".  Living on a farm does seem to harden him, but these "false sentiments" would only seem false on a farm, where animals have to die to benefit humans.  However, these sentiments are not false because when he feels them, he has not learn the ins and outs of farm life, so they are merely naïve.  The thought that this is a "farm attitude" is confirmed by his reference to the town being a place "where they consider death unnatural".

        The language Heany uses in The Early Purges is atmospheric.  When the kittens are "slung on the snout of the pump", the "slinging" depersonalises them, showing that Heany no longer sees them as animals, but like objects to be repulsed by.  This is echoed strongly by the description of them as "mealy and crisp" , which also adds a definite sense of revulsion, and when they "bob and shine" like "wet gloves".  The pups and kittens are "pitched" and "prodded" to their deaths, confirming that they are not considered pets as they would be in the town, but merely "pests".  The harsh "p" sound adds to this.  Heany "sadly hung round the yard".  This seems similar to the kittens "bobbing" in the bucket, and it shows the same mood, that it was hopeless for the kittens, that they were helpless, and Heany is also helpless; he cannot save the dead kittens.  His fear is forgotten when the kittens are rotted, they no longer enter his mind until Dan starts to kill again, by trapping, shooting, snaring and pulling necks, when the fright returns, but he becomes desensitised and realises that it is necessary for some animals to be killed.  The title refers to the fact that he first saw these "purges" early on in life, and that the kittens were purged when they were still young.  "Purges" has a slight biblical ring to it, reminiscent of the plagues in Egypt and also the purging of sinners.  There is also the thought that he is being purged of "false sentiments" at a early age.

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        Death of A Naturalist is about a boy (Heany) who is spellbound by nature, and in particular, frogspawn.  He likes to fill "jampots full" and watch it hatch and the "fattening dots" turn into "nimble-swimming tadpoles".  This fascination with nature is quite an innocent, even childish thing, and he brings the tadpoles to school where his teacher, Miss. Walls, teaches him and the other children about how the frogspawn was brought about, but in a way that the children will understand, and that reflects Heany's juvenile interest - she talks about "the daddy frog" and the "the mammy frog", and ...

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