Duffy's poem is her own personal experience which makes us know how she felt in the classroom. Heaney's poem probably is one of his own experiences because he lived in a farm where he would have collected frogspawn. I think poems were influenced by their own childhood experiences and were described with great detail.
Both poems describe the ending of childhood innocence in different ways. At the start of Duffy's poem it seems more calm and happy,
'Mrs Tilcher chanted the scenery'
It seems like a more calm and colourful room which made you feel warm and make you smile,
'The classroom glowed like a sweetshop.'
Heaney's poem seems more dull and doesn't give you a nice image,
'Flax had rotted there'
The word 'rotted' gives you an ugly image of something old and dirty been there for ages. It also makes you feel uncomfortable as you read it,
'Daily it sweltered in 'the punishing sun'
The word 'punishing' gives you a very unhappy feeling and makes you think of pain.
A similarity in the poem is that they both mention frogs and tadpoles. Mostly in 'Death of a naturalist' but also in ‘In Mrs Tilcher's class',
'Three frogs hopped in the playground'
Although the frogs are described very different in each poem because in Heaney's poem the frogs are made out to be scary,
'Angry frogs'
Whereas in Duffy's poem they just sound like innocent little creatures,
'Jumping and croaking away from the lunch queue.'
The clean images of each poem is a big difference as Duffy's sounds and smells fresh or clean,
'Then scent of a pencil slowly, carefully, shaved.'
On the other hand Heaney's is the opposite,
'Wove a strong gauze of sound around the smell' and 'cow dung'.
These quotes make you imagine the smell which isn't nice and makes you feel a bit sick.
Both poems end the same as they both end with a negative feel.
Duffy's poem ends where the parents are appalled at the child,
'But stared at your parents, appalled'
Also it makes you feel how the child feels as they can't wait to get out of school,
'You ran through the gates, impatient to be grown.'
In Heaney's poem it ends in fear,
'That if I dipped my hand the spawn would clutch it'
Both poems use a lot of alliteration but in different ways. At the start of Heaney's poem he used alliteration in a negative way,
'heavy headed'.
Whereas in Duffy's poem she uses it in a calmer way,
'With' and 'While'.
This makes you automatically judge what the poem will be like. In Duffy's poem she uses alliteration to describe nicer things,
'sweet shop'
When you hear this you feel happier and think of nicer things.
In Heaney's poem he describes things that aren't really a nice image,
'jampotfuls' and 'jellied'
These don't sound as nice or give you as nice of an image as 'sweet shop' does.
In the third stanza of Duffy's poem it makes you feel sort of relieved,
'freed' and 'followed'.
This reminds you more of being a child. The word 'freed' makes u feel a lot less trapped and feel more comfortable.
In stanza 2 of Heaney's poem he uses,
'coarse croaking'.
This seems more threatening as it gives you the image of being surrounded by frogs. Both these poems mention 'croaking' in them.
At the end of Duffy's poem it starts to get more negative,
'tasted' and 'tangible'.
The word tangible makes you feels uncomfortable. The last piece of alliteration is,
'sky' and 'split'.
This isn't a positive thought therefore both poems end negatively.
Both poems use a range of similes. In Duffy's poem she uses a simile in a more positive way,
'The classroom glowed like a sweet shop.'
This is a nice colourful image; also as well as being a simile this quote also has alliteration which has worked well. However in Heaney's poem the use of simile in negative,
'their loose necks pulsed like sails.'
This isn't a nice image and is more a threatening thought. It makes us understand more clearly the thoughts of each writer and how their childhood affected their poems. Another simile used in Heaney's poem is just as negative,
'poised like mud grenades'
This makes it sound more dangerous as grenades are life threatening. There is also a negative simile used in Duffy's poem,
'Brady and Hindley faded, like the faint, uneasy smudge of mistake.'
This quote begins to even out the negativeness used in the poems. Although there are more similes used in Heaney's poem,
'frogspawn that grew like clotted water.'
The word 'clotted' makes it sound more dangerous.
Heaney also uses metaphor in his poem, again in a more negative way,
'Daily it sweltered in the punishing sun'
This makes you think of pain and sort of feel sympathy for the person because it's like he’s being punished. Duffy's poem uses metaphor in a negative way at the end of her poem,
'The air tasted of electricity'
In a way this sort of reminds me of pain as well, like an electric shock. Heaney makes you feel uncomfortable,
'The air was thick'
This is more a feeling of being claustrophobic which is very intimidating and makes you feel a bit sick. He also mentions 'angry frogs' which makes you feel worried as the frogs could attack at any moment. Heaney uses metaphor throughout his poem and Duffy only uses it at the end of her poem.
I found the personification in each poem very interesting, especially in Duffy's poem,
'The laugh of a bell.'
I found this an amazing way to describe something and it makes me feel full of joy. Surprisingly I found that at the start of Heaney's poem he uses some positive personification,
'heart of the townland'
This sounds happy and makes it out to be a nice place so you don't really expect the rest of the poem to sound so negative.
I found the personification in Duffy's poem better as it used more throughout her poem,
'A xylophones nonsense heard from another form.'
This reminds me a lot of my childhood especially the way she mentioned 'nonsense'.
I found one piece of personification shocking coming from a child but it shows she is getting older,
'Heavy sexy sky.'
I wouldn't expect a younger person to use the term 'sexy' to describe something.
Neither poems rhymed which I found disappointing. I think they would be more enjoyable to read if there was rhythm. In Duffy's poem where she used the word 'chanted' I think she could have made it better by making the countries rhyme.
Heaney's poem has used Onomatopoeia in a funny but disturbing way,
'The slap and plop.'
Duffy uses onomatopoeia in a completely different way which makes you feel calm and relaxed,
'Mrs Tilcher chanted the scenery.'
There is not really any repetition of words in either of the poems which I think makes them less threatening.
After reading both poems I can feel empathy for both poets’. In Heaney's poem it made me remember when I went out and collected frogspawn, but I never found it scary or threatening like his poem makes it sound. Therefore I would prefer Duffy's poem. In her poem everything said in it happened to me during my childhood in school. Reading Duffy's poem made me think back to me sitting in class in a brightly coloured classroom. Although I was disappointed that it didn't rhyme at all because it would have made me enjoy it even more.
