Comparing 'The night of the scorpion' and 'Digging'.

• At the start of the poem ‘Digging’ the first two opening lines sound as though they are or could be the end of the poen. This gives extra deph to the poem making the reader want to immagine and try to the think what is going to happen next. It also makes the reader want to read on. ( line 1-2, “Between my finger and my thumb The squat pen rests:snug as a gun”)

• The poem is narrated by the son although there is no sign of this until the last line of the second paragraph. I think the writer was trying to let the reader have a wide immagination. (line 5, My father, digging. I look down)

• There are three stages to the poem: 1memories of te father (past)

                                                                    2 memories of grand father (further past)

                                                                    3 the present.

This is a leap in the tense fron past to present.+

• The ending of the poem is similar to the first with some minor alterations.(line 29- 31, “ Between my finger and my thumb The squat pen rests. I’ll dig with it.”)

• The tittle,once one has read this poem, becomes clear that it is not ment as digging with a shovel but digging into the past.

• The language used in ‘The Night Of The Scorpion’ is very simple yet very detailed. Something that struck me as a very good metaphor was using the people as flies and how they buzzed out. (line8, “the peasents…a hundered times”)
• The writer goes into detail and depth about the peasents culture or religion by using words such as ‘evil one’ and ‘blessing’.
• The poem as a whole is quite detaild specially when the writer describes the father as “sceptic,rationalist” in line 36.

• The language in the poem ‘Digging’ was very detailed and there was a very wide use of vocabulary.
• The writer uses idiomatic phrases to enhance the poem. (line 2 ‘snug as a gun’) this phrase showa how the squat pen rests very comfterble like a gun in a hand is ergonomic.
• There is some boasting added in to emphise the feeling of the young boy and the way he feels terwards hs father and grand father.(line 17 –18, “My grandfather cut more turf in a day Than any other man on Toner’s bog.
• Repititon in the poem is used to emphisise the point. ( line 23, “going down and dowm”)
• Quick sentence structure gives impressions of character movin fast.

Reflection:  I found this work quite hard as In that I thought a bit more background info and a basic outline of how to set it out would have come in handy.