What do we learn of Seamus Heaney, both as a child and as an adult, from the selection of poetry studied? (Use quotations if you feel this would help)

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Louise Downie                                                                                                

Poetry Coursework

What do we learn of Seamus Heaney, both as a child and as an adult, from the selection of poetry studied? (Use quotations if you feel this would help)

After studying a selection of poetry by Heaney I have decided to discuss the poems ‘Mid Term Break’, ‘Blackberry Picking’ and ‘Death of A Naturalist’ to answer the above question.

        In particular the poems ‘Blackberry Picking’ and ‘Death of A Naturalist’ are similar in the way that they show Heaney looking back at his childhood, and showing his reluctance to grow up and his refusal to accept reality.

        Heaney uses irony is his work, and the title ‘Mid Term Break’ is ironic, it gives the reader the wrong idea. Reading the title makes you think its going to be a nice happy poem about a Childs half term holiday but it’s the total opposite.

        In this poem Heaney is reflecting on his past, and at first has created the mood of anticipation with his lines ;

‘I sat all morning in the college sick bay

Counting bells knelling classes to a close’

          From the above lines we learn that Heaney was away at boarding school as a child, and on that occasion had been called out to the college sick bay and, unaware what’s going on but senses that something urgent is happening because the bells where knelling, which only happens in a time if crisis.

          We learn that Heaney deals with adult issues at a young age and goes through seeing his father in a different light. We learn this from the lines ;

In the porch I met my father crying

He had always taken funerals in his stride’

           His father however isn’t taking this funeral in his stride because its one of his own.

           In the next two verses Heaney shows us the awkwardness in the situation and the line ;

‘The baby cooed and rocked the pram’

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           made the situation for Heaney worse. It seemed as if things were going to carry on like normal as if everyone hasn’t yet accepted it. The lines ;

‘When I came in, and I was embarrassed

By old men standing up to shake my hand

And tell me they were sorry for my trouble

Whispers informed strangers I was the eldest away at school’

  shows the awkwardness and embarrassment Heaney felt.

Heaney doesn’t want to admit to himself that its his brother that’s ‘gone’ all the way through the poem. Heaney is ...

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