The poetry of Seamus Heaney.

Answer the following question. Your essay must not be shorter than
500 words.

Discuss how feelings of fear and/or disgust are portrayed in two of

the following poems by Heaney (‘Death of a Naturalist’, ‘The Barn’,
‘Blackberry Picking’). Your essay should comment on how these
themes are represented in the two poems, paying particular attention
to the use of diction, sensory imagery and figures of speech. 

“ I think childhood is generally speaking a preperation for

dissapointment” as once said by Seamus Heaney. A various number of Seamus
Heaney’s intial poems depict episodes from his early years, and give a prompt
feeling of the expectations and fears along with the delights and agonies of
childhood experience and his development towards adulthood. These are poems
that show ‘ a rite of passage’, ‘a transition stage’ where the youthful Heaney
changes his mentality towards the natural world in order to convey the concerns
of growing up and the loss of innocence. Two such poems are ‘DEATH OF A
NATURALIST’ and ‘BLACKBERRY PICKING’.

In ‘Death of a Naturalist’ we see a young Seamus Heaney, an innocent

child still yet to discover the harsh realities of life. At a young age Heaney
shows keen interest and attraction towards nature through the use of natural
imagery that can be described as positive, “dragonflies, spotted butterflies,/But
best of all was the warm thick slobber of frogspawn” we can observe how
things he finds fascinating, most people would find unpleasant. He would “fill
jampotfuls of the jellied/Specks” indicating how much he simply loved
collecting them, and put them “on window sills at home” and “On shelves at
school” and “[waited] and [watched]” them grow with fascination. Up until the
day when one incident changed his life, this incident is full of negative and
threatening imagery indicating the fear that this child comes face to face with.
One day Young Heaney hears “coarse croaking” he had never heard before
(indicating his transition stage) and goes to investigate where it was coming
from. He encounters an army of “angry frogs/ Invaded” the use of military
language suggests threat and fear, as young Heaney thinks that the frogs are out
for revenge for the stolen frogspawn. He comes across a scary discovery of
“gross bellied frogs” “cocked/ On sods” and “The slap and plop” his perspective
of these frogs transitions from fascination to fear and disgust. The child
disgusted, terrified and shocked “turned, and ran .The great slime kings” this
indicated how the frogs were transformed into an object of fear, and dominated
the flax-dam. At the same time here Heaney’s Innocence and his childhood
attitude towards nature is lost.

In ‘Blackberry-Picking’ in the title itself blackberries indicate the loss of

innocence and consequences that come along with knowledge and growing up.
In this poem we see young Heaney and his friends Go picking blackberries in
“Late August, given heavy rain and sun” This would be the best time as the
berries would be the ripest and the sensual atmosphere created a sensual
attraction. He describes the blackberries as “glossy purple clot” using visual and
tactile imagery to describe the deep desire towards them. “It’s flesh was sweet
like thickened wine” use of flesh here creates a sense of desire and hunger for
more, “leaving stains upon the tongue” a sense of guilt on their behalf a sin.
They continue picking them “until the cans were full, /until the tinkling bottom
had been covered with green ones” this further indicates their greed and lust, so
lost in their actions that their “hands were peppered with thorn pricks” but lust
made them forget the pain. After they “hoarded the fresh berries in the byre “As
a result of their greed, the berries are covered in a disgusting rat-gray fungus
and are no longer attractive. The juice was stinking too in contrast to the earlier
description of “the sweet flesh” that has now turned “sour” in a metaphorical
sense also indicating that childhood innocence will never last long and is short
lived.

And so, proven above are how feelings of fear and/or disgust are
portrayed in Seamus Heaney’s “Death of a naturalist” and “Blackberry-Picking
“. Also, that how through Heaney’s eyes childhood is portrayed as an
experience served as a preparation for disappointment through his own personal
experience of life depicted through his poems.