Digging- Seamus Heaney

Reading for meaning
At the start of the poem the writer is sitting in his room next to a window looking down at his father digging. The writer is holding a pen.
The sight of his father digging reminds him of his father working in the potato fields when he was younger.
The writer also associates his Grandfather with digging aswell. He has a memory of taking his Grandfather milk in a bottle when he was very young and him drinking it but then getting back to work straight away.
However the writer decides to write instead of digging.

Finish these statements
The poem is about how the writer has chosen to become a writer instead of following in his Father's and Grandfather's footsteps and becoming a digger in a field. He compares how they are very different in trade but how they are similar but two dig with shovels while one with a pen.
The words and phrases that struck me most was the way onomatopoeia was used in the words to make you feel like you were there such as 'nicking and slicing' which is the sound of the shovel hitting the ground. Also the words 'squelch and slap' which shows the sound of the mud making you feel like you're there and also that nature is alive.
Heaney is different from his father because his father worked on the land all of his life doing hard labour everyday but Heaney has never worked hard labour and has wrote poetry for a living.

Death of a Naturalist continued...

Seamus Heaney also creates a vivid impression of learning about the tadpoles at school by using many images such as, 'jellied specks'. This shows how small the tadpoles are and by using the word 'jellied' it makes you image the tadpoles like a jelly texture (smooth and quite soft) which is what a tadpole is like.
He also uses the feeling of warmth to describe the tadpoles showing that they are nice to touch and feel.
The word 'burst' also describes something very beautiful when the tadpoles leave their eggs. This word makes me think of a firework bursting out when it is rocketed up to the sky; this is a very beautiful thing.

Response to Death of a Naturalist

What I did  when I was a child that I wouldn't do now:

• Play in  mud
• Splash in puddles
• Climb the trees
• Pretended I was a princess
• I used to love playing with My Little Pony's

As you grow up you begin to get into trouble for doing certain things so you learn to not do them. For example you start to get in trouble for splashing in muddles because your clothes become dirty and your parents tell you off.
I stopped pretending to be a princess because I grew up and learnt that I couldn't become a princess and that fairytales weren't the same as real life. (This ruined my childhood).

I think the poem is about nature becaue it mentions different amimals and plants in the poem. The opening lines evoke nature beautifully. This is because Heaney uses images such as 'bubbles gargled delicately', 'wove a strong gauze of sound,' and 'dragon-flies, spotted butterflies'.

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This blog is for my English Literature G.C.S.E.