preview

Comparing Seamus Heaney Poems Follower, Mid-term Break, and Digging

Better Essays

In this essay I will be comparing three Seamus Heaney poems we looked at in class these are called, “Follower”, “Mid-term Break” and, “Digging”. There are differences as well as similarities, the similarities include: they are all poems about and set in Seamus’ childhood memories
In addition, all the poems more or less use some of the same poetic devices and techniques like: onomatopoeia and some of the same characters appear in all three poems such as like: Seamus (himself obviously) and his father. The differences include the fact, “Mid-term break” which is more emotional in my personal opinion. And is about a completely different situation then, “Follower” and, “Digging”, which are set on the farm Seamus lives on and is …show more content…

“Mid-term break”, is a poem about one of Seamus Heaney’s most upsetting and disturbing memories of his childhood, going to his first ever funeral and it being his only bother who was just 4 years old you had just become what do you call them these days err…oh that’s it, an infant would not have made it any better for Seamus, plus the fact the room was full of strangers shaking his hand and telling him they were sorry about the tragedy that had fallen upon his family and whispers about him informed them he was the eldest made him very embarrassed and scared enough to hold his mothers hand,

“ 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, as my mother held my hand.”

I mean, how would you feel if you went to a funeral for the first time wouldn’t you frightened and embarrassed of the strange people coming up to you shaking you’re hand talking to you because you did not know any of them, and it was you’re only brother(s) or sister(s) or even twin(s) funeral wouldn’t you be a upset and really lonely? Because if you had nobody younger or the same age as you to talk to about what teenagers call “stuff” i.e.: the latest fashions, most popular celebrities of the time (I say this because you know kids these days, one day one band is the coolest one day and crap the next) and about you’re

Get Access