The Loss of Childhoos in Heaneys Poems Essay -- Seamus Heaney Poetry

The Loss of Childhoos in Heaneys PoemsSeamus Heaneys metrical compositions search the loss of childhood and the cruelawakening into the world of adulthood. Discuss.Seamus Heaney has been depict as the best Irish poet since Yeats.He was born on April thirteenth 1939 and was the eldest of nine children toMargret and Patrick Heaney, at the family farm in Mossbawn. He studyEnglish in Queens University in Belfast, to a fault in Saint JosephsCollege in Belfast, to become a teacher. After many years of writing wipeout of a Naturalist was published in 1966. It contains poemssymbolic of death of childhood, specifically Heaneys childhood as acurious young naturalist, enthusiastic to learn about nature.Heaneys poems reveal his thoughts of his childhood and his family.His poems are filled with the images of dying, however are also firmlyrooted in childhood. His poems of transition explore the journey fromchildhood into the adult world.Blackberry Picking is a notice of adulthood and childh ood.Heaney tries to tell us that we should enjoy childhood becauseadulthood is disappointing. He gives the message to have lowexpectations, therefore when we grow up we testament not be let down by theadult world.The poem is written from an adult perspective, although it has manychildlike phrases in it. It is about Heaneys summertime ventures with hisfriends during which they would collect blackberries in milk-cans,pea-tins, jam-pots. It is an elegy, mourning the spiritual death ofchildhood. The poem is also an extended metaphor. The beginning isabout childhood, seeing the world as a child. However there areassociations made with adulthood by means ofout the origin stanza eg likethickened wine. This implies that adulthood... ...ive side to adultery, monotonous,boring, defensive, greedy and engulfing. Heaney drags out all of theaspects we accurse most about being an adult. Then he places them in an daunting setting, through a childs perspective and allows us tointerpret the exper ience for ourselves.Heaney presents a generally pessimistic, almost fatalistic view ofadult life. His poems illustrate dangers and closing off vivid in adultlife, in contrast to the dependence we curse on in childhood. Theyexplain to us the dramatic change from purity and purity as infantsto corruption and voracity in adulthood. The poems are employ to conveyyoung Heaneys insecurities and uncertainties, coupled with a faintprogression through the conclusion of each of the poems something hasbeen learned or achieved. What more can unrivalled hope for from thesesignificant childhood incidences?