Seamus Heaney Research Paper
Seamus Heaney Research
The recently deceased Seamus Heaney (1939 - 2013), was an Irish poet who explored a wide range of themes in his poetry, covering subjects such as Iron age bog bodies, modern day religious and social conflict, Ancient Irish history, and autobiographical work with his trademark imagery and symbolism. Heaney was highly critically acclaimed as a poet, and received numerous awards during his lifetime, most notably of which was the 1995 Nobel prize in literature for “works of lyrical beauty and ethical depth, which exalt everyday miracles and the living past”. Heaney was regarded by some, such as the American poet Robert Lowell, as “the greatest Irish poet since Yeats”, and the quality and quantity of his poetry certainly reflected this statement.
Poems are born of disillusionment, and this is especially evident in the poetry of Seamus Heaney that deals with Iron age bog bodies as its focus. Poems such as “Tollund Man” and “The Grauballe Man” use these bodies as metaphors to express the author’s skepticism that modern-day Irish society is any more “civilised” than its …show more content…
This poem describes with vivid detail a bog body who has died a violent death, complete with “Slashed throat”. This time the body in question is an ancient Gaul, who lived around the same time as Julius Caesar. Throughout the poem, Heaney constantly compares the body with nature and the earth. His wrists are compared to “bog oak” while his spine is referred to as “an eel arrested/under a glisten of mud”. Though the tone of the piece, it is clear that Heaney sees the bog body as a beautiful and wondrous thing. “Who will say ‘corpse’/to his vivid cast?” asks Heaney. “Who will say ‘body’/to his opaque repose?”. This balance between the way that Heaney saw the body and the brutal reality is brought to a head near the end of the poem where Heaney proclaims that the “dying Gaul” is “hung in the
The recently deceased Seamus Heaney (1939 - 2013), was an Irish poet who explored a wide range of themes in his poetry, covering subjects such as Iron age bog bodies, modern day religious and social conflict, Ancient Irish history, and autobiographical work with his trademark imagery and symbolism. Heaney was highly critically acclaimed as a poet, and received numerous awards during his lifetime, most notably of which was the 1995 Nobel prize in literature for “works of lyrical beauty and ethical depth, which exalt everyday miracles and the living past”. Heaney was regarded by some, such as the American poet Robert Lowell, as “the greatest Irish poet since Yeats”, and the quality and quantity of his poetry certainly reflected this statement.
Poems are born of disillusionment, and this is especially evident in the poetry of Seamus Heaney that deals with Iron age bog bodies as its focus. Poems such as “Tollund Man” and “The Grauballe Man” use these bodies as metaphors to express the author’s skepticism that modern-day Irish society is any more “civilised” than its …show more content…
This poem describes with vivid detail a bog body who has died a violent death, complete with “Slashed throat”. This time the body in question is an ancient Gaul, who lived around the same time as Julius Caesar. Throughout the poem, Heaney constantly compares the body with nature and the earth. His wrists are compared to “bog oak” while his spine is referred to as “an eel arrested/under a glisten of mud”. Though the tone of the piece, it is clear that Heaney sees the bog body as a beautiful and wondrous thing. “Who will say ‘corpse’/to his vivid cast?” asks Heaney. “Who will say ‘body’/to his opaque repose?”. This balance between the way that Heaney saw the body and the brutal reality is brought to a head near the end of the poem where Heaney proclaims that the “dying Gaul” is “hung in the