Death Of A Natrualist Flashcards
Author
Seamus Heaney
Context
Irish poet connects landscape to personal memories
Post romantic response to nature
Irish troubles
Form
Two stanzas which emphasise the change in emotion and the loss of innocence
Two objects of childhood to emphasise the youth in the first stanza and the naivety
“Jampots” “school”
War vocabulary which juxtaposes the childish vocab, and shows loss of innocence and the horror if the real dangerous world
“Cocked” Grenades”
Two quotes from the first stanza and the second, to show how he goes from focusing on the beauty of the world optimistically to focusing on the ugly with an all knowing pessimistic view
“Dragonflies, spotted butterflies”
“gross bellied frogs”
Quotes which show the romanticised parent hood before discovering the realisation of the body such as sex or death.
“Mammy frog”
“Daddy frog”
Last line which suggests the discovery and fear of mortality and that he is scared that the world of violence would pull him in
“That if i dipped my hand the spawn would clutch it”
Soundscape
“Bubbles gargles delicately” shows precious gentle, naive protected
Contrasts to the “the air was thick with a base chorus” which is consuming dangerous, and a chorus is something that that u want to join in so he is horrified of himself and what he/ the word has become/ is
What is the poem really about (conc)
This guy loss of inconce. But could be interpreted as the change from forced knowledge in a classroom (authorised education) to natural learning and the messy reality of the world. But could also be nativity falling away ans discovering ones self as a body and a sinner.