By Emily Ashford Essay

In the course of this essay I unavoidableness to contrast and compare two rimes by the Irish poet Seamus Heaney. His anthology Death of a natural scientist was written in reflection of childhood and the loss of ingenuousness possibly base on his own experiences. This anthology has received much plaudit and recognition over the past few decades. Seamus was brought up in the racy hearted countryside of Ireland. He grew up alongside reputation and alongside 8 otherwise children, although he was the oldest and maybe understood some things before the other children such(prenominal) as death and the facts of life. In the poems Death of a Naturalist he follows the true realities of reputation, and how the frogspawn and frogs come to be there. In The Early Purges he learns not to be sympathetic toward cute and fluffy but ultimately choice draining animals. Both settings are rural rather than urban however, the separately poem focuses on different areas of the countryside Death of a Naturalist is based around where all the year flax-dam grows. Flax dam it a stagnant pool where harvested flax is left to decompose to prepare for manufacture into linen and other materials.The poem is narrated by a young male child, he is recalling events in which he explored nature where the flax dam festered in the heart of the townland. This implies that, at this time in the boys life, nature was especially important. In The Early Purges events are recalled on a farm. A well run farm where delicate and unnecessary animals are seen as scraggy wee shits and are slaughtered. The poem is narrated once more, from a young boys perspective and perhaps even the perspective of the poet himself. Through the boys fundamental interaction with nature we are reminded and recognize the childhood innocence.In Death of a Naturalist the boy is fascinated with nature to the extent that even the roughly trivial and perhaps annoying things to most adults, such as bluebottles and the affectio nate thick slobber of frogspawn become exciting to him. He likes these things best of all. The steering nature is presented also shows us a childish imagination where numerous things are considered and elaborated in a way only a child could think. Also through the eyes of a child we learn about death, where at first this brutal inevitability frightened him. However, again the boys fascination with this process of killing and decaying is described in every detail.After the kittens drown and their tiny din soused the boy watches the corpses and follows the process of deterioration. Both poems involve a change in attitude, each of these changes represent a loss of innocence. In Death of a Naturalist this change is represented from the start of the second stanza. Contrasting to the first stanza he begins to describe the flax-dam in a negative way. Where it was once green and large(p) headed it has now been invaded by angry frogs Seamus also uses military terms and circle of similes and metaphors like blunt heads farting, to draw attention to how daunting nature sens be to a child.