An Advancement of Learning and An August Midnight Compare and contrasting

The poems “An Advancement of Learning” and “An August Midnight” are connected in some way, these poems focus on encounters with certain creatures or animals. Heaney’s with a rat on a river embankment in Belfast and Hardy’s with nocturnal insects that fly through his window.
In the poems
In contrast they are laid out in different structures. In “An Advancement of Learning” it has eight stanzas of four short lines. In contrast “An August Midnight” is made up of two stanzas with six long lines, giving the poem a calm quality.

In “An Advancement of Learning” Heaney recalls on his childhood fear of rats. This is due to his experiences of fear growing up on a farm as a child. The rats provide a link between his childhood and his inner-city life as an adult. “An August Midnight” is based on Hardy’s beliefs that all animals were conscious beings worthy of respect based on the evolutionary theory that all living things are related. This interest is also evident in the close up acute details of the insects’ anatomy “winged, horned and spined”.
The settings of both poems are very different or inconsistent. In “An Advancement of Learning” it is situated outside in an urban river landscape. It is portrayed as polluted with “dirty-keeled swans”. Overall it is an urban setting and a shabby environment, where it projects the negativity of the encounter. Whereas in “An August Midnight” it is inside and a welcoming scene inside a tranquil room where the insects are lured in by lamplight and an open window.

Both poems contrast, in “An August Midnight” Hardy isn’t dismissive or scornful towards the insects, he shows them respect. This is shown when Hardy says “God’s humblest”. However in “An Advancement of Learning” uses words such as “slimed” and “slobbered” to describe the rat’s movements, this portrays Heaney’s dislike or hatred towards rats.