poetry essay

As a person discovers more about there past, they ultimately unravels their own identity, as shown in the poem, "Digging" by Seamus Heaney, were the narrator, through digging through his own family roots, comes to acquire his or her own heritage and family traditions. In this poem, the theme of heritage and family traditions are most clear. The narrator describes two relationships in the poem, and through examination of the two relationships; one between father and son and one between grandfather and grandson and two, realizes that the narrator comes to accept his own family traditions. In addition, throughout the entire poem, there is a key metaphor of digging for roots, which offer how the narrator, in his writing is discovering his own roots.
In the poem Digging, there are metaphorically many different ways of digging, which plays a significant role to the life of the narrator. There are two literal ways to dig, digging for food or digging for fuel. For example, the grandfather of the narrator digs for “turf” (13) or fuel, because the grandfather has been digging for fuel his whole life and that’s what he knows best and is best at. “Nicking and slicing neatly” (22) the grandfather digs for the good turf, showing his strength and his ability to dig for fuels. “Stooping in rhythm through potato drills,” (8) his father works hard and bends low to correctly get the job done. Both his father and grandfather are phenomenal diggers, while the narrator “corked sloppily with paper” (20) showing his insecurity about digging. The narrator lacks the ability to be a strong and well-built digger like his dad and grandfather. Therefore, Seams Heaney digs for an internal resource, he digs with his pen for ideas with his pen versus digging for food or fuels with a shovel.
Seamus Heaney, contrasting his father and grandfather, digs for a deeper meaning into his own life, digging for ideas, an idea of companionship and relationship with his pen. Seamus looks down on his