Death of a Naturalist - Seamus Heaney

• • "All year the flax-dam festered in the heart of the townland"
  • "Bubbles gargled delicately"
  • Heaney sets the scene where he reflects on his childhood in the countryside
  • As a child Heaney sought out the beauty in nature and was captivated by its sounds highlighting his childhood innocence
• • "best of all was the warm thick slobber of frogspawn"
  • "I would fill jampotfuls of the jellied specks"
  • Heaney is fascinated by even the most gruesome aspects of nature which an adult would usually find repulsive and sick - exemplifies his childhood innocence and early love for nature
  • Heaney was curious about the frogspawn and could not yet link it to the reproductive process due to his childhood innocence
• • "Miss Walls would tell us how the daddy frog was called a bullfrog"
  • Heaney reflects on how he learnt new things about nature remembering the child-like language used by his teacher - This leads to his loss of innocence and more mature view on nature which was the reasoning behind his change of perspective as an adult
• • "fields were rank with cowdung"
  • "angry frogs invaded the flax-dam"
  • There is a change in tone as Heaney revisits the flax-dam as an adult - there is a contrast in his perspective as he is no longer fascinated by nature - loss of childhood innocence
  • He has matured and his child-like world has become threatening to him displaying the aggression of nature
• • "I sickened turned and ran"
  • Heaney is now repulsed by nature and wants to escape its aspects - Heaney has lost the naturalist views he once carried as a child as they have been destroyed by his maturity and loss of innocence
• • "the great slime kings were gathered there for vengeance"
  • Heaney is disturbed by the presence of the frogs as carries guilt and believes the frogs will never forgive him
  • He has lost his curiosity for nature and will never view it in the same perspective again