Poetry Sunday: Digging
The world lost one of its most famous, best beloved, and most honored poets last week, when Seamus Heaney of Ireland died at age 74. Many of his obituaries hailed the Nobel Prize-winning poet for his ability to meld the soil and strife of Ireland into poetry of lyrical beauty and ethical depth. He was born on a family farm in Northern Ireland, but, as an adult who was Catholic and nationalist, he chose to live in Dublin. However, his poetry often used the imagery of his childhood. He wrote of peat bogs, small towns, and potato farms. He also wrote of the sectarian violence that tore Northern Ireland apart. He explored both the causes of the violence and its inevitable sorrows. The first thing that I specifically remember reading of Heaney's was the wonderful translation that he did of Beowulf several years ago. I had fallen in love with that ancient work when I had to read it in college many years before. Heaney's translation was a revelation which made clear the brilliance of...