Farming as a Poetic Process: A Study in Robert Frost’s “After Apple-picking” and Seamus Heaney’s “Digging” | ||
| Journal of Literature Ink | ||
| Article 1, Volume 1, Issue 8, June 2018, Pages 649-661 | ||
| Author | ||
| Hamid Badry Abdul Salam | ||
| Abstract | ||
| Every poet has his own conception of writing poetry. If we trace back the history of poetry, we can see that poets have been taking many roles and assigned themselves different missions. Sometimes they are introduced as teachers, moralists, educationalists and guardians of society. On other occasions, they appear as philosophers and prophets who are concerned with moral values and the good of society. While in some other times they act like leaders and politicians who take the responsibility to guide people to better future. As far as this paper is concerned, the poet appears as a farmer who plants and reaps ideas for his poems. Though Robert Frost and Seamus Heaney belong to different nations and cultures, they meet in this particular area. They are classified by critics as nature poets; as they reflect the rural experiences in their poetry. In some of their poetic works they tried to link poetry to farming, and the reader can see much of this by reading their poems. For Robert Frost, poetry is life and throughout his literary career he tried his best to link poetry to life and life to poetry. He sees poetry as a combination between mind and emotion. Metaphorically, writing poetry is a marriage between mind and emotion. He once said: If poetry isn’t understanding all, the whole world, then it isn’t worth anything. Young poets forget that poetry must include the mind as well as the emotions. Too many poets delude themselves by thinking the mind is dangerous and must be left out. Well, the mind is dangerous and must be left in.1 This combination between mind and emotion is deepened, fathomlessly, in his own mind. According to Frost’s conception of poetry, poetry must serve two purposes; delight and wisdom. He sees the poem in this way “A poem begins in delight and ends in wisdom | ||
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