Death of Naturalist

Poetry | Seamus Heaney

I sickened, turned, and ran. The great slime kings

Premium

Explain the following with reference to the context I sickened turned and ran The great slime kings Were gathered there for vengeance and I knew That if I dipped my hand the spawn would clutch it These lines come from the second part of Seamus Heaney s - Death of a Naturalist In the poem the poet describes how a young boy s love for nature changes into fear At the beginning of the poem the boy enjoys collecting frogspawn He thinks frogs are friendly and magical But later when he grows a little older his feelings change In these lines the boy returns to the flax-dam on a hot day The place now feels completely different The air is full of a strong smell of cow dung The frogs are not small or cute anymore They look big swollen and angry Their movements seem frightening Because the boy has

grown older his imagination also changes He feels as if the frogs are standing together like an angry army So he calls them the great slime kings This shows that the frogs look powerful and scary to him The boy also imagines that the frogs want revenge because earlier he had taken their frogspawn in jars He thinks that if he puts his hand inside the water again the frogspawn will grab his hand These thoughts show his fear Nothing real is attacking him but his imagination makes him terrified The line I sickened turned and ran shows the moment when the boy loses his childhood innocence He feels disgusted afraid and runs away This is the death of the naturalist inside him His old excitement dies and fear takes its place It is the loss of childhood innocence and the beginning of maturity

Continue Reading

Sign in and subscribe to unlock the full content