I felt like some old pike all badged with sores
Wanting to swim in touch with soft-mouthed life" (Heaney 20).
I have the most difficult time reading poetry. I honestly do not have the patience to do it, and I never really have. Heaney's poem "The Guttural Muse" was not as hard as most poems for me to read. I was somewhat able to see what his message was after reading the poem twice and for me, that is a huge jump from the work I usually have to put in to even begin to understand. I was able to paint a picture in my head after reading this poem. I think it was his imagery that helped me tremendously. He referenced what the smell was outside, and the entire scenery. I felt the sadness from the narrator. He was feeling as if his youth was completely gone, as he watched the other younger bunch of kids after a night out at the club. I am going to take the understanding I have of this poem, and use it to hopefully begin to understand similar poems more easily.
I thought his use of imagery was really intriguing as well! Thankfully that is one thing that is not hard to understand!
ReplyDeleteI agree, the imagery is what sold me! It definitely adds an easier angle in order to understand the total meaning of the work.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree here as well. For me without imagery there’s a large part of the poem left unknown. This is especially the case if the poet uses words that I don’t know too. The best way for me to break down a poem is with the use of imagery.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, I always have a hard time reading poetry as well, but "The Guttural Muse" I found its imagery very simple, which helped me picture the poem in my head while reading it.
ReplyDeleteWhy do you think you dont like reading poetry? im in a similar shoe as well.
ReplyDeleteThis is true ! I despise reading poems, but I like writing my own. This was one of the easiest ones for me to understand too, it was straightforward and I think I like that. He said what he wanted to say and I didn't have to look up these different words and phrases to figure out what he was talking about. Good Job !
ReplyDeleteThe images that Heaney gives us are so powerful, you are all right about that. I wonder, too, about what Luis asked: I wonder what it is about poetry that turns us off, usually?
ReplyDeleteI think its partly because poetry has a lot of emotion, personal experiences and opinions within it. Since we're not the ones who wrote the poetry we don't know what the poet was thinking and where the poet is coming from, so it's hard to understand it. Also, there's a lot of symbolism in poetry and every word counts, so for me I think it makes it tedious and hard.
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