At a Potato Digging

1. At a Potato Digging by Seamus Heaney H

2. Context • The poem deals with two different potato harvests. One is the harvest from the present day (written in the ’60s) that goes successfully and which delivers a rich crop. • The second potato harvest looks back to the famine of 1845 when the crop failed and many people starved. • Whilst the famine is no longer a threat, its ongoing fear remains and this can be seen in the use of religious language throughout the poem. H

3. Potato Famine • The Irish Potato Famine occurred in Ireland in 1845-49 when the potato crop failed in successive years. • As a direct consequence of the famine, Ireland's population of almost 8,400,000 in 1844 had fallen to 6,600,000 by 1851. • About 1,100,000 people died from starvation or from typhus and other famine-related diseases. • The number of Irish who emigrated during the famine may have reached 1.5 million. H

4. IA mechanical digger wrecks the drill,Spins up a dark shower of roots and mould. Labourers swarm in behind, stoop to fillWicker creels. Fingers go dead in the cold. IIFlint-white, purple. They lie scatteredLike inflated pebbles. Nativeto the blank hutch of claywhere the halved seed shot and clottedthese knobbed and slit-eyed tubers seemthe petrified hearts of drills. Splitby the spade, they show white as cream. IIILive skulls, blind-eyed, balanced onwild higgledy skeletonsscoured the land in 'forty-five,' wolfed the blighted root and died. IVUnder a white flotilla of gullsThe rhythm deadens, the workers stop. White bread and tea in bright canfulsAre served for lunch. Dead-beat, they flop Tall for a moment but soon stumble backTo fish a new load from the crumbled surf. Heads bow, trucks bend, hands fumble towards the blackMother. Processional stooping through the turf Turns work to ritual. CenturiesOf fear and homage to the famine godToughen the muscles behind their humbled knees, Make a seasonal altar of the sod. Like crows attacking crow-black fields, they stretchA higgledy line from hedge to headland; Some pairs keep breaking ragged ranks to fetchA full creel to the pit and straighten, stand Good smells exude from crumbled earth. The rough bark of humus eruptsknots of potatoes (a clean birth) whose solid feel, whose wet insidepromises taste of ground and root. To be piled in pits; live skulls, blind-eyed. A people hungering from birth, grubbing, like plants, in the bitch earth, were grafted with a great sorrow. Hope rotted like a marrow. Mouths tightened in, eyes died hard, faces chilled to a plucked bird. In a million wicker hutsbeaks of famine snipped at guts. Stinking potatoes fouled the land, pits turned pus in filthy mounds: and where potato diggers areyou still smell the running sore. The new potato, sound as stone, putrified when it had lainthree days in the long clay pit. Millions rotted along with it. The poem begins with Heaney describing workers in a potato field in Ireland. They follow a machine that turns up the crop and they put these into a basket and then store them. AT A POTATO DIGGING I A mechanical digger wrecks the drill, Spins up a dark shower of roots and mould. Labourers swarm in behind, stoop to fill Wicker creels. Fingers go dead in the cold. Like crows attacking crow-black fields, they stretch A higgledy line from hedge to headland; Some pairs keep breaking ragged ranks to fetch A full creel to the pit and straighten, stand Tall for a moment but soon stumble back To fish a new load from the crumbled surf. Heads bow, trucks bend, hands fumble towards the black Mother. Processional stooping through the turf Turns work to ritual. Centuries Of fear and homage to the famine god Toughen the muscles behind their humbled knees, Make a seasonal altar of the sod. II Flint-white, purple. They lie scattered Like inflated pebbles. Native to the blank hutch of clay where the halved seed shot and clotted these knobbed and slit-eyed tubers seem the petrified hearts of drills. Split by the spade, they show white as cream. Good smells exude from crumbled earth. The rough bark of humus erupts knots of potatoes (a clean birth) whose solid feel, whose wet inside promises taste of ground and root. To be piled in pits; live skulls, blind-eyed. III Live skulls, blind-eyed, balanced on wild higgledy skeletons scoured the land in 'forty-five,' wolfed the blighted root and died. The new potato, sound as stone, putrified when it had lain three days in the long clay pit. Millions rotted along with it. Mouths tightened in, eyes died hard, faces chilled to a plucked bird. In a million wicker huts beaks of famine snipped at guts. A people hungering from birth, grubbing, like plants, in the bitch earth, were grafted with a great sorrow. Hope rotted like a marrow. Stinking potatoes fouled the land, pits turned pus in filthy mounds: and where potato diggers are you still smell the running sore. IV Under a white flotilla of gulls The rhythm deadens, the workers stop. White bread and tea in bright canfuls Are served for lunch. Dead-beat, they flop Down in the ditch and take their fill, Thankfully breaking timeless fasts; Then, stretched on the faithless ground, spill Libations of cold tea, scatter crusts. The second section of the poem involves the healthy potatoes being described. The third section writes about the famine of the past. Fungus destroyed the entire crop of potatoes and this happened for three consecutive years. In the final section of the poem, Heaney returns to the first section of the poem – Ireland in the 1960s at lunchtime. The workers sit happily, with food to eat. H

5. AT A POTATO DIGGING I A mechanical digger wrecks the drill, Spins up a dark shower of roots and mould. Labourers swarm in behind, stoop to fill Wicker creels. Fingers go dead in the cold. Like crows attacking crow-black fields, they stretch A higgledy line from hedge to headland; Some pairs keep breaking ragged ranks to fetch A full creel to the pit and straighten, stand Tall for a moment but soon stumble back To fish a new load from the crumbled surf. Heads bow, trucks bend, hands fumble towards the black Mother. Processional stooping through the turf Turns work to ritual. Centuries Of fear and homage to the famine god Toughen the muscles behind their humbled knees, Make a seasonal altar of the sod. II Flint-white, purple. They lie scattered Like inflated pebbles. Native to the blank hutch of clay where the halved seed shot and clotted these knobbed and slit-eyed tubers seem the petrified hearts of drills. Split by the spade, they show white as cream. Good smells exude from crumbled earth. The rough bark of humus erupts knots of potatoes (a clean birth) whose solid feel, whose wet inside promises taste of ground and root. To be piled in pits; live skulls, blind-eyed. III Live skulls, blind-eyed, balanced on wild higgledy skeletons scoured the land in 'forty-five,' wolfed the blighted root and died. The new potato, sound as stone, putrified when it had lain three days in the long clay pit. Millions rotted along with it. Mouths tightened in, eyes died hard, faces chilled to a plucked bird. In a million wicker huts beaks of famine snipped at guts. A people hungering from birth, grubbing, like plants, in the bitch earth, were grafted with a great sorrow. Hope rotted like a marrow. Stinking potatoes fouled the land, pits turned pus in filthy mounds: and where potato diggers are you still smell the running sore. IV Under a white flotilla of gulls The rhythm deadens, the workers stop. White bread and tea in bright canfuls Are served for lunch. Dead-beat, they flop Down in the ditch and take their fill, Thankfully breaking timeless fasts; Then, stretched on the faithless ground, spill Libations of cold tea, scatter crusts. The second section has fewer rhymes in an irregular pattern. Lines and sections run into each other. The first and last sections have a loose iambic metre and a clear ABAB rhyme scheme - which breaks down only in the poem's final line. Why might Heaney do this? The third section uses rhyme in pairs: AABB and so on. H

6. Could this also have military connotations? Struggling to live of the land. We now rely on technology to dig the land. Is this natural? Wreck the rows in which the potatoes are planted. May also suggest the routine of the work. I A mechanical digger wrecks the drill, Spins up a dark shower of roots and mould. Labourers swarm in behind, stoop to fill Wicker creels. Fingers go dead in the cold. Like crows attacking crow-black fields, they stretch A higgledy line from hedge to headland; Some pairs keep breaking ragged ranks to fetch A full creel to the pit and straighten, stand Tall for a moment but soon stumble back To fish a new load from the crumbled surf. Heads bow, trucks bend, hands fumble towards the black Mother. Processional stooping through the turf Turns work to ritual. Centuries Of fear and homage to the famine god Toughen the muscles behind their humbled knees, Make a seasonal altar of the sod. Vivid image of the power of the machine over the land. Man’s power over nature? Suggests the vast number of labourers involved The work is hard and uncomfortable. Why else might Heaney have chosen this phrase? ‘stoop’ Might this suggest prostration as well as the back breaking labour? Enjambment at this and other points in the poem suggest the unending nature of the work H

7. Links the people to nature both as animals and as a description of the land. Why crows? Scavengers? ‘Birds of Death’ Again the labour is referred to in terms of a battle. Perhaps a battle for survival? The workers could be seen as soldiers in the fight I A mechanical digger wrecks the drill, Spins up a dark shower of roots and mould. Labourers swarm in behind, stoop to fill Wicker creels. Fingers go dead in the cold. Like crows attacking crow-black fields, they stretch A higgledy line from hedge to headland; Some pairs keep breaking ragged ranks to fetch A full creel to the pit and straighten, stand Tall for a moment but soon stumble back To fish a new load from the crumbled surf. Heads bow, trucks bend, hands fumble towards the black Mother. Processional stooping through the turf Turns work to ritual. Centuries Of fear and homage to the famine god Toughen the muscles behind their humbled knees, Make a seasonal altar of the sod. Emphasises the sheer number of them involved A full basket of potatoes to be stored The respite is brief and they ‘stumble’ back to work, emphasising the exhausting nature what they do Proud of their labours and enjoying a short break H

8. Does it suggest the skill of the people? What is the effect of this metaphor on the reader? Bowed in prayer? Prostration? Is this an almost religious experience? I A mechanical digger wrecks the drill, Spins up a dark shower of roots and mould. Labourers swarm in behind, stoop to fill Wicker creels. Fingers go dead in the cold. Like crows attacking crow-black fields, they stretch A higgledy line from hedge to headland; Some pairs keep breaking ragged ranks to fetch A full creel to the pit and straighten, stand Tall for a moment but soon stumble back To fish a new load from the crumbled surf. Heads bow, trucks bend, hands fumble towards the black Mother. Processional stooping through the turf Turns work to ritual. Centuries Of fear and homage to the famine god Toughen the muscles behind their humbled knees, Make a seasonal altar of the sod. Gives a strong visual image of the land after the drills are wrecked. Is this a pagan God that they fear? Is Heaney suggesting that God forsook them in the famine? Giver of life. Protector. Acknowledgement of importance H

9. Assonance and alliteration stress the natural links between the potatoes and the land Repeated image of death linked to the potato across generations by memories of the famine II Flint-white, purple. They lie scattered Like inflated pebbles. Native to the blank hutch of clay where the halved seed shot and clotted these knobbed and slit-eyed tubers seem the petrified hearts of drills. Split by the spade, they show white as cream. Good smells exude from crumbled earth. The rough bark of humus erupts knots of potatoes (a clean birth) whose solid feel, whose wet inside promises taste of ground and root. To be piled in pits; live skulls, blind-eyed. The second section has fewer rhymes in an irregular pattern, perhaps mimicking the irregular sizes and shapes of the potatoes Heart of the land Potatoes piled as bodies once were Images of death abound once more and these are echoed in the next stanza about the famine Each year the potato harvest can be an anxious process, as the workers smell the potatoes and feel them for firmness - making sure they are free of the blight. H

10. Repeated image but this time it is starving people who are ‘skulls’ and ‘blind-eyed’ III Live skulls, blind-eyed, balanced on wild higgledy skeletons scoured the land in 'forty-five,' wolfed the blighted root and died. The new potato, sound as stone, putrified when it had lain three days in the long clay pit. Millions rotted along with it. Mouths tightened in, eyes died hard, faces chilled to a plucked bird. In a million wicker huts beaks of famine snipped at guts. A people hungering from birth, grubbing, like plants, in the bitch earth, were grafted with a great sorrow. Hope rotted like a marrow. Stinking potatoes fouled the land, pits turned pus in filthy mounds: and where potato diggers are you still smell the running sore. ‘balanced’ implies the weakness of people and their skeletal hunger. Higgledy people reflect the higgledy lines in which they work now (section 1) ’45 needs no year date because the event is such a part of Ireland’s social consciousness They still ate the bad potatoes but couldn’t survive Animal savagery suggesting the hardness of the times H

11. The language is incredibly negative and harsh. Much like the times they are describing III Live skulls, blind-eyed, balanced on wild higgledy skeletons scoured the land in 'forty-five,' wolfed the blighted root and died. The new potato, sound as stone, putrified when it had lain three days in the long clay pit. Millions rotted along with it. Mouths tightened in, eyes died hard, faces chilled to a plucked bird. In a million wicker huts beaks of famine snipped at guts. A people hungering from birth, grubbing, like plants, in the bitch earth, were grafted with a great sorrow. Hope rotted like a marrow. Stinking potatoes fouled the land, pits turned pus in filthy mounds: and where potato diggers are you still smell the running sore. Heaney describes the false hope of a sound new potato which rots and dies in the pit Ambiguous phrase, the people rotted along with the potatoes and died H

12. III Live skulls, blind-eyed, balanced on wild higgledy skeletons scoured the land in 'forty-five,' wolfed the blighted root and died. The new potato, sound as stone, putrified when it had lain three days in the long clay pit. Millions rotted along with it. Mouths tightened in, eyes died hard, faces chilled to a plucked bird. In a million wicker huts beaks of famine snipped at guts. A people hungering from birth, grubbing, like plants, in the bitch earth, were grafted with a great sorrow. Hope rotted like a marrow. Stinking potatoes fouled the land, pits turned pus in filthy mounds: and where potato diggers are you still smell the running sore. Vivid, visual account of the physical effects of the famine ‘wicker’ emphasises the simplicity of their lives but also links back to their ‘wicker creels’. Both are devoid of potatoes due to the famine Snipping, metaphorical beaks of hunger attack the guts of the hungry. Could this link back to the images of crows earlier on? Life-long hunger and misery is emphasised here The earth is not ‘mother’ but ‘bitch’ now. Cruel and forgiving (the famine god?) Suggesting hard work Marked with sorrow? H

13. III Live skulls, blind-eyed, balanced on wild higgledy skeletons scoured the land in 'forty-five,' wolfed the blighted root and died. The new potato, sound as stone, putrified when it had lain three days in the long clay pit. Millions rotted along with it. Mouths tightened in, eyes died hard, faces chilled to a plucked bird. In a million wicker huts beaks of famine snipped at guts. A people hungering from birth, grubbing, like plants, in the bitch earth, were grafted with a great sorrow. Hope rotted like a marrow. Stinking potatoes fouled the land, pits turned pus in filthy mounds: and where potato diggers are you still smell the running sore. ‘filthy mounds’ of both potatoes but also of the bodies piled up. (Remember, over 1 million people died during the famine) As the potatoes did ‘you’ why has he used the second person at this point? Last two lines return to the present tense Does it suggest the immediacy of the last two lines- this is now The knowledge of the famine is still an open wound for the people of Ireland H

14. ‘flotilla’ maintains the military and sea-faring images of the first section but the crows of earlier are contrasted now with the ‘gulls’ Through the tiredness of a day’s work but the image could be likened to the weak falling of the famished over a century earlier IV Under a white flotilla of gulls The rhythm deadens, the workers stop. White bread and tea in bright canfuls Are served for lunch. Dead-beat, they flop Down in the ditch and take their fill, Thankfully breaking timeless fasts; Then, stretched on the faithless ground, spill Libations of cold tea, scatter crusts. They take their tea-break. No longer reliant just on potatoes for food they do still make their living form digging them Not in the ‘pit’ anymore and no longer hungry they can ‘take their fill’ Why has Heaney chosen the word ‘timeless’? Compare the past and present as shown in the poem. They still don’t trust the ground. The religious imagery is repeated at the end as the give offerings to appease the ‘famine god’ mentioned earlier. H

15. Comparisons • A Difficult Birth / The Field-Mouse– Both poems look at the natural world and the way in which it operates. • Inversnaid– This poem takes delight in the natural world, describing the beauty of the town of Inversnaid as it has not been touched by human hand. • Patrolling Barnegat– In common with ‘At a Potato Digging’, this poem enables the reader to understand the power of the natural world and we appreciate the extent to which it can have an impact on the lives of human beings. What other poems and ideas can be used for comparison? H

16. Themes • Nature – The poem deals with the natural world and the different aspects of nature can be seen in the reference to the earth as the ‘black mother’ that gives life and also the ‘bitch earth’ that is capable of inflicting great suffering. • Suffering – The suffering of the people of Ireland is described in detail in the poem and we understand the extent of the misery that was caused by the famine. • The Past – Heaney’s desire to make connections between the past and present is very important to the poem – a link is made between events more than a century apart. H

17. Review • Once again digging is used symbolically by Heaney. Explain how. • How, in this poem, does Heaney connect past and present (think about language and images used)? • What view does the poem give of man's relationship with the earth? • Does the poet really think of the earth as a “bitch” and “faithless”? • Modern readers in the west may no longer have a sense of where our food comes from. How does this poem challenge us not to take things for granted? • How does this poem explore ideas of religion, ritual and ceremony? H