Digging Deep

Not long ago, I went to a talk about Irish poet Seamus Heaney, who is perhaps best known for receiving the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1995. The talk was given by Dr. Rand Brandes, Heaney’s longtime bibliographer and archivist. 

Most of the talk focused on the work Brandes has done to document Heaney’s publication history. According to Brandes, Heaney did not find instant widespread fame; his earliest poems, written when he was a college student in the 1950s, were published in school journals and local newspapers. As Brandes explained, it was only over time that Heaney’s poetry began to be accepted by publications with wider readerships, eventually leading him to become known as one of the most influential poets of all time. Heaney was still writing poetry until his death in 2013, which Brandes described as untimely due to a short illness.

My favorite parts of the talk were when Brandes focused on Heaney’s poetry. Apparently, one of Heaney’s poems, “The Rain Stick,” was inspired by and dedicated to Brandes and his wife, who introduced Heaney to his first experience with a rain stick. For those not familiar with them, rain sticks are made by hollowing out a tubular piece of wood and partially filling the tube with pebbles or small beads. When the stick is tipped end-over-end, the pebbles filter down through obtrusions inside the tube, replicating the sound of rain. Here’s what a typical one looks like:

A rain stick. (Wikimedia/Andy Brice)

Brandes brought a rain stick to the talk to demonstrate its operation so the audience could understand how its sound is reflected in Heaney’s poem. The lines from this poem that stand out to me most are:

Upend the stick again. What happens next

Is undiminished for having happened once.

Twice, ten, a thousand times before. (lines 12-14)

I think these lines resonate with me because they indicate the romantic notion that nature is unending. In an era of climate change, it’s hard to feel secure that life on Earth will continue indefinitely. But these lines imply that for recorded time up to now, natural phenomena have happened again and again and again. Perhaps even without human life around to hear in the future, rain might persist. I find that idea oddly comforting.

Another poem that struck a chord with me was “Digging.” In this poem, Heaney explores the generation gap that exists between him and his father and grandfather. His father and grandfather were farmers, and Heaney describes in the poem the physical labor involved in harvesting potatoes and peat. But Heaney has chosen a different career path (or a different path has chosen him). He’s a writer. The lines in this poem that resonate with me most are:

But I’ve no spade to follow men like them.

Between my finger and my thumb

The squat pen rests.

I’ll dig with it. (lines 28-31)

My reaction to these lines is complex. First, I hear a sense of loss that’s implied by the recognition of generational difference. Heaney admits he has “no spade to follow men like them,” indicating an absence that makes his life different than, and perhaps potentially lesser than, theirs. His life is not marked by the dignity associated with carrying on a family legacy of working the land as his father’s and grandfather’s lives were. Additionally, by naming his tool, the pen, he highlights its contrast with his father’s and grandfather’s tool, the spade. This difference in tools is representative of the significant difference between the generations.

Yet in the last line, there’s a shift. Here he highlights a similarity. Like his father and grandfather who dig with a spade, he digs also, only with a pen. The tool is different, and certainly the results of the digging are different, but all three of the men dig. Whereas his father and grandfather dug up food and soil, he digs up emotions, memories, thoughts, imaginings, and sensations. While what they dig for is different, all three dig. This last line tempers for me the sadness of the preceding lines. The generations are connected by hard work, albeit of different types, bridging the gaps between them.

I reacted to this last line for a sentimental reason as well. It reminded me of a former professor I studied with in college, Dr. Twila Yates Papay. Twila was the director of the Rollins College Writing Center when I was a student there. I worked for her for three years after she selected me as a peer writing consultant, and I also took courses from her as part of my major in the English Department. In my previous post, I mentioned some of the academic journals I kept in her courses. When I worked in the Writing Center, she had the peer consultants keep both individual and group journals, and she was my adviser for an independent study project titled Journaling in Utopia that I completed for the Honors Degree Program.

One of Twila’s favorite lines when teaching her students how to journal was to tell us to “dig deep.” By this she meant that we should describe with details rather than skimming the surface. She also meant that we shouldn’t stop our analyses with the easy or obvious answers. Instead, we should “dig deep” to try to get at the root of the issues we were exploring. As I did with the poems above, Twila wanted us to explore why words hold the meanings they do, what impacts the words might have on us, and where those impacts stem from. She also wanted us to strive to impact our readers. She wanted us to evoke emotional and intellectual responses from our readers. I hope I’ve done that for you. 

Twila was a mentor to me for many years, long after I graduated from college. After I ended up pursuing rhetoric and writing studies as a career path, I would sometimes run across Twila at conferences. She always made time away from the busy schedules at those conferences to join me for a cup of coffee or a meal. She would listen to stories of my current situation and also share with me stories of hers. Her husband Joe would be with her, and he would talk about a recent train ride he had taken or the latest model train he had added to his collection. 

Twila passed away in 2017, and I’ve felt the void ever since. Nonetheless, when I have faced challenges in the years since her passing, I’ve thought of her and been reminded that I’m not the only one to have faced such matters, for Twila was open and honest about not only the joys but also the challenges she faced. I’m grateful to have known her and grateful for her generosity of spirit and intellect that stays with me today. I’m glad to have attended Brandes’s talk and heard Heaney’s poem “Digging,” which reminded me of her.