Digging Essay

Characterization in “Digging” by Seamus Heaney

In "Digging" by Seamus Heaney, the author characterizes his speaker as someone who is unable to follow his family’s legacy, and needs to find his own way to carry out the tradition. Heaney introduces the speaker as conflicted as he watches, instead of helps, his father digging, demonstrating the lack of interest in digging. However, by the end of the poem, the speaker puts aside the fact that he views himself as an outcast in his own family, and does his own "digging" by writing. Heaney characterizes the speaker to deal with expectations we cannot meet, and that there is always an alternative answer to a problem.

            In the beginning of "Digging," Heaney characterizes the speaker as conflicted, and troubled by the fact he can only watch his father dig. As the speaker sits in his room, he hears “…a clean rasping sound/When the spade sinks into gravelly ground:/[His] father, digging. [He] look[s] down" (Heaney 3-5). Heaney has his speaker looking down to have the question of why he isn’t helping his dad dig raised. However, Heaney has the speaker notice his father digging, which shows his interest. Then, the speaker describes how his father digging and “…his straining rump among the flowerbeds/Bends low, comes up twenty years away” (6-7). Having the speaker’s father doing hard work while the speaker is up in his room makes the speaker appear guilty and conflicted. The speaker watches his father labor in the fields, while he sits comfortably in his room. Heaney has conflict build up in the speaker as he watches his father doing hard work while digging.

            Heaney then uses this feeling of guilt to enhance feelings of admiration the speaker has towards his father and grandfather to explain how important digging is in the family. As the speaker reflects on his grandfather and father, he mentions how “[his] grandfather cut more turf in a day/Than any other man on Toner's bog" (17-18). Heaney uses this sentence to show how proud the speaker is of his grandfather. This sense of pride also causes an internal conflict though because the speaker cannot carry out this pride out by digging. Then, the speaker shows how digging is a family tradition by saying, "By God, old man could handle a spade. Just like his old man" (15-16). Not only does this sentence still show admiration, it also depicts how digging is a family tradition, and not taken lightly. Digging is also a sense of pride, which causes more pressure to the speaker to carry out this family tradition. Heaney has the speakers admiration of his father and grandfather also show the pressure he faces, and how he cannot live up to he expectations laid upon him.

Finally, Heaney uses the speaker's decision to write instead of carrying on the family tradition of digging to show that we sometimes cannot live up to the expectations set upon us. The speaker realizes “[he] [has] no spade to follow men like them" (28) and has no interest in digging. Heaney has the speaker realize this to show how sometimes we cannot fulfill what others want us to do. Even though the speaker knows that digging is a family tradition, he must follow his own path because he doesn’t have the same passion for digging as his father and grandfather have. However, "between [his] finger and [his] thumb/The squat pen rests./[he] will dig with it" (30-32). The speaker choses to carry out a form of digging by using his pen to dig while he writes. Heaney has his speaker be an example of how to follow your own path.

Heaney uses his speaker to convey how we sometimes cannot meet the expectations people set for us. When we cannot meet those expectations, some people create alternate solutions, while others simply give up. Heaney has the speaker find his own way and come up with his own solution, encouraging us to not give up under pressure.