Essay on the Relationship between Parents and Children in Heaney's 'Follower' and Jenkins's 'Effects'
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Course
Unit 3 - Poetry
Institution
PEARSON (PEARSON)
An essay comparing the relationship between parents and children in the two poems from the Poems of the Decade anthology: Jenkins's 'Effects' and Heaney's 'Follower'. Written by a current university student that achieved an A* in English Literature A level by memorising these essays.
Compare the ways in which the relationship between parents and children are explored in Seamus
Heaney’s ‘Follower’ and Alan Jenkins’ ‘Effects.’
An immediate point of comparison between Seamus Heaney’s ‘Follower’ and Adam Thorpe’s ‘On
Her Blindness’ is that they both concern the relationship between a child and a parent. In Heaney’s
poem, the speaker as a child idolises his father but when he transitions into an adult he seems to
become disillusioned with his father. Meanwhile, in Jenkins’ poem, the speaker is retrospectively
looking at his late mother’s life and perhaps regrets the condescending attitude he had towards her
while she was still alive.
While the speaker in ‘Follower’ felt a strong sense of admiration towards his father, in ‘Effects,’ it
could be inferred that the speaker wished his mother was different and more communicative in his
lifetime. The child in ‘Follower’ perceives his father as “an expert” in his field for his remarkable
strength which the poet conveys in the simile “his shoulders globed like a full sail.” The verb form of
globe, typically used to describe the shape of the world, emphasises the great responsibility his
father took on in his work; almost as if he had to carry the world on his shoulders. Overall, the first
half of Heaney’s poem conjures up a positive view of one’s parent that is relatively common in
childhood.
In the opening section of ‘Effects,’ the speaker holding his late mother’s “scarred”
hand evokes in him memories of his mother’s rather difficult life. Jenkins uses the active verbs
“washing up,” “scrubbing” and “chopping, slicing” in succession to describe how the speaker’s
mother endured the scars on her hands through carrying out domestic chores. The speaker then
suggests her reason for doing so was to give “love the only way she knew,” recalling his mother’s
caring yet non-communicative nature, as her feelings of love and affection for her family only
manifested in her actions. In contrast to the majority of ‘Follower,’ Jenkins immediately portrays a
more realistic view many have of their parents when they have matured enough to reflect upon
their parents’ actions.
Additionally, in both poems a sense of distance is created between the parent and the child. In
‘Follower,’ the child starts off as a follower of his parent, but he is unable to adequately live up to his
father’s standard, as he his presented as rather inferior compared to the overtly powerful figure of
his father. This is evident when the speaker notes that he literally and figuratively followed his
father’s “broad shadow around the farm,” highlighting the way in which he physically followed his
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