Synopsis
Seamus Heaney’s Follower is a reflective poem in which the speaker looks back on his childhood and his deep admiration for his father, a skilled farmer. The poem vividly describes the father’s strength and expertise in working the land with a horse-drawn plough, portraying him as a heroic figure through rich imagery and technical language.
As a boy, the speaker struggled to follow in his father’s footsteps—literally tripping and falling behind him, and metaphorically feeling he could never live up to his father’s example. Despite his desire to become like him, the speaker was only ever “a nuisance.”
The final stanza delivers a powerful emotional twist: now, as time has passed, the roles have reversed. The once-strong father is now old and weakened, stumbling behind the grown-up son. The poem ends on a poignant note, highlighting themes of admiration, growing up, family legacy, aging, and the inevitable shift in parent-child relationships.
1. “My father worked with a horse-plough,”
Explanation: The speaker introduces his father as a traditional farmer using a horse-drawn plough.
Analysis: This sets the rural, pastoral scene and highlights the father’s physical labor. It contrasts modern machinery with older, more intimate farming practices.
2. “His shoulders globed like a full sail strung”
Explanation: The father’s shoulders are described as large and rounded, like a sail full of wind.
Analysis: A powerful simile showing strength and grandeur. The father is almost mythic in scale, likened to a ship sailing forward—symbolizing movement, purpose, and mastery.
3. “Between the shafts and the furrow.”
Explanation: The father is positioned between the wooden shafts of the plough and the furrow being cut in the earth.
Analysis: This line grounds the metaphor in reality. The physical placement shows his central role in shaping the land—he is quite literally part of the process.
4. “The horse strained at his clicking tongue.”
Explanation: The horse obeys the father’s clicking sounds and puts in effort to pull the plough.
Analysis: This highlights the father’s control and skill. He doesn’t need to shout—just a sound is enough to command the horse, showing quiet authority.
5. “An expert.”
Explanation: The speaker directly states his father’s mastery of his craft.
Analysis: The short, punchy sentence adds weight and reverence. It isolates the father’s excellence and draws attention to why he is worthy of being followed—simple yet powerful.
6–7. “He would set the wing / And fit the bright steel-pointed sock.”
Explanation: The father carefully adjusts parts of the plough before working the land.
Analysis: Technical terms (wing, sock) show the speaker’s detailed memory and admiration. The language elevates farming to a skilled trade, almost like engineering or surgery.
8. “The sod rolled over without breaking.”
Explanation: The earth is turned over smoothly by the plough.
Analysis: A sign of precision and expertise. The smoothness of the action shows how well the father understands and works with nature.
9–10. “At the headrig, with a single pluck / Of reins, the sweating team turned round”
Explanation: At the end of a row, the father easily turns the horses around with a tug on the reins.
Analysis: Efficiency and ease—despite the effort involved (sweating team), the father remains composed. Single pluck suggests finesse.
11–12. “And back into the land. His eye / Narrowed and angled at the ground,”
Explanation: The father watches the land closely as he ploughs.
Analysis: Suggests concentration and alignment with the earth. His gaze is purposeful, not random—he studies the soil like a craftsman at work.
13. “Mapping the furrow exactly.”
Explanation: He ensures that each furrow (trench) is perfectly straight and even.
Analysis: Reinforces the theme of precision and mastery. Mapping implies intentional design, not just brute labor.
14. “I stumbled in his hob-nailed wake,”
Explanation: As a child, the speaker followed clumsily behind his father.
Analysis: Hob-nailed refers to his father’s heavy boots, which leave strong impressions—symbolic of his powerful presence. Stumbled shows contrast: the child is weak, unsure.
15. “Fell sometimes on the polished sod;”
Explanation: The child sometimes tripped on the freshly turned soil.
Analysis: The polished sod (well-ploughed land) shows his father’s perfection, but also how hard it is for the speaker to keep up.
16–17. “Sometimes he rode me on his back / Dipping and rising to his plod.”
Explanation: Occasionally, the father would carry the speaker as he worked.
Analysis: A tender moment. The father’s plodding rhythm is steady and predictable, like a machine. There’s affection here, but also a sense of being carried both literally and metaphorically.
18. “I wanted to grow up and plough,”
Explanation: The speaker aspired to be like his father.
Analysis: A clear expression of childhood admiration. The desire is rooted in love and awe.
19. “To close one eye, stiffen my arm.”
Explanation: He wanted to mimic the father’s ploughing technique.
Analysis: A child’s mimicry reflects both innocence and reverence. It underlines how the father’s movements were iconic in the speaker’s eyes.
20–21. “All I ever did was follow / In his broad shadow round the farm.”
Explanation: Despite his wishes, he could only follow his father, not match him.
Analysis: The broad shadow suggests dominance and awe, but also hints at being overshadowed. The speaker feels small in comparison, trapped in a legacy he can’t match.
22–23. “I was a nuisance, tripping, falling, / Yapping always.”
Explanation: He was a clumsy and noisy child, more of a burden than a help.
Analysis: There’s some guilt and embarrassment here. It also adds realism to the poem—idealized images meet the truth of childhood.
24–26. “But today / It is my father who keeps stumbling / Behind me, and will not go away.”
Explanation: The poem ends with a role reversal: now the father follows the son, possibly due to age or infirmity.
Analysis: This powerful conclusion contrasts past and present. It’s tinged with sadness, frustration, and maybe guilt. The reversal is natural yet emotionally complex—the once-strong father is now dependent.
Essay Plan
👨‍🌾 What the Poem Is About
“Follower” explores the relationship between a son and his father through vivid memories of farm life. As a child, the speaker admired his father’s physical strength and skill as a farmer. He struggled to follow in his footsteps—literally and metaphorically—feeling clumsy and inadequate. The poem ends with a role reversal: now the father is the one following the son, suggesting aging, dependency, and the passage of time. It’s a powerful reflection on family, legacy, admiration, and the inevitability of change.
🗺️ Context
Seamus Heaney was an Irish poet deeply influenced by his rural upbringing in County Derry, Northern Ireland. Heaney’s father was a farmer, and many of his poems reflect this background. Follower is part of his first major collection, Death of a Naturalist (1966), which often explores childhood, nature, and rural life. The poem captures a generation gap, shifting family roles, and the conflict between rural tradition and personal identity—all key themes in Heaney’s work.
🎨 Imagery
Heaney uses rich, vivid imagery to bring the farm and his father to life:
- “His shoulders globed like a full sail strung” – A powerful simile that likens his father’s back to a ship’s sail, evoking size, movement, and strength.
- “The sod rolled over without breaking” – Smoothness of the ploughing reflects the father’s expert skill.
- “I stumbled in his hob-nailed wake” – The son’s struggle to follow is captured in this physical, almost nautical image. Wake suggests both movement and being left behind.
The poem’s imagery often connects the body to the land, reinforcing the deep bond between man and nature.
🗣️ Language
Heaney’s language is both technical and personal:
- Specialist vocabulary: Words like “plough”, “furrow”, “sock”, and “headrig” show the authenticity of the farming world and the speaker’s intimate knowledge of it.
- Short, declarative lines: “An expert.” This line stands alone, emphasizing the father’s skill and the son’s awe.
- Verbs like “tripping, falling, yapping”: These create a childish, chaotic image of the speaker, highlighting his clumsiness in contrast to his father’s precision.
The language is accessible but carefully crafted, balancing admiration with reflection.
🎠Tone
The tone of Follower shifts subtly throughout the poem:
- Admiring and respectful: The speaker recalls his father’s physical and professional prowess with pride.
- Reflective and self-critical: The speaker views his younger self as a nuisance, always getting in the way.
- Bittersweet and poignant: The final stanza introduces a sense of sadness and emotional complexity, as the once-powerful father now “stumbles behind” the son.
Overall, the tone moves from reverence to reversal, capturing the emotional weight of aging and changing roles.
🧱 Structure
Follower is a tightly structured poem:
- 6 quatrains (4-line stanzas) with a controlled ABAB rhyme scheme.
- The steady rhythm and rhyme reflect the rhythmic nature of ploughing and the orderliness of farm work.
- Shift in the final stanza: The poem’s conclusion marks a turning point. The focus moves from the father’s dominance to the father’s dependency, delivering an emotional impact through structure as well as content.
This controlled form mirrors the father’s precision and contrasts with the speaker’s clumsiness—until the roles reverse.
✏️ Final Thoughts
Seamus Heaney’s Follower is more than a nostalgic memory of a father at work—it’s a deeply human reflection on growing up, shifting relationships, and the slow passing of time. It invites readers to think about how we see our parents in youth, and how time can change those perceptions entirely.
🔄 Best Poems to Compare with Follower
1. “Walking Away” by Cecil Day-Lewis
Theme match: 🧒👨 Parent-child relationship, growing up, separation
Why it’s a good comparison:
- Both poems explore the bond between parent and child, but from different perspectives:
- Follower is from the child’s viewpoint, admiring the parent.
- Walking Away is from the parent’s viewpoint, watching the child grow independent.
- Both use natural imagery to reflect emotional distance or change.
- Both end with a bittersweet tone, acknowledging time and change.
đź“ť Perfect for comparing: emotional shifts in family roles, tone, imagery, and the passage of time.
2. “Mother, Any Distance” by Simon Armitage
Theme match: đź‘©đź“Ź Parent-child bond, independence, change
Why it’s a good comparison:
- Explores a child moving away from a parent (like in Follower, where the child cannot stay in the father’s world).
- Uses metaphors and physical space (like the measuring tape) to show emotional distance.
- The tone moves from dependency to freedom, mirroring the journey in Follower from admiration to independence.
đź“ť Great for discussing: metaphor, structure, emotional tone, and personal growth.
3. “Climbing My Grandfather” by Andrew Waterhouse
Theme match: 👴🧗 Admiration, family legacy, exploring identity
Why it’s a good comparison:
- Both poems show the speaker admiring a male family figure through extended metaphor.
- Climbing My Grandfather uses the metaphor of climbing a mountain to explore closeness, just like Follower uses farming imagery.
- Both poems mix physical detail with emotional connection.
đź“ť Ideal for comparing: imagery, metaphor, admiration, and tone.
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