Marx and sprectres: a hauntological exploration of the poetry of Seamus Heaney through the lens of Jacques Derrida's Specters of Marx

Abstract

This thesis will examine the spectral inheritances and hauntings that dwell within the poetry of Seamus Heaney. It will use hauntology, an idea first coined by Jacques Derrida in Specters of Marx, as a way of locating and unearthing the influence of spectres over the unconscious of the poet. A sustained argument that spectres of the past haunt and influence the present and future will carry throughout the course of this thesis. It will be shown that Heaney inherits from these past spectres, be they national or international, and that these ghosts of the past haunt and influence not only Heaney’s unconscious, but Northern Irish society as a whole. The core objective of the thesis is to interrogate and analyse the continuity and repetition of the past in the present of Heaney’s work; in a historical sense but also in a personal, literary manner. The degree to which colonialism, both British and Norse, impacts upon the present will breathe life into the argument that these spectres of past colonialism not only impact upon Heaney’s use of language, his identity, and his place in the world, but also, through the workings of the Derridean spectre, influence and garner the violence that sprung forth in Northern Ireland during the Troubles. Similarly the absent presence of the bog people, Virgil, and Dante within the poetry finds Heaney inheriting, and being influenced by, wider, older, broader European mythical hauntings. The degree to which these spectres influence and repeat themselves in the poetry will culminate in the discussion of ‘Route 110’ as a poem that incorporates all of these spectres and shows the overall spectral inheritance at play within the body of Heaney’s work. This study will show that Heaney’s poetry is deeply influenced by the workings of the spectre upon the unconscious of the poet.