Topic > The Unifying Spirit of Seamus Heaney's "Funeral Rites" neighborhood". However, preferring the sterility of "defiled rooms" in which the dead lie "chained" by religious chains of "rosaries", Heaney's affinity for the mythological and archaic "serpent" and the pagan times of the "sepulchre" supports a a return to an Ireland unified by pre-Christian beliefs, rather than a country shackled by fragmented sectarian violence of religious origin. Only in this "triumph" will "the whole country" be able to overcome the impasse of violence, allowing the victims to "be beautiful" and "not avenged". Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Immediately, the “shoulder” of patriarchal duty and the “lifting” of the weight of the coffin deaden the mood in the opening stanzas, as the idea of ​​toil and effort pervades the funeral. This "ceremony" is a static and heavy burden, and this is also exemplified in the monosyllabic "dead", which ends with the heavy sound "/d/", which has a directness that accentuates the finality of death and introduces a somewhat abrupt tone . to these verses. Furthermore, the "brown dulse" of the "shroud" is an example of Heaney's disagreement with this overtly religious "ceremony". By comparing the "shroud" to the "dulse" of seaweed, Heaney apostatizes the sanctity of this garment, making it opaque, papery and lifeless. This sense of lifelessness and stagnation is a presence that pervades Part I of the poem, perpetuated by the description of the women as "hovering" and also of the flames as "hovering", this repetition reinforces the superficiality of the ritual. Furthermore, “hovering” conjures up an image of “women” flickering like a candle, compromising the sense of their solidity, rendering them weak and tremblingly passive, huddled “behind” Heaney. Heaney thus exposes the funeral as a fragile and apathetic event, of intense torpor, devoid of any dynamism or ardor. It is sterile, 'always' the same and cold, like the 'igloo foreheads' of distant 'relatives'. While there is a sense of 'admiration[action]' for the 'glittering crosses', the adjective 'small' introduces a tone of mocking tenderness, which reveals that this is out of 'court[esy]' and expectation. In an Ireland steeped in religious ties, this tradition seems to fail, but "it is enough". Heaney iconoclastically exposes the funeral in this way as lethargic, reflected in the rigid frigidity of the "black glacier", implying a predictable linear, slow "distancing", in contrast to the free-form, naturalistic and dynamic meandering movement of the "serpent". ' procession in part II. Part II begins with a temporal shift – 'now', moving away from the coherent register of the past in Part I. This nature of this shift becomes evident when the reader learns that the Irish people are now 'pin[ing]' for these Monotonous and predictable 'habitual rhythms'. This accentuates the hopelessness of the situation as the verb 'pine' implies a loss of people's power, where they are limited only to an intense desire for closure, rather than able to take concrete action. It reduces their independence, almost as if the Irish people are so weakened and violated by the savagery they are experiencing, that they ask for any form of respite, such as the funeral might provide. Their lives are invaded by the exact opposite of the pause, the slow burn of the funerals in Part I: they are haunted by the sardonic notion of "neighborhood murder," of which the "news" comes in an ebb and flow, as implied by the qualification "each". Referring to the procession as a “courtship”of “tempered steps,” Heaney retrospectively makes the value of these rituals malleable and ever-evolving. The open '/è/' followed by the soft "/g/" sound ending in "cortège" contrasts with the glossy, glassy "/c/" of "glacier", and this way the "cortège" seems more personal and comforting compared to the bare and monumental "glacier" of before. Furthermore, the notion of "temperate steps" personifies the procession here, which makes it more personable than the cool, silent glide of a "glacier", and the description of the procession as "temperate" evokes the sense of quiet, uniform steps of a constant "rhythm". This “rhythm” serves as a buffer to the shocking “news” that arrives unpredictably, and is the stable, unshakable anchor that people can hold on to during this social turmoil. Previously, in Part I, these banal funerals embodied Heaney's earlier condemnation of traditional euphemism in death, present particularly in "Mid Term Break" when Heaney feels swamped and overwhelmed by the "old men" and the subdued "whispers" of distant relatives . “Now,” however, faced with the abominable alternative of uncertainty, this “ceremony” is a pillar of normality and predictability, for which people “pine.” Despite this desire for ritual, Heaney seeks an alternative to the 'obedien[ce]' and 'chackl[ing]' of religious ceremonies, which are remnants of the religious roots of the 'fiefdom'. The focus instead shifts to the image of a procession of "serpents". Through the image of the archaic 'serpent' and the 'megalithic door', evocative of a primordial and prehistoric existence, and of Celtic symbolism, Heaney replaces modern Christianity and, together with the shift from the pronoun personal 'I' in part I, with "we" and "our" in Part II, hope to unify "the whole country" through their collective roots in pagan spiritual beliefs that existed without comparison ” and “stifled,” Heaney creates a gentle symphony of stillness and background noise, embodying the peace that Heaney aims to evoke in this section, as reflected by the “quiet” and “slow” procession. This tranquility resembles that of stillness in Part I, but it is somehow imbued with positivity. Where descriptions such as “dulse” in Part II make the environment dull, the lush, bucolic notion of a “grassy avenue” in Part II is more vibrant and sensorial than the cool alabaster “soapstone.” Aurally, the word "grassy" evokes the sensation that the "snake" procession is "dragging" and rustling through hissing blades of grass, and evokes a complex olfactory melange of moist earthiness, yet fresh, sedgy and verdant. These images immerse the reader in a scene of naturalness that galvanizes in the reader an appreciation for freedom and airiness that is in contrast to the confined "rooms" of Part I. Drawing on the geographically recognizable Irish symbols of the "great chambers of Boyne" and the "Gap of the North", Heaney resurrects an intrinsically Irish Ireland - a unified halcyon of pre-Christian beliefs, where unrest is non-existent and peace is so abundant that the environment is almost soporific, epitomized by the 'women sleepwalkers'. The sense of solidarity and ritual continues in Part III. The action of "putting the stone back" evokes kinship and cooperation; necessary to move a heavy boulder. Furthermore, this image is highly suggestive and reminiscent of the Christian belief in the replacement of the stone of the Holy Sepulcher of Jesus after his burial, which could imply many things. Heaney may be attempting to merge aspects of the Christian faith and Irish spiritual faiths in a further demonstration of unity, or he may be suggesting that.