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Seamus Heaney's North found a myth which allowed him to articulate his vision of Ireland. The experience is refracted through images drawn from different parts of the Northern European experience. North takes him from the simpler country poems to him Putting Northern Irish politics inside the framework with a darker world where he confronts the violence and ends up in exile just outside Dublin. The poet, becomes far more ambitious in scope with this collection, maybe the most diverse. There is a strategy of violence being followed in the early 1970s (when this volume was written), which clearly had a big impact on Heaney. There is also a celebration of Gunnar, the Icelandic hero, who "lay beautiful inside his burial mound...and unavenged" (in 'Funeral Rites') was a brave response to the assassins on the Catholic side. So it is no real surprise to find him in exile, and referring to Ovid's banishment, in the last poem of this book. With many poems I felt that Heaney was swimming into new, difficult waters with a bit more passionate trust put into his words. Not always easy to digest, but a very good elegant and powerful collection indeed.