While the poems in Wintering Out are more formally open, they also demonstrate Heaney's intensifying commitment to rooting his poetry in the Irish landscape.

Throughout the collection, Heaney uses linguistic cues and place names to develop a sense of community and forge a connection with the Irish past.

[3] Heaney explained the importance of the Irish landscape in Wintering Out during an interview with literary critic Seamus Deane.

As Heaney said, the place name poems were his mode for rooting the collection in Ireland, acknowledging his own origins, even while doing so in the English language.

Bogs were a familiar feature of the Northern Irish landscape and Heaney found contemporary political relevance in the relics of the ritualistic killings.