At first
glance, “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night” appears
to be a poem about war or men dying unjustly; upon a second or third
reading, the subject becomes even more baffling. Without secondary
resources, primarily biographical information about the author Dylan
Thomas, it would be almost impossible to fully interpret the nuances
of this poem. Although much biographical information comes into play
within the lines of “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night,”
the most relevant information is simply to know that Thomas had an
immense respect for his father as strong, good, and wise man-
probably romanticized by Thomas’s poetic mind- and it was
inexpressibly difficult for Thomas to watch his father who was once
strong, now made weak, passive, and apathetic by his approaching
death.
The structure of this poem is complex. Dylan has used one of the most
difficult structures, the villanelle. A villanelle is a poem of
nineteen lines that begins with five stanzas of three lines (tercets)
and a final quatrain of set pattern. “The first and third lines
of the first tercet are repeated alternately as a refrain closing the
succeeding stanzas and joined as the final couplet of the quatrain.”
(American Heritage Dictionary) In other words, the pattern of
repeated lines looks like AXB, XXA, XXB, XXA, XXB, XXAB. Not only
must the creator of a villanelle stay confined to this pattern of
line repetition, through the entire 19 lines, but also there can be
only two words to rhyme with. (In this piece, perhaps symbolically,
the rhyme scheme originates from “night” and “day”)
Thomas further limits himself by keeping relatively the same beat and
amount of syllables per line throughout the poem. The fact that
Thomas created this masterpiece of a poem out of such a limiting
structure and with primarily monosyllabic words should awe even those
unfamiliar with the difficulty of writing poetry.
Thomas makes
use of numerous literary devices discussed in Studying Poetry;
some of these devices include enjambment (lines 5-6) alliteration,
and conceit. Although enjambment in lines five through six is
discussed below, it would be of value to explore the way Thomas uses
alliteration and conceit. The most obvious use of alliteration occurs
in the title itself in the words “Go,” “gently,”
and “good.” By repeating the “G” sound,
Thomas achieves two things: he strengthens the presence and
intensity of the refrain, and, especially with the hard “G’s,”
makes the sentence sound even more of an imperative command. Although
conceit might not be the proper word to describe it, Thomas has built
this entire poem upon the images of light, day, and sun representing
life, and images of darkness and night representing death.
The
first stanza is framed with the two lines that will form the backbone
and, ultimately, the focus of the poem. The words “Do not go
gentle into that good night” (1) are an imperative command,
which can be understood as being addressed to his father, that exhort
him to not give into death without a fight. “Going gentle”
refers to giving up and passively accepting death, and “that
good night,” (1) refers to death itself. It is important to
note that Thomas refers to death (night) as “good.” As he
will expound upon later in the piece, Thomas recognizes it is not
death itself that should be fought- but death come unfairly and too
early. The second line is the only line in this stanza that will be
repeated only once in this poem: “Old age should burn and rave
at close of day.” (2) What Thomas is telling his father is that
people who are advanced in age should see what a gift life is, they--
even more than others-- should fight for death and scream out their
last words, not passively pass on. The close of the stanza is another
exhortation to his father. This time, instead of a negative command
(do not) Dylan writes a positive imperative statement “(you)
rage.” (3)
The next
three stanzas discuss how three different types of men might feel
about their death when it comes. Dylan discusses wise men, good men,
wild men, and grave men. Dylan had a great amount of respect for his
father and it can be surmised that Dylan felt his father fit each of
these descriptions.
The
second stanza, beginning with “though wise men at their end
know dark is right,” (4) expounds upon the theme of death being
good and natural in its time and place, but a sorry end to a man
who’s words never carried the weight they should have. In this
stanza, Dylan examines how a “wise man” might approach
his death: “knowing dark is right,” (4) and yet because
their words had “forked no lightning,” (5) (i.e. had not
had a significant impact or received the accolades they deserved)
they do not give in to death, but “rage” against it.
Interestingly,
Dylan’s father was a teacher in a grammar school, a profession
that can, arguably, claim most to have their word unheeded or allowed
to pass “without forking lightning.” It is important to
note that in the third through fourth lines, Dylan makes use of
enjambment, to help finish this thought while still maintaining the
symmetry of repeated lines. This stanza is perhaps the most
structurally complex of the entire poem; within it Dylan uses the
form “though a know b, because c, they d.” This is the
only stanza in which “Do not go gentle into that good night”
completes the specifc thought of the line preceding it.
The third stanza discusses how good men approach their time of death.
Even good men, in the end, cannot help but lament over how great they
might have become or what wonderful things they might have achieved
if they had been given the opportunity to go away and make an impact
on the world. For these men, Dylan suggests, their chance has passed
and although they were “good,” they dream they could have
been better.
In the fourth stanza, Thomas moves towards discussing another type of
men: the wild men. In the first two lines of this stanza, Dylan makes
use of the object of the sun as an extended symbol. Dylan writes
about men who caught the sun in the air, but realized to late that
the sun was “on it’s way,” (11) or giving itself
over to the night. This image is symbolic of squandering life and
realizing too late that life is on its way and the darkness is
coming. Dylan is quick to point out that no matter the celebration
and vitality a wild man can extract from his life, he will always
find it ending too soon, and himself left with a feeling of emptiness
and grief for the coming death. Here Thomas is exhorting his father
not to grieve at his own passing but, once again, to “not go
gentle” (12)
Moving towards the climax of the piece, the second to last stanza
begins to conclude the poem by discussing the final type of men:
grave men. In the first line, Dylan discusses how grave men, when
they are near their death, are solemn enough to see the truth that
death can be good. As he moves to the second line of the stanza,
Thomas subtly moves the description from that of “grave men”
(13) to men of “blind eyes.” (14) This discussion of
blind eyes is a direct allusion to Dylan’s own father, who was
going blind at the time. (Grimes) This is another, more symbolic,
encouragement to his father, exhorting him that even though he is
going blind, if he is wise, good, wild, or grave, through the eyes of
his mind he could see incredible things. It could be interpreted that
Dylan is encouraging his father to resist death so that he might
share whatever knowledge he gains in the process of dying. Dylan is
reminding him that he could, as he is dying, have unique perceptions
of the universe or an understanding of meaning in life- and it would
be worth fighting death to grasp onto those moments.
The final stanza sums up the entire poem and ties the themes and
images together. It is in this stanza that we see the most obvious
evidence that this poem is, indeed, written for his father. The first
line contains a direct address, “and you my father.” (16)
The second line of the last stanza may perhaps be the most
significant of any of the unrepeated lines: “Curse, bless me
now with your fierce tears I pray.” (17) Here Thomas asks
(prays) that his father would cry his fierce tears (a sign of
fighting death, Dylan seems to suggest “fierce tears”
were “his” or somehow common to him) and would either
curse or bless him. It might strike the reader as odd that Dylan
would ask his father to “curse [or] bless” him (17), but
we can understand this line as a cry from a son to a dying father:
“curse me, bless me, scream at me, console me- but whatever you
do, do not give up!”
In
conclusion, the poem “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night”
by Dylan Thomas is not only a very poignant, applicable, and
emotional poem, but is perhaps the perfect example of a villanelle.
Though Thomas’s poem undoubtedly had deep personal meaning to
him and his father, this poem is applicable to all of us, as we will
each find ourselves, one day, in the position of either Dylan or his
father. Although Thomas leaves us with a paradoxical theme, he loudly
declares that one must live their life even though they are in the
process of dying. We must not be weak and apathetic in our passing
over to death, but we must life with a good, wise, grave, and
sometimes wild approach to appreciating the life we have been given.
Light is sweet, and it
pleases the eyes to see the sun. However many years a man may
live, let him enjoy them all. But let him remember the days of
darkness, for they will be many.
Ecclesiastes
11:7-8
Works Cited
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language,
Fourth Edition. 2000. Houghton Mifflin Company.
Grimes, Linda Sue. "Dylan Thomas Do Not Go Gentle." Nov 5,
2001. <http://www.geocities.com/classicpoetry/dtdonotgogentle.html>.
