An Analysis Of 'Do Not Go Gentle Into That Goodnight'

Explication: Dylan Thomas’s untitled poem known as “Do not go gentle into that goodnight” (1)is a deep poem that goes against the familiar theme of accepting death, instead Dylan Thomas proposes that perhaps we fight against inevitable grip of death and live as long as we can. The first stanza begins with the speaker addressing an unknown audience, saying “Do not go gentle into that good night”(1). The speaker is indirectly speaking to the audience by using euphemisms like “good night” to refer to death, to say that they should not accept death. Line two “Old age should burn and rave at close of day” (2) the speaker is saying that the elderly should live life as vividly as they can in few years that they have left in their lives. In the second

Villanelles have five three-lined stanzas, also called tercets and a sixth four-lined stanza. The first and third lines have to be repeated in each stanza, which helps to convey the idea or theme within the poem for example here the repeated lines are “Do not go gentle into that goodnight/ rage, rage against the dying of the light.” These two lines give the main message within the poem. That one should not just accept death, they should as much as they can while they can. Symbolism is intertwined throughout the poem, which allows for Thomas to place so much meaning into very little text. In the first stanza there is an extended metaphor where death is represented by night, life is represented by day and sunset is the closing of life. This metaphor is brought up throughout the poem, for example “Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight” here the sun or day represents life. The speaker is an important aspect of the poem that needs to be understood. The speaker in this poem unlike many other poems is the poet himself. Dylan Thomas wrote this poem in the wake of his own father’s death, begging his father to hold onto to life and to not leave him. However, there may also be two speakers within the poem. The first speaker who is talking about men in general in stanzas one through five, and then Dylan Thomas himself in the final stanza because the speaker

The first is to try and convince his father to fight harder for life and to stay with him for as long as he could. If this was a reason than Thomas failed because his father died shortly after writing this poem. However the other reason for writing the poem, was to express his feeling during this time in his life and his desperation for his father not to die. I feel that in this respect Thomas did an amazing job of translating his pain into this poem. I have lost a parent and it is still a fresh wound, I can feel the need that Thomas has for not losing his father. Losing a parent is not only like losing a friend, but also like losing your way in life because you no longer have someone to help guide you along and it can make you feel