Do Not Go Gentle into That
Good Night
Poet: Dylan Thomas 1914 - 1953
Presentation by Trisha and Josh

Dylan Thomas
Thomas was born in Swansea, Wales in 1914. Many of his works such as Death Shall Have No Dominion, became famous when he was just a teenager. Although many of his works became critically acclaimed he was unable to make a living, due to both his alcoholism and his publishers taking advantage of him.
Thomas met his future wife in a london pub in 1936, and while drunk, proposed within the hour of meeting her. They married in the summer of 1937 and had their first child in the early months of 1939. due to a lung condition, Thomas was unfit to be conscripted into the Second World War, and after seeing many of his friends conscripted, he fell into depression and embraced his alcoholism further. Thomas was able to work as a BBC broadcaster, but he was never able to secure a full time staff position due to his alcoholism. Over the years Thomas was unable to secure a full income and often sent letters of begging to rich patrons who enjoyed his works. Between 1950-1953, thomas toured the United States 3 separate times. In 1951 Thomas wrote his work Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night. Thomas had many opportunities to work on many projects throughout the years but do to his addictions, he never made these projects come to be. Thomas died on November 9, 1953 in St. Vincents Hospital in New York. Thomas died in a coma, attributed to pneumonia and alcohol damage to the brain. Thomas died with his assets valued at just £100

Significance of the Title
“Do not go gentle” shows that the speaker wants his audience to resist the “good night”. This night represents death, however the speaker shows that death is not inherently bad, in fact he calls it good.
He is saying that death should be resisted but that when one finally dies it is not something to be sad about so long as they did not die gently and lived their lives until the last possible moment

Identify the speaker and his main idea
The speaker is a son speaking to his father who is on his death bed. The speaker is begging his father to not gently die, but rather to continue living until death. The son believes that as people draw close to death they should not be content with their lives until they have been complete.

Literary devices
● Light and dark imagery is used many times in the poem. For example, the dark is mentioned in the second stanza and it represents the termination of life just as the darkness of night did in the title. The opposite of darkness, light, represents life and goodness.
● This symbolism allows the speaker to portray his message clearly without being harsh. This gives his poem a persuasive quality

Literary devices
● Metaphors are used in the poem to portray the speaker’ s ideas in a relatable fashion, allowing them to be better understood by his audience and thus reinforcing the main idea.
● An example of a metaphor used in this poem starts on the first line of the fourth stanza. The sun in flight is its progression through the sky throughout the day and it represents a person’s lifespan. The metaphor is saying that wild men celebrated their lives until they realised, too late, that it wouldn’t last.

Literary devices
A paradox is used in the last stanza when the speaker says that his father’s tears “curse” and
“bless” him. This serves to emphasise the speaker’s inner conflict