don t go gentle into that good night meaning

The urgency of tone has kept the poem among the world’s most-read works in English for more than half a century. Thomas uses the poem to address his dying father, lamenting his father’s loss of health and strength, and encouraging him to cling to life. He wanted his son Dylan to become a poet, which Dylan Thomas accepted as his fate and he set out to prove that his father’s rage, along with his love of language, would live on. had a great passion for English literature and he was particularly interested in Shakespeare’s poems which he often read to Dylan. Thomas taught English at a grammar school and he had a great influence on his son Dylan Thomas. David John Thomas died not long after the poem was published, at a time when Dylan Thomas was at the top of his career. It was written in 1947 when Thomas was in Florence with his family and it is one of his most popular poems, but it was not published till 1951.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”ĭylan Thomas a Welsh poet and writer wrote, “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night” for his dying father David John Thomas known as D.J., who he felt had just a short time left to live. Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sightīlind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,Īnd you, my father, there on the sad height,Ĭurse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray. Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,Īnd learn, too late, they grieved it on its way, Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay, Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright Though wise men at their end know dark is right,īecause their words had forked no lightning they

Rage, rage against the dying of the light. Old age should burn and rave at close of day

Don t go gentle into that good night meaning