Dylan Thomas was a Welsh poet who died in 1953 at the age of 39. His most well-known poem is one which you have no doubt heard at many funerals. It is titled “Do not go gentle into that good night”. It was written as a tribute to his father on his death. As one commentator, Denise Levertov, more poetically astute than I, said in her Statement on Poetics:
“Few poems furnish such a wakeful breaking open of possibility more powerfully than “Do not go gentle into that good night” — a rapturous ode to the unassailable tenacity of the human spirit by the Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas”
This poem was first written in 1947, and published in 1951 and included in his 1952 poetry collection “In Country Sleep, And Other Poems.”
In the fall of the following year, Thomas — a self-described “roistering, drunken and doomed poet”, drank himself into a coma while on an American reading tour. The organizer was required to lock Thomas into a room to meet a deadline for the completion of a radio drama “Under Milkwood”. Thomas died in New York in the fall of 1953.
He was staying at the now famous Chelsea Hotel in Soho, the hotel of choice of many artists and writers, including Arthur Miller, Thomas Wolfe, Leonard Cohen, and Brendan Behan.
Below is the dedication to Thomas in front of the hotel.
Bob Zimmerman adopted Thomas’ first name as his surname. Christopher Nolan made “Do not go gentle into that good night” a narrative centerpiece of his film “Interstellar”. The Beatles’ Sargeant Pepper’s Album featured his likeness immediately to the right of Marlon Brando, wearing the odd looking hat, left hand side, middle-ish row.
Nothing could be better than listening to Thomas read his best work:
And Anthony Hopkins:
We all need more poetry to guide our thoughts.