How can a list of favourite poems not include one by Dylan Thomas? For many years I used to sell Dylan's poetry books, so I feel a close connection with this flawed angel of a man, this charismatic genius with feet of clay. Some, Kingsley Amis for example, have criticised Thomas's poems for being all sound and fury, for elevating rhetoric over meaning. I can't agree. Sure, one is not always in the mood for his intense romanticism and apocalyptic gravity, but, for me, life would be infinitely less rich without the existence of those two lyrical masterpieces, Fern Hill and Poem in October.
In my craft or sullen art
Exercised in the still night
When only the moon rages
And the lovers lie abed
With all their griefs in their arms,
I labour by singing light
Not for ambition or bread
Or the strut and trade of charms
On the ivory stages
But for the common wages
Of their most secret heart.
Not for the proud man apart
From the raging moon I write
On these spindrift pages
Nor for the towering dead
With their nightingales and psalms
But for the lovers, their arms
Round the griefs of the ages,
Who pay no praise or wages
Nor heed my craft or art.
DYLAN THOMAS
8 comments:
Thanks. This one is new to me and of course gives insight into his work. It is the poems that matter. I enjoyed last night programme by Owen Sheers about the poems. I found it interesting how Dylan tried out words from long lists. His poems work for many people but also have a multitude of connections in a rich and sensual landscape that can satisfy us all.
He is in a class of his own Robert.
I can never decided whether Dylan Thomas was a great poet or a sort of Welsh Stanley Unwin. (Perhaps the two are not mutually exclusive).
It would be difficult for me to choose between "In My Craft or Sullen Art" and "Fern Hill." Music to my ears.
I've always liked Dylan Thomas's poetry, including the poem you've reproduced here. Academic critiques aside, the question for me is not where he stands in the legions of poets, but whether he has provided an authentic voice that connects meaningfully with some of those who open an ear to his music. For me, the answer is a resounding "yes."
Yes,. I agree with you John, such 'a rich and sensual landscape' Dylan gave us.
Indeed, Pat, he's unique.
Dominic: ?!
Such musicality, Am...
And George, yes, music again, and authenticity... true...
"Do Not Go Gently Into that Good Night" was one of the first of the poems I ever voluntarily memorized. 50 years later it seems even more relevant than it did when I first memorized it.
One of his great poems, Loren.
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