Dylan Thomas: Tearaway, Genius, or Both ?
Dylan Thomas represents something of an enigma, even now, 57 years and millions of written words after his death in 1953, from a swelling of the brain caused by pneumonia. Contrary to expectations, his liver was remarkably sound, showing no signs of cirrhosis. He was perhaps Wales’ best known poet, yet wrote exclusively in English. He was undoubtedly a womaniser and a drunkard, admitting to having drunk eighteen straight whiskies in succession during one New York binge, yet he wrote some of the most sublime poetry in the English language.
His relationship with his wife Caitlin was an interesting one, and once again illustrates the essential dichotomy in Thomas’ character. They certainly loved each other, yet he had numerous affairs with other women which Caitlin deeply resented. She too was dependent upon alcohol, and in fact their relationship has been described as a mutual alcoholic co-dependency. Needless to say, it was an exceptionally tempestuous marriage, even allowing for artistic temperament on both sides. Yet this is the same man who wrote the celebrated villanelle for his dying father “Do not go gentle into that good night” :
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on that sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
There is a story that when Thomas himself was comatose on his death bed in St Vincent’s 
Hospital in New York, Caitlin burst into the ward shouting “Is that man dead yet?” People have taken this to illustrate her instability and perhaps her alcoholism, but I believe it was an act of love. She wanted to make quite sure that Dylan did not go gentle into that good night.
Under Milk Wood is a 1954 play for radio by Dylan Thomas, later adapted for the stage. A film version, Under Milk Wood directed by Andrew Sinclair, was released in 1972.
An all-seeing narrator invites the audience to listen to the dreams and innermost thoughts of the inhabitants of an imaginary small Welsh village, Llareggub (which backwards is bugger all).
They include Mrs Ogmore-Pritchard, relentlessly bossing her two dead husbands; Captain Cat, reliving his seafaring times; the two Mrs Dai Breads; Organ Morgan, obsessed with his music; and Polly Garter, pining for her dead lover. Later, the town wakes and, aware now of how their feelings affect whatever they do, we watch them go about their daily business.
Although Dylan always denied any conscious knowledge of the Welsh language, much of his poetry carries a distinctive Welsh lilt which is derived from pronunciation of Welsh. Listen to “Fern Hill” :
FERN HILL
Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
The night above the dingle starry,
Time let me hail and climb
Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
Trail with daisies and barley
Down the rivers of the windfall light.
And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
In the sun that is young once only,
Time let me play and be
Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,
And the sabbath rang slowly
In the pebbles of the holy streams.
All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
And playing, lovely and watery
And fire green as grass.
And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the nightjars
Flying with the ricks, and the horses
Flashing into the dark.
And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm
Out of the whinnying green stable
On to the fields of praise.
And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
In the sun born over and over,
I ran my heedless ways,
My wishes raced through the house high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
Before the children green and golden
Follow him out of grace.
Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
In the moon that is always rising,
Nor that riding to sleep
I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.
Lyrical, even rhapsodic. Thomas arguably at his best.
He was an interesting human being with enormous talent. Who knows what he might have produced had he survived beyond his mere 39 years ?
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Read more articles by Peter Shaw in “Oldies and Wrinklies Today” !
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