All individuals deserve the opportunity to leave their mark on the world. Unfortunately, most people do not use life as an opportunity to do this and realize too late that they have not lived up to their own potential. Dylan Thomas’s villanelle “Do Not Go Gentle” urges people who are nearing death and feel this regret to fight. Through this villanelle, he directly addresses his father by asking him to “rage against the dying of the light” (3) and “not go gentle into that good night” (1) but, instead, to show that he cares. Thomas challenges his father to use the last moments of life to continue to feel as if he still has more to accomplish and not go gentle. By asking this of his father, he is able to convey a universal feeling everyone fears
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Where wise men and good men differentiate is how they handle the finality in death. Wise men accept it while good men cry over “the last wave” (7) and how “Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay” (8). Good men view their last moments at the crest of a wave and are afraid of the moment when it crashes. They are afraid because when they look back and remember the wave when it was at its trough, they realize all too late that they wasted their time completing ‘frail deeds’ instead of meaningful ones. They wish for nothing more than to have more time to correct their misgivings and this is the reason that good men feel they must not go gentle. They feel as if they have not lived up to their perception of their own potential and therein lies their purpose to persist and not give into …show more content…
They came to this conclusion by taking on more than they were capable of handling that it stressed them out. By taking on more than they can chew, at some point, made them question the point of it all and prompted them to consider whether it is worth being stressed out all the time. Questioning life causes them to consider two courses of action, either come up with an justifiable answer for their struggles or stop caring. Considering the mentality of a grave man, they are more likely to adopt a lifestyle around the first course of action and find the second rather difficult to implement. Additionally, having a mindset that every action must be justified or every question must have an answer allows them to come to conclusions “with blinding sight” (13). Living with the need to constantly overanalyze has caused them to see everything on a deeper level. In many ways, grave men can consider themselves their own worst enemy since they hinder themselves by creating fears that would not exist if they had just acted instead of overanalyzed. Thomas reminds them that if they could change their mentality and remember what it meant to live happily, they would free themselves of this tired feeling that comes with overanalyzing. By redirecting all this energy towards living a meaningful life, they have a strong potential to
Where wise men and good men differentiate is how they handle the finality in death. Wise men accept it while good men cry over “the last wave” (7) and how “Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay” (8). Good men view their last moments at the crest of a wave and are afraid of the moment when it crashes. They are afraid because when they look back and remember the wave when it was at its trough, they realize all too late that they wasted their time completing ‘frail deeds’ instead of meaningful ones. They wish for nothing more than to have more time to correct their misgivings and this is the reason that good men feel they must not go gentle. They feel as if they have not lived up to their perception of their own potential and therein lies their purpose to persist and not give into …show more content…
They came to this conclusion by taking on more than they were capable of handling that it stressed them out. By taking on more than they can chew, at some point, made them question the point of it all and prompted them to consider whether it is worth being stressed out all the time. Questioning life causes them to consider two courses of action, either come up with an justifiable answer for their struggles or stop caring. Considering the mentality of a grave man, they are more likely to adopt a lifestyle around the first course of action and find the second rather difficult to implement. Additionally, having a mindset that every action must be justified or every question must have an answer allows them to come to conclusions “with blinding sight” (13). Living with the need to constantly overanalyze has caused them to see everything on a deeper level. In many ways, grave men can consider themselves their own worst enemy since they hinder themselves by creating fears that would not exist if they had just acted instead of overanalyzed. Thomas reminds them that if they could change their mentality and remember what it meant to live happily, they would free themselves of this tired feeling that comes with overanalyzing. By redirecting all this energy towards living a meaningful life, they have a strong potential to