Theme Of Do Not Go Gentle Into The Good Night

The poem ‘Do not go gentle into the good night’ explains what a man is going through as he watches his father die, and what he wishes to tell him. To say ‘not go gentle into the good night’ is explaining how to die with purpose, to not simply just die, but to die with meaning. Dylan Thomas used strong words and sentence structure to get his point across and show a powerful theme. When I first saw the title ‘Do not go gentle into the good night’ I thought it meant fighting till the end. I believed this because I didn’t know at the time the character had a dying father and wanted to tell him to have a purpose. The title sounded like fighting till the end when it said don’t go gentle to the good night. After the analysis of the tile, I read …show more content…
The first stanza simply talked about not going peacefully to the end and how old age shouldn’t slow you down from what you believe in. This was generally spoken, with no knowledge of what was the real meaning of it. The second stanza explains how those who are smart will understand death is a good thing but will still have a purpose in what they do. The third and fourth stanzas both explain how men who are good will be remembered by their deeds and that you must have a purpose. By the fifth stanza, you can feel a mood change starting, as Thomas explains how dying men should still fight for a meaning, and by the 6th, it has completely shifted and into first person as the character asks his father to forgive him and to fight for a purpose. All of this shows the characters emotions for his father and the overall meaning of the poem, to not die without a …show more content…
Thomas starts off immediately addressing someone who is dying,then urgently addresses his dying father at the end of the poem asking him to fight against death and to find meaning in life. Another key part of the poem that shows the theme are the shifts. In ‘Do not go gentle into the good night’, 3 shifts are made by Thomas. The first is in the beginning stanza when the speaker addresses an unknown subject and merely states “Old age should burn and rave at close of day”, which is essentially asking someone to not die. Then the poem shifts again and the speaker talks of people who died without a purpose and how little their words affected their surroundings. By the final shift in the last stanza, the speaker directly talks to his father and tells him to not die, and with the context of the poem it is understood the father shouldn’t die regretting the things he never did or say, and that he should make a difference in the world before his time is