preview

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night And Poem At Thirty-Nine

Decent Essays

A common theme in many poems is life and death, especially the one of a loved one, this theme is one of the similarities in both poems “Do not go gentle into that good night” and “ Poem at thirty-nine.” “Do not gentle into that good night,” written by Dylan Thomas, is dedicated to his dying father in the poem who he commands to fight death. Correspondingly that “Poem at thirty-nine,” written by Alice Walker, is written for her father informs him about her life now and the impact he had made. In both poems imagery and repetition, diction, and chronological structure are used to convey to the reader the passing of life and to honor their fathers.

To emphasize the antithesis of life “Do not go gentle into that good night” uses repetition, whereas “Poem at Thirty-Nine” uses imagery for a similar effect. Thomas references the phrases “Do not go gentle into that good …show more content…

In “Do not go gentle into that good night” the specific men introduced in the stanzas are an indication of time, whereas Walker uses clear words such as “born” to signalize this. Thomas starts out with the wise men, then good men, wild men, and finally grave men. This represent phases that a “man” would go through before ending at the grave men, he is the closest to death the word “grave” symbolizes this. Walker clearly states that the poem is in chronological order by using the words “birth” and then “high school”, these are all events she has passed through. Closer to the end we see phrases such as “before the end” and finally “he would have” this shows the events she and her father experience before death and the she reflects on the person she has become after her father's death. Walker and Thomas both structured their poems in a chronological order from birth to the deaths of their father to emphasize the fleeting of life and the great impact the bond between them and their fathers had on their

Get Access