Dylan Thomas Essays (Examples)

Dylan Thomas "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night"

Dylan Thomas wrote "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" for his father in 1950. It was included in his anthology In Country Sleep in 1952. Dylan Thomas' father was a militant man during the course of his life, and "when in his eighties, he became blind and weak, his son was disturbed seeing his father become "soft" or "gentle" (Grimes, 2-3). This is one of Thomas' more personal poems as we see him almost begging for his father to "rage, rage against the dying of the light" (line 19).

The poem is divided into six stanzas, where the middle four offer his father examples of different kinds of men and their approach to death. In the second stanza, he quotes wise men and though they possess the knowledge of what awaits them in the afterlife, they do not…

Dylan Thomas was an English poet who was greatly inspired by his father, David John (D.J.)Thomas, an English Literature professor at Swansea Grammar School. As a response to his father's death, Thomas penned "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night," one of his most well-known and popular poems. While there are many interpretations of what the poem represents, in Poetry Criticism, David Galens comments on the function of the poem's structure and form, which can be supported through an analysis of the poem "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" and its use of duality, however, Galens also argues that the repetition "insistently" proclaims the remoteness of all fathers, an argument that appears to be based on personal biases.

Galens write that the poem "is a living cross-section, a simultaneously open and closed form, one in which the cycles of youth and age, of rise and fall, growth…

Dylan is also speaking to his father in this poem, for he tells him "Do not go gentle into that good night/Rage, rage against the dying of the light." Thematically, this poem is a reflection of Dylan Thomas's great genius, for it illustrates man's "struggle from darkness to light;" Dylan "uncovered the darkness in us that we should otherwise not have known and brought us to a light we should not otherwise have seen" (Olson 89).

In conclusion, it would be safe to say that Dylan Thomas, while growing up and maturing in the small Welsh village of Swansea, saw this place as a protective barrier against the outside world, meaning that he was protected from becoming part of a literary clique which caused him to transform into a superb and original poet. As Clark Emery understands it, in Swansea "the young men had time to formulate their own artistic…

He fought the Ottomans while in the Spanish Navy. On his way back to Spain, he was taken hostage and held in Algiers for five years. This experience contributed to Don Quixote. This work was his most popular. In 1606, he moved to Madrid, where he died in 1616.

Ancient Greek Theater forms the foundations of modern theater. Greek theater is said to have evolved from religious rites around 1200 BC, rituals that would eventually come to involve both dancing and poetry. As the subject matter became more complex, the art of drama was born. The performance of Greek plays is similar to that of modern theater, and so are its forms. The most prominent forms are tragedy and comedy, both of which are the basis for theater today as well. Many of the classic stories of Greek mythology found their way to theater, inspiring later theater eras significantly.

Ancient…

Dylan Thomas

Understanding a poem is a matter of first and foremost understanding the poet. The individual poet's choice of words and emotions which grab the reader, make a connection, and then deliver an emotional message which leaves a lasting message can be achieved through a number of techniques. But the poet who achieves a lasting memory in the minds of hearts of his readers is a person who approached the pen and ink often from a radically different perspective or with an emotional charge to his life that others not only find fascinating, but envy. Such is the case of Dylan Thomas, a Welshman with a known history of avid drinking, little self-discipline, and a penchant for over-indulgence which lead him to an early grave.

As a young child, Thomas loved the written word. He began writing his first poems at 8 or 9, while his attention was fixed…

Dylan Thomas’s poem “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night” consists of six stanzas, each with three lines. With a structured rhyme scheme and tight organization, Thomas conveys the main theme of the poem with aplomb. The speaker assumes a firm, pedantic stance from the first line forward, speaking in a commanding voice to the reader. Ultimately, Thomas’s poem encourages living life to the fullest and never giving into the temptations of cynicism or apathy that tend to plague those in their senior years.
The primary tone of “Do Not Go Gentle” is empowering or uplifting. Rather than fear death or simply succumb to its inevitability, people need to “rage, rage against the dying of the light,” (lines 3 and 15). Using diction that should evoke anger, such as the term “rage” is instead meant to ignite the fire of passion that lives within each person. In fact, Thomas…

Thomas/Updike Compare/Contrast

The Fight for Life in Dylan Thomas' "Do not go gentle into that good night" and John Updike's "Dog's Death"

Death has proven to be an inspiration for many poets and has been written about throughout history. These poets look at death from differing perspectives and many have argued that it should be fought against while others are more submissive to the concept. In "Do not go gentle into that good night," written by Dylan Thomas (1951), and "Dog's Death," by John Updike (1993), take a stance that accepting death is unnatural and that a person or any living being should fight until the end. In "Do not go gentle into that good night," Thomas argues that death is something that should be fought against and that a person should only succumb to their end when he or she is ready. On the other hand, in "Dog's Death,"…

In "Do not go gentle into that good night," Thomas argues that "old age should burn and rave at close of day," implying that individuals should not give in to death easily (Thomas line 2). In order to prove his point, and convince his father to fight for his life, Thomas provides various examples of men from all walks of life, who regardless of their past fought to live for as long as they could. Thomas writes, "wise men at their end know dark is right…Do not go gentle into that good night," "Good men…Rage, rage against the dying of the light," "ild men…Do not go gentle into that good night," and "Grave men, near death…Rage, rage against the dying of the light" (4,6,7,10,13). Thomas's fears are emphasized when he addresses his father and pleads, "Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray," which can be taken to…

Thomas-Dickinson

Perspectives of Death

"Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" is one of Dylan Thomas's most recognized poems. In the poem, he urges his father to fight against death even though it is something that everyone must at some point in his or her lives have to accept. On the other hand, Emily Dickinson, in "Because I could not stop for Death," accepts death as a natural part of life and unlike Thomas, does not combat it. Dylan Thomas and Emily Dickinson approach the topic of death from different perspectives with Thomas attempting to rebel against the inevitable and Dickinson passively submitting to her end.

"Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" was written for Thomas's dying father and is stylistically structured as a villanelle where only two sounds are rhymed. The poem is composed of 19 lines, rhyming the first and third lines, with an alternation…

Dylan Thomas's 1951 poem, "Do not go gentle into that good night," like Johnson's poem, is an elegy to someone he loves -- his father -- but unlike Johnson's poem, at the time the poem was written before his father passed away, which allows him to express and explain his fears to the man he wrote the poem for. In "Do not go gentle into that good night," Thomas urges his father to fight to live, a stark contrast from Johnson's lament for death to escape the "world's and flesh's rage" (Johnson line 7). Thomas writes, "Old age should burn and rave at close of day," in supplication to his father in order to get him to fight against "the dying of the light," which can be taken as a metaphor for a person's transition through life into death (Thomas line 2-3). Thomas then proceeds to list different types of…

Dylan Thomas

In "Elegy," Dylan Thomas uses the connection of his father being blind, to talk about his father's death. This poem is about Thomas's father's death, but explains how Thomas felt about his father. His father was blind, and Thomas felt that he had to see things for his father. The following quotes explain this: "...broken and blind he died/.../the darkest justice of death, blind and unblessed/.../Veined his poor hand I held, and I saw/Through his unseeing eyes.../.../Out of his eyes I saw the last light glide/.../and old blind man is with me where I go/alking in the meadows of his son's eye." The first line of the quote states he's blind, and through the next few lines of the poem, it keeps hinting about darkness and how Thomas's father was blind. It then starts talking about how Thomas saw through his father's eyes. You see this in the…

Perez's poem speaks of the final memories of the dying person as she is in her hospital bed. "I remember your hands laying / at the side of your steel / bed, gnarled and twisted / like old oak trees" (Perez lines 8-11). These memories are painful for the speaker as is the memory of her funeral when she looked "stuffed / and painted like a swap meet / China doll" (Perez lines 15-17). It is at the end of this poem that the speaker reconciles with death.

That is the key differences between the poems. Thomas wants the dying person to "rage" against death to the end. He would never want anyone to face the dying of the light without a mighty battle although he recognizes the power of death. Perez's speaker feels one more connection to the dead woman and accepts that she is in a better place.…

Dylan Thomas once said of himself, "I hold a beast, an angel, and a madman in me, and my enquiry is as to their working, and my problem is their subjugation and victory, downthrow and upheaval, and my effort is their self-expression." Thomas was one of the best-known British poets of the twentieth century and is best remembered for his powerful poetry readings over BBC radio and his amusing tales and plays, as well as his highly publicized personal life.

Thomas possessed tremendous talent and was blessed with immense gifts that made him a professional success at a relatively young age, however, his personal life was often disappointing and his relationships were more often than not in a state of shambles.

Some believe these failures were rooted in his inability to cope with the demands of sudden fame as perhaps explained by the "various ways his personality have been described:…

Dylan's "The Times they are a Changing," Hughes' "Harlem: A Dream Deferred," and Auden's "The Unknown Citizen" all investigate the themes of human goals, and the impact of society upon these goals. Hughes' poem provides an analysis of how the deferment of life goals by society can result in great destruction to both the individual and society. Auden's poem also looks at the loss of life goals, this time through the overarching control of a mechanized, soulless state and conformity. In contrast, Dylan's lyrics provide hope for the realization of dreams and hopes through social change.

In his poem, "Harlem: A Dream Deferred," Langston Hughes investigates the theme of the destructive impact of deferring dreams. In his first sentence, Hughes sets up a rhetorical question, "hat happens to a dream deferred?," and then sets about determining the effect of life goals that are delayed or put off. Clearly, Hughes wants…

Fern Hill (Dylan Thomas)

The "Poetry Explications" handout from UNC states that a poetry explication is a "relatively short analysis which describes the possible meanings and relationship of the words, images, and other small units that make up a poem."

The speaker in "Fern Hill" dramatically embraces memories from his childhood days at his uncle's farm, when the world was innocent; the second part brings out the speaker's loss of innocence and transition into manhood. This explication will identify and critique Thomas' tone, imagery (including metaphors) and expressive language (as it contributes to the power of the poem). ("Fern Hill" uses 6 verse paragraphs; there are 9 lines in each paragraph.)

"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…

Gentle into That Good Night and This Is it: A Comparison

Dylan Thomas' poem Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night and the Kenny Loggins, Michael McDonald song This Is It both deal with the mortality of man. Each is a plea to a dying father, Thomas' and Loggins', not to give up the good fight as they neared death. Both works are saying that even at the end of life one should choose to fight against the inevitability of death.

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

Thomas' poem is composed of six stanzas of three lines each except the sixth with four. The rhyme scheme is A, B, A with the last line alternating between Rage, rage against the dying of the light, and Do not go gentle into that good night. The last stanza ends with both refrains, thus the extra line and an A,…

4, l. 1ff).

The narrator is a God-like figure sending a man of his flesh to the dry world; the Father/Son construct, as with Jesus Christ. Although the exact dates for most of these poems are uncertain or unknown, we do know Ferris has stated the poet used religious mythology without thought or conviction. However, in the final verse, Thomas calls for "flower, flower, the people's fusion"(v. 6, l.1). And that "all and all the dry world's couple" -- a strong peace theme (v. 5, l. 1). This serves to reinforce the Father/Son theme earlier in the poem. It is interesting to note, as well, that the people in the dry worlds are characterized by the Father/God as mechanical, toolbox, like figures (ribs of metal, synthetic blood (v. 4, 5-6) and love associated with violence (the bridal blade, the lover's mauling (v. 3, v. 5-6)). Is it possible they have…

September 11, 2001, terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners full of fuel for transcontinental flights and sent three of them hurtling into occupied buildings. The nation reeled with shock, not only from the brutal attacks, but from the sudden loss of so many lives. Even those who did not personally know the deceased felt injured and shaken. Some people raged at the unfairness of it all. Others begged those trapped in the crushed buildings to "hang on" long after it became clear that rescue efforts were futile. Even the most devoutly religious struggled to reconcile their faith with their sense of outrage and grief. As the months passed after the attack, though, a healing process slowly began. The national focus shifted slightly to encompass rebirth as well as death, and several magazines and television news programs featured "Sept. 11 idows" who had given birth to new babies since the attacks.

Dylan…

Although using such a constricted form as the villanelle might seem to soften the poet's rage and anger against the coming death of his elderly father, the repetitive nature of the poem's structure shows how singular and blinding the anger and fear of death can be, when it is about to come to a parent. Unlike Donne's theoretical, abstract sense that death comes to everyone, Thomas underlines how even wise, good, wild, and grave men alike, no matter what they thought about death before they were actually facing it, still rage against the dying of the light. "And you, my father, there on the sad height, / Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray." No one, Thomas suggests, really wants to die, no matter how much they might profess to believe in a world hereafter, nor how fully or godly a life they lived.

Thomas begs his…

" Rather than endlessly musing upon his father's death, like a drumbeat Thomas simply repeats that his father must not "go gentle into that good night." ith every tercet, the repeated lines take on a different nuance. Reading the poem is like hearing a favorite song sung in a different way, again and again -- every time, a different shade of meaning is brought forth in the refrain of the poem. It is all too easy for a free verse poem to say the same thing in different ways: Thomas uses the same words again and again to convey different shades of emotion: good men, wild men, grave men, all for different reasons, he states, have not borne the inevitability of death with meekness.

The reader comes to understand that repeated words are a paradox -- Thomas tells his father, begs his father, to do what is futile -- to…

Rebellion Against Death

"Do not go gentle into that good night" may be considered Dylan Thomas's most recognizable and popular poems. First published in Botteghe Oscure in 1951, the poem later appeared as part of the collection called "In Country Sleep." ritten for Thomas's dying father, the poem explores the theme of death and the resistance thereof.

ritten as a villanelle in which only two sounds are rhymed, such as night/light and day/they, and containing nineteen lines, the poem rhymes the first and third lines, alternating the third line of each successive stanza and closes with a couplet. The villanelle was first utilized in English language poetry in the 19th century and draws upon French poetic models.

Rife with undertones of rebellion, the opening line of "Do not go gentle into that good night" sets the tone for the rest of the poem. Thomas urges his father, and the men…

Ode on a Grecian Urn" by John Keats; "The Convergence of the Twain" by Thomas Hardy; and "Fern Hill" by Dylan Thomas. Specifically, it will identify the common theme in these three poems, which is time. Time stops in all three poems for various reasons, and adds to the impact of each poem in a special way.

COMMON THEME

In "Ode on a Grecian Urn," Keats is celebrating the past, stopped in time for a moment on an ancient Grecian urn. Time stands still on the urn, and all the people depicted on it are caught in a fleeting moment of time. Nothing around them can ever change, from the trees, to their love, to their age. "Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare; / Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss, / Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve; / She cannot fade, though thou…

Death in "Do Not Go Gentle Into that Good Night"

"Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" is one of Dylan Thomas's most recognizable poems. ritten for Thomas's dying father, this poem is 19 lines and is structured like a villanelle where only two sounds are rhymed. Through the use of imagery, Thomas is able to vividly explore the theme of death and resistance to it.

"Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" is full of rebellious undertones with the opening line setting the tone for the rest of the poem. In the poem, Thomas urges his father, and others, to fight against death saying that "old age should burn and rave at close of day" and that a person should not give in so easily to Death's demands (line 2). Thomas continues to describe "wise men" who "at their end know dark is right" do not give…

Death in Poetry

Ruba

Poetry is an effective form of literature wherein the significance and importance of human experience are depicted. Life as people perceive and live it are the most common issues and topics used in poetry, although death is becoming a dominant topic in contemporary poetry because of its enigmatic and subjective quality. Death has many meanings for people: death can be an escape, relief, punishment, pain, suffering, or a meaningless void in a person's life. These different depictions of death will be discussed in the analyses of 5 poems wherein the theme of death is used.

Emily Dickinson's poem entitled, "Death" is a poem that talks about the futility of Man's greatness after death. The poem illustrates two dead people who had been known for their beauty (character 1) and a champion for the truth (character 2). Although these people had been great in their previous lives,…

The message of the poem is the longing for life and youth. In this case as well the images have a strong symbolical dimension, the light must be understood as life and youth, whereas the night as death and decay. Just as the title suggests it, there are people who will not easily accept their fate. "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" (Thomas, 10-12). Wild is a state of mind and the sun in flight is a symbol of freedom and creation. The imagery creates spiritual landscapes which unite the poet and the reader.

Shakespeare in his sonnet "My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun" makes a clear opposition between elements of nature and parts of the body of the woman he loves. On the…

Death of the Ball Turret Gunner by Randall Jarrell Without knowing that a ball turret is small place in a B-17, we would not understand the central metaphor analogizing the mother's womb to the ball turret, which is essential to understanding that the poem is about the contrast between the warmth of a mother's love and the cold dehumanizing treatment of the "State" where he is just another soldier.

Common Ground by Judith Cofer Before reading the poem, the title seemed quite self-explanatory, I figured the poem would be about finding common ground between people, and in a sense it is, but the message, after reading the poem, is much starker. It is more about the inescapability of aging, the common links that tie generations as the young get old and realize the commonalities they share with their parents.

Hazel Tells LaVerne by Katharyn Machan Knowing the fairy tale helps…

He, therefore, continued experimenting with new musical style, and his 1964 album, Another Side of Bob Dylan hinted at the things to come. The album was categorized a "folk album" only because Dylan had not yet decided to go electric and continued to use an acoustic arrangement for his songs. As for the content of his songs on Another Side, they had already veered away from the political protest of folk. The album started with the light-hearted and personal "All I Really ant to do" and ended rather significantly with "It Ain't Me" -- Dylan pointedly saying adieu to his folk audience. The album's departure from folk traditions was a prelude to a more dramatic change in Dylan's musical style that was to be unveiled in the following year.

Dylan goes Electric

The year 1965 was the start of perhaps the most concentrated, magical, and impressive two-year period of creative…

Dickinson

Flaming Hope

There are a number of points of comparison that exist between Emily Dickinson's "Because I Could Not Stop For Death" and Dylan Thomas' "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night." Both of these poems are highly similar in terms of their content, which thematically detail various aspects of death and dying. Some motifs are shared between each of these poetic works as well, such as the literal and symbolic focus on sunlight and light in general that are found within both manuscripts. But where the poems primarily converge from one another is in the poet's attitude and regard for the inevitable -- death. Whereas Dickinson's work suggests a sort of quiet assent to death, Thomas's poem argues staunchly against such compliant acceptance and urges people to rally as much as they can against their inevitable end.

Due to this principle distinction between both of these poems,…

With him, this vital energy goes its own way, independent of the pessimism and the disillusionment so typical of the age.' Hemingway did not go to the awards ceremony due to illness, some time before that same year his plane crashed and he lived to read his own obituaries. y then he was already experiencing the results of his fast paced lifestyle and at the end of his life he dealt with sicknesses such as mental depression, and eventually a form of paranoia. This was written of his last days 'After Hemingway began talking of suicide his Ketchum doctor agreed with Mary that they should seek expert help. He registered under the name of his personal doctor George Saviers and they began a medical program to try and repair his mental state. The Mayo Clinic's treatment would ultimately lead to electro shock therapy. According to Jefferey Meyers Hemingway received "between…

Tshcinag and Goddeck

What dew me to the poem? I am always cuious and fascinated at poetic mysteies. That is, what is the poet eally talking about? What line o lines offes a clue (o clues) to the pupose of the poem? The post itself is somewhat confusing and even vague. "The only thing that comes to mind is that it's about abuse between a fathe and a boy," the post explains. I will ty to evaluate and citique the post along with the poem.

The post offes some inteesting appoaches to undestanding the poem. But while I agee that the fathe appaently doesn't know what the boy is thinking o seeing, and doesn't eally elate to the boy's feelings, I don't immediately elate to the assetion that the fathe is the abuse. I'm not saying it isn't possible that the fathe is the abuse but when the fathe says,…

hen she returns armed with candy bars and the visceral poetry of Dylan Thomas' "Do not go gentle into that good night," they respond, and eventually accept her as their teacher. LouAnne must be flexible to be a good teacher, she cannot simply force her students to learn, and her choices are thus limited in the approaches she can take. She must have a sense of humor, and use her background as a marine to impress them as well as to discipline them.

Even after being exposed to LouAnne's teachings, the fate of her students is far from assured. Had she been born in different circumstances, Callie would likely never have felt pressured to engage in unprotected sex. Callie must balance the social expectations of her environment with her own innate intelligence -- it is not fully reflective of her life's challenges to merely say that Callie should 'choose' to…

sprinkled with skepticism, but once she is well into the piece she produces a deluge of cynicism -- and readers are thoroughly drenched (nearly drowned) in the tsunami of her pessimism (for good reason). Many of Walton's points have validity because disillusionment can hit a person in the face like an icy snowball thrown by a neighborhood bully if he or she is not prepared to face the world as it really is.

Happiness is not the same as immaturity at all, and this paper will delve into that subject, because happiness is finding pleasure and joy in a world that can be brutally cold and callous. But meanwhile when Walton says she knows adults "…who will never recover from happy childhoods," she is alluding perhaps to people who were lucky to have great, loving parents that raised them in emotionally pristine environments, sheltered from simpletons and tormenters. But those…

Psychology

Application of E. Kubler-oss Theory to eal Life Loss

Kubler-oss Theory

Stages of Bereavement in relation to eal Life Loss

Elizabeth Kubler-oss posits a theory that the process of loss and grief can be measured in seven distinct steps - shock, denial, anger, negotiation, depression, acceptance, and hope. While these stages may be in any order and can amount to any length of time to progress and advance to the next level, its significance is shown in the application of this theory to a real-life situation concerning the death of a loved one. This paper endeavours to explore each of the seven stages as outlined in the E. Kubler-oss theory. Its application is also conducted on a real-life tragedy I experienced as a teenager when my childhood friend passed away. The stages of grief and loss in the E. Kubler-oss theory does much to convey that the whole process…

Songs for win ower

For the United States, the events of September 11, 2001, and the post-9/11 developments arc full of historical drama. In he 9/11 Commission Report, the summary of the drama is stark: 'On September 11, the nation suffered the largest loss of life-2,973-- on its soil as a result of hostile attack in its history.' his description is usually accompanied by countless stories and mini- histories involving persons, families, workers. Citizens of the U.S. And of other nations too, near and far from New York and Washington, DC, found their comings and goings full of new meaning.

Union Square had become a public site for families and friends of the dead, grieving their losses or seeking the missing by posting photos, laments, poems, prayers. hey also scrawled their epithets of rage. he unity of work and remembrance, forged amid unfolding trauma, reminded me of the families of…

The child's presentation of his naive question that is asked without any expectation of an answer conveys an innocence over the entire poem.

In the second stanza, however, the imagery is not quite so clear, and the images become more analogy than picture, but the analogy represents innocence and purity. In the child's answer about who made the Lamb, the child describes the creator as both a child and a Lamb. Commonly, children are thought of as innocent and pure, as are lambs (the children of sheep, if you will) considered harmless and docile. In Christianity, Jesus often refers to a child-like state or a child-like mind as the most innocent and teachable mindset to have. Also in Christianity, lambs are considered innocent and blameless, at times in need of love and guidance. Indeed, the child in the poem explains it best when he says that the Lamb's creator "became…

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"A Good Man is Hard to Find" ends with the family being executed by the Misfit, a murderous outlaw. Although O'Connor's story is evidently supposed to be humorous, it gives the reader pause to note that the family will die without ever exchanging a kind word. There are different types of family violence: the somewhat positive violence of the Roethke poem that makes the boy adore his father at the expense of his mother vs. The carelessness and cruelty in the O'Connor story, which arises as a result of a lack of respect and the superficiality of the modern family. Family relationships do not necessarily create a state of understanding. In the story, the most transcendent moment of grace occurs between two strangers, before one kills the other, as physical violence makes the grandmother appreciate her time on earth. "His voice seemed about to crack and the grandmother's head…

Although "Midsummer" is a shot work, in keeping with more of the original modernistic style of poetry writing, it is no less poignant in the message it conveys.

Conclusion

In many ways, DH Lawrence is a visionary that offers the reader imagery and creativity that engulfs the reader into the world in which he creates with his words. As with Walcott, it was not necessary for Lawrence to achieve cadence in his writing though the use of rhyme. There is a balance that is struck that clearly reads as poetic. Lawrence's expressive language and use of interesting characters helps to tell the stories of dehumanization that only comes with man's lack of recognition for the power of nature, and moving too fast in directions unknown under the call for modernization.

"If one thinks a poem is coming on… you do make a retreat, a withdrawal into some kind of silence…

Article Analysis

The author presents three specific theories to explain Cockburn's success at being so versatile. First, he suggests that it is a function of the artist's "persona" but even the author acknowledges the hackneyed metaphor. Second, he suggests that Cockburn's lyrics lend themselves better to a dual appreciation. Third, he suggests that Cockburn's choice of contemporary rather than classical (i.e. biblical) themes and imagery are responsible. Those two explanations seem to make more sense than the author's first explanation. Moreover, it is largely the author's subjective opinion about how successfully other performers may have appealed to respective audiences in different genres. Ultimately, the article may do more to confirm that both beauty and artistic appreciation may be equally in the eye of the beholder than it does to establish a fundamental difference between Cockburn and some of his predecessors.

eference

Smucker, T. "You've Never Seen Everything," Commonwealth, Vol.…

American Idiot

Popular Music and Social Change in the Present: Green Day's 'American Idiot' (2004)

Following the catalyzing events of September 11th, 2001, the United States would find itself deeply divided over the issues of terrorism, war and presidential politics. At the heart of this frequently impassioned and vitriolic debate would be the U.S.-led invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq as well as a far-reaching culture clash between two distinction American populations. The 2004 album by pop-punk trio Green Day, American Idiot, would be crafted with the intent of exploring these divisions. In the title track, Green Day would author an anthem that would become omnipresent in pop culture as the U.S. used falsified information to justify its invasion of Iraq.

"American Idiot" would serve both as a harsh critique of the war, of the presidency of George . Bush and of the violent, materialistic culture being fomented in the U.S.…