Poet Dylan Thomas was born in Swansea on the 27th October 1914 in Swansea Wales. Apparently an unremarkable child Thomas would leave school at the age of 16 and become a journalist while writing and collecting almost 200 poems which he kept in four notebooks. Success came early for Thomas and at the age of just twenty a poem called “Light breaks where no sun shines” caught the eye of several important literary figures after being published in The Listener in 1934 and it wouldn’t be long before Thomas became a much loved and well known poet.
These beautifully melodic quotes from Dylan Thomas show perfectly just why he is still a respected and revered writer for anyone who loves poetry.
“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 lovers be lost, love shall not; And death shall have no dominion.”
“I think, that if I touched the earth,
It would crumble;
It is so sad and beautiful,
So tremulously like a dream.”
“Poetry is not the most important thing in life… I’d much rather lie in a hot bath reading Agatha Christie and sucking sweets.”
“Man’s wants remain unsatisfied till death.
Then, when his soul is naked, is he one
With the man in the wind, and the west moon,
With the harmonious thunder of the sun”
“When one burns one’s bridges, what a very nice fire it makes.”
“He who seeks rest finds boredom. He who seeks work finds rest.”
“Great is the hand that holds dominion over man by a scribbled name.”
Arriving in New York on 20 October 1953 Thomas was ill having complained of chest trouble and gout while still in Britain. With the smog in the city making his breathing worse Thomas deteriorated and on the night on November 5th he was admitted to hospital where he sank into a coma never to regain consciousness.
Dylan Thomas died on 9th November 1953 aged just 39 and is buried in Laugharne.