Theme Analysis of Dylan Thomas' and Anne Sexton's Poems Through Diction.
ABSTRACT
Dalam skripsi ini saya menganalisis tema dari tiga puisi karya Dylan
Thomas dan tiga puisi karya Anne Sexon. Masing-masing tema dari setiap puisi
didapat dari analisis diksi yang digunakan.
Dylan Thomas dalam puisi pertamanya “Do Not Go Gentle into that Good
Nightmdc” menyampaikan agar seseorang jangan menyerah begitu saja kepada
kematian. Di dalam puisi “And Death Shall Have No Dominion,” Thomas
menyampaikan bahwa seseorang akan memasuki kehidupan baru yang lebih baik
setelah ia meninggal; oleh karena itu, janganlah ia menganggap bahwa kematian
itu berkuasa. Di dalam “The Conversation of Prayer,” Thomas memaparkan
bahwa ketika seseorang memanjatkan sebuah doa, ada kemungkinan ia
menyelamatkan hidup orang lain.
Anne Sexton dalam puisi pertamanya “Wanting to Die” menggambarkan
bagaimana seseorang memiliki keinginan untuk mati, yang dapat muncul kapan
saja dan berkembang menjadi hasrat. Di dalam “Sylvia’s Death,” Sexton
menyampaikan bahwa seseorang dapat merasa terkhianati dan kecewa karena
keinginannya untuk mati belum tercapai. Selanjutnya, di dalam “The Death
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King,” Sexton menunjukkan bagaimana seseorang berpikir bahwa kematian
adalah jalan keluar dari penderitaan dan ketakutan yang ia alami dalam hidupnya.
Dari semua paparan tersebut saya menyimpulkan bahwa kedua penulis ini
dalam karya-karyanya memiliki kesamaan dan perbedaan. Kedua penulis samasama memiliki cara menulis yang deskriptif, sedangkan perbedaannya adalah
pemilihan kata-kata dalam puisi mereka ketika menyampaikan sudut pandang
mereka mengenai kematian. Kata-kata yang dipilih oleh Dylan Thomas secara
tidak langsuung menyampaikan pandangan dan sikap positif ketika menghadapi
kematian, sedangkan kata-kata yang dipilih oleh Anne Sexton secara langsung
memberikan pandangan yang menyimpulkan bahwa kematian adalah sebuah jalan
keluar bagi penderitaan.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.................................................................................. i
TABLE OF CONTENTS..................................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT .......................................................................................................... iii
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study ..............................................................................1
Statement of the Problem .............................................................................2
Purpose of the Study ....................................................................................3
Method of Research .....................................................................................3
Organization of the Thesis ...........................................................................3
CHAPTER TWO: THEME ANALYSIS OF
DYLAN THOMAS’ POEMS THROUGH DICTION ............................4
CHAPTER THREE: THEME ANALYSIS OF
ANNE SEXTON’S POEMS THROUGH DICTION ............................16
CHAPTER FOUR: CONCLUSION ..................................................................27
BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................................30
APPENDICES:
Dylan Thomas’ Poems ...............................................................................32
Anne Sexton’s Poems.................................................................................35
Biography of Dylan Thomas ......................................................................39
Biography of Anne Sexton .........................................................................40
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APPENDICES
Poems by Dylan Thomas
Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night
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 wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
5
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
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.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
10
15
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
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And Death Shall Have No Dominion
And death shall have no dominion.
Dead men naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.
And death shall have no dominion.
Under the windings of the sea
They lying long shall not die windily;
Twisting on racks when sinews give way,
Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;
Faith in their hands shall snap in two,
And the unicorn evils run them through;
Split all ends up they shan't crack;
And death shall have no dominion.
And death shall have no dominion.
No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;
Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;
Through they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;
Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,
And death shall have no dominion.
5
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The Conversation of Prayer
The conversation of prayers about to be said
By the child going to bed and the man on the stairs
Who climbs to his dying love in her high room,
The one not caring to whom in his sleep he will move,
And the other full of tears that she will be dead,
5
Turns in the dark on the sound they know will arise
Into the answering skies from the green ground,
From the man on the stairs and the child by his bed.
The sound about to be said in the two prayers
For sleep in a safe land and the love who dies
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Will be the same grief flying. Whom shall they calm?
Shall the child sleep unharmed or the man be crying?
The conversation of prayers about to be said
Turns on the quick and the dead, and the man on the stairs
Tonight shall find no dying but alive and warm
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In the fire of his care his love in the high room.
And the child not caring to whom he climbs his prayer
Shall drown in a grief as deep as his made grave,
And mark the dark eyed wave, through the eyes of sleep,
Dragging him up the stairs to one who lies dead.
20
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Poems by Anne Sexton
Wanting to Die
Since you ask, most days I cannot remember.
I walk in my clothing, unmarked by that voyage.
Then the almost unnameable lust returns.
Even then I have nothing against life.
I know well the grass blades you mention,
the furniture you have placed under the sun.
5
But suicides have a special language.
Like carpenters they want to know which tools.
They never ask why build.
Twice I have so simply declared myself,
have possessed the enemy, eaten the enemy,
have taken on his craft, his magic.
In this way, heavy and thoughtful,
warmer than oil or water,
I have rested, drooling at the mouth-hole.
10
15
I did not think of my body at needle point.
Even the cornea and the leftover urine were gone.
Suicides have already betrayed the body.
Still-born, they don't always die,
but dazzled, they can't forget a drug so sweet
that even children would look on and smile.
20
To thrust all that life under your tongue!-that, all by itself, becomes a passion.
Death's a sad Bone; bruised, you'd say,
and yet she waits for me, year after year,
to so delicately undo an old wound,
to empty my breath from its bad prison.
Balanced there, suicides sometimes meet,
raging at the fruit, a pumped-up moon,
leaving the bread they mistook for a kiss,
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leaving the page of the book carelessly open,
something unsaid, the phone off the hook
and the love, whatever it was, an infection.
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Sylvia's Death
for Sylvia Plath
O Sylvia, Sylvia,
with a dead box of stones and spoons,
with two children, two meteors
wandering loose in a tiny playroom,
with your mouth into the sheet,
into the roofbeam, into the dumb prayer,
(Sylvia, Sylvia
where did you go
after you wrote me
from Devonshire
about raising potatoes
and keeping bees?)
what did you stand by,
just how did you lie down into?
Thief —
how did you crawl into,
crawl down alone
into the death I wanted so badly and for so long,
the death we said we both outgrew,
the one we wore on our skinny breasts,
the one we talked of so often each time
we downed three extra dry martinis in Boston,
the death that talked of analysts and cures,
the death that talked like brides with plots,
the death we drank to,
the motives and the quiet deed?
(In Boston
the dying
ride in cabs,
yes death again,
that ride home
with our boy.)
O Sylvia, I remember the sleepy drummer
who beat on our eyes with an old story,
how we wanted to let him come
like a sadist or a New York fairy
to do his job,
a necessity, a window in a wall or a crib,
and since that time he waited
under our heart, our cupboard,
and I see now that we store him up
year after year, old suicides
and I know at the news of your death
a terrible taste for it, like salt,
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(And me,
me too.
And now, Sylvia,
you again
with death again,
that ride home
with our boy.)
And I say only
with my arms stretched out into that stone place,
what is your death
but an old belonging,
a mole that fell out
of one of your poems?
(O friend,
while the moon's bad,
and the king's gone,
and the queen's at her wit's end
the bar fly ought to sing!)
O tiny mother,
you too!
O funny duchess!
O blonde thing!
45
50
55
60
65
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The Death King
I hired a carpenter
to build my coffin
and last night I lay in it,
braced by a pillow,
sniffing the wood,
letting the old king
breathe on me,
thinking of my poor murdered body,
murdered by time,
waiting to turn stiff as a field marshal,
letting the silence dishonor me,
remembering that I'll never cough again.
Death will be the end of fear
and the fear of dying,
fear like a dog stuffed in my mouth,
fear like dung stuffed up my nose,
fear where water turns into steel,
fear as my breast flies into the Disposal,
fear as flies tremble in my ear,
fear as the sun ignites in my lap,
fear as night can't be shut off,
and the dawn, my habitual dawn,
is locked up forever.
Fear and a coffin to lie in
like a dead potato.
Even then I will dance in my dire clothes,
a crematory flight,
blinding my hair and my fingers,
wounding God with his blue face,
his tyranny, his absolute kingdom,
with my aphrodisiac.
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Biography of Dylan Thomas
Dylan Marlais Thomas was born in the Welsh seaport of Swansea,
Camarthenshire, Wales on October 27, 1914. Thomas could not speak Welsh but
he adopted the rhythms of the language and he started to write poetry while he
was still at school. When he was twelve, his poem was published in the Western
Mail.
Thomas was known as a precocious poet. His first book of poetry,
Eighteen Poems, was published in 1934 when Thomas was not yet twenty years
old. His second and third books of poetry were Twenty-Five Poems (1936) and
The Map of Love (1939), and the poems of his first three books were collected in
The World I Breathe (1939). Thomas’ poetic output was not large; he wrote only
six poems in the last six years of his life. His poems are marked by vivid
metaphors, the use of Christian and Freudian imagery, and the celebration of the
mystical power of growth and death. Thomas said, “My poetry is the record of my
individual struggle from darkness toward some measure of light . . . . To be
stripped of darkness is to be clean, to strip of darkness is to make clean.”
Thomas mentioned that the reason for him to become a poet was that he
had fallen in love with words. His sense of richness and variety and flexibility of
the English language shines through all of his works. The most prominent theme
of all his poems is the celebration of the divine purpose in all human and natural
process. The cycle of birth and flowering and death is found in Thomas’ poems.
He died on November 1953 shortly after his 39th birthday.
Source(s):
“Dylan Thomas” and “Dylan Thomas Biography.”
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Biography of Anne Sexton
Anne Sexton was born in Newton, Massachusetts, on November 9, 1928
under the name of Anne Gray Harvey. She attended Garland Junior College for
one year and married Alfred Muller Sexton II at the age of nineteen. She was a
glamorous woman--her early career before writing poetry included a brief stint as
a model--and she had many fans, both inside and outside academia. Many people
thought of her as a celebrity first and a poet second.
She wrote about subjects that were previously unexplored in poetry, such
as abortion, menstruation, and the allure of suicide. She made the experience of
being a woman a central issue in her poetry, and though she endured criticism for
bringing controversial subjects into her work, her skill as a poet transcended the
controversy over her subject matter. “Though she received little formal training in
poetics, claiming to learn meter by watching I. A. Richards on television, her
poetry has notable formal sophistication” (Encyclopedia of World Biography on
Anne Sexton). In 1967 Sexton received the Pulitzer Prize for Live or Die (1966)
and also received the Shelley Memorial Prize. Her best work is probably found in
All My Pretty Ones (1962), which bears an epigraph from Shakespeare's Macbeth.
In 1954 she was diagnosed with postpartum depression, suffered her first
mental breakdown, and she was admitted to Westwood Lodge, a neuropsychiatric
hospital. Sexton suffered another breakdown and was hospitalized again after
giving birth to her second daughter. She committed suicide on October 4, 1974.
Source(s):
“Anne Sexton” and “Encyclopedia of World Biography on Anne Sexton”
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
People’s ideas about death can vary. Some people will say that death is the
best way out to end life’s problems but others may think that death is not
something that can make someone feel better when they are facing problems in
their life. Some people “fear being dead, while others are afraid of the actual act
of dying” (Fritscher, par.1). In the world of poetry, there are at least two poets,
namely Dylan Thomas and Anne Sexton, who dealt with death as their subject,
with different interpretation in their poems.
Dylan Thomas was a Welsh poet who lived in the era of World War II. He
was a war witness because in that era he worked as a documentary film
scriptwriter and served as an aircraft gunner. I am interested in analyzing Thomas’
poems because he says, “My poetry is the record of my individual struggle from
darkness toward some measure of light” (Liukkonen and Pesonen, par.9). Thomas
was also one of the modern poets who helped restore the English poetry to its
basic form in its own language. One of the statements about him says, “Rather
than using long words derived from foreign languages, Thomas preferred to
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impress readers with strong, short words from native English” (“Dylan Thomas
Biography,” par. 6). His poems that I analyze are “Do Not Go Gentle into that
Good Night,” “And Death Shall Have No Dominion” and “The Conversation of
Prayer.”
The second poet whose poems I will analyze, Anne Sexton, was a
contemporary American poet who began writing poems in 1956. Her poems are
said to be “a result of an emotional breakdown that led to serious depression”
(“Encyclopedia of World Biography on Anne Sexton,” par. 2). Sexton belonged to
the confessional school of poets who wrote about “private experiences with and
feelings about death, trauma, depression and relationships . . ., often in an
autobiographical manner” (“A Brief Guide to Confessional Poetry,” par. 2). Her
poems that I analyze are “Wanting to Die,” “Sylvia’s Death,” and “The Death
King.”
In my thesis, I discuss the themes of Thomas’ and Sexton’s poems. I am
interested in their poems because they are related to how someone perceives death
in his/her life. Theme in poetry is “the central concept developed in a poem”
(Reaske 42). To reveal the theme, I analyze Thomas’ and Sexton’s poems through
diction, which is defined as “the choice and use of words in literature”
(“Diction,”def 2).
Statement of the Problem
In my thesis I am going to answer the following questions:
1.
What is the theme of each of the poems?
2.
How does the diction used by the poets help reveal the theme?
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Purpose of the Study
The purpose of my discussion is
1.
to show the theme of each of the poems;
2.
to show how the diction used by the poets help reveal the theme.
Method of Research
I used library research in writing my thesis. First, I read the poems that I
had chosen. I then searched for some print and online sources to support my
discussion. In the end, I drew a conclusion from the whole discussion.
Organization of the Thesis
This thesis consists of four chapters, which are preceded by the
Acknowledgements, the Table of Contents, and the Abstract. Chapter One is the
Introduction, which consists of the Background of the Study, the Statement of the
Problem, the Purpose of the Study, the Method of Research and the Organization
of the Thesis. Chapter Two is the Theme Analysis of Dylan Thomas’ poems,
whereas Chapter Three is the Theme Analysis of Anne Sexton’s poems. Finally,
Chapter Four is the Conclusion. The thesis ends with the Bibliography and the
Appendices, which contain Dylan Thomas’ and Anne Sexton’s poems and the
biography of each poet.
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CHAPTER FOUR
CONCLUSION
In this chapter, I am going to draw a conclusion from my analysis of three
of Dylan Thomas’ poems and three of Anne Sexton’s poems.
The three poems of Dylan Thomas that I analyze are “And Death Shall
Have No Dominion,” “Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night” and “The
Conversation of Prayer.” From each poem the reader may see that Thomas uses
some diction that represents an opposite meaning that gives a contrast between the
condition before and after death. Furthermore, Thomas uses the words
representing the passion of struggle against death and also the diction proving that
one’s life can be saved through a prayer.
Dylan Thomas’ poems mostly deal with the “divine purpose in every
human and natural process” (Dylan Thomas Biography, Par.7). The natural
human process discussed in the poems are life and death. Using his passionate and
vivid way of writing poems, Thomas shows how passion occurs while someone is
fighting against death, facing death, and facing the possibility of life or death.
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The three poems of Anne Sexton that I analyze are Wanting to Die,”
“Sylvia’s Death,” and “The Death King.” From the diction used in each poem, the
reader may see directly that one has the desire to die which turns into a passion
and then if the desire to die is not fulfilled one will feel betrayed. Furthermore, the
diction also clearly describes that one’s resignation to death may end one’s
suffering and fear.
Anne Sexton is famous for her confessional voice as she makes the reader
falsely believe that she wrote her poems based on her own life experiences. Her
poems mostly deal with taboo and shocking subjects, such as mental breakdowns,
suicide, and marital problems. In these poems the taboo and shocking subjects are
death and suicide. In all three poems, the speakers say that their desire is to die,
specifically by committing suicide.
Both Dylan Thomas and Sexton are very descriptive in writing poems
concerning death. Both of them use some words that make the poems easily
understood and imagined. For example, in one of the Thomas’ poems here, in line
2 to line 3 of “And Death Shall Have No Dominion,” the reader can easily
imagine how dead people will lay in the grave and will be united with other dead
people or how the word “care” is emphasized to reveal the idea in the poem. Yet,
Thomas uses some common words to explain the hidden idea behind the
connotative meaning present in some words of his poem. For example, the word
“rage” represents not only the struggle against death but also the act of anger.
Sexton is also descriptive, which can be seen when she explains about
someone who has a desire to die and the desire has turned into a passion. Her
description in apparent, for example, in “Wanting to Die,” which simply refers to
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the speaker’s desire to die. Different from Thomas, Sexton has used much simpler
words or everyday words in describing what happens to the speaker in the poem.
In other words, Sexton’s way of explaining the idea is quite simpler as she only
uses the denotative meaning of the words in each line of her poems. Significantly,
both of them, through their descriptive way of writing, enable the reader to feel,
smell, taste, hear, and see everything presented in the poem.
Even though Dylan Thomas and Anne Sexton share the same subject,
which is death, and also similarly use the diction in accordance to the importance
of their conveying something from their poems, they share different perspective in
seeing death. Referring to the fact that he does not make any statement about what
death is, Thomas seems to regard death as a natural thing that happens to anyone.
Moreover, he indirectly shows the general expression that encourages the reader
to have positive attitude in facing death. Different from Thomas, Anne Sexton
makes a statement that death is a solution or something desirable. Referring to the
fact that she suffers from depression and that she is one of Confessional poets, it
seems that through the diction used in the poem she directly expresses her belief
that death is a solution to her problems.
In my opinion, Dylan Thomas and Anne Sexton are both skillful in
presenting their perspectives and their perceptions of death. However, I prefer
Dylan Thomas’ idea about perceiving death positively, as it makes me feel no fear
in facing death. It also makes me think positively of how to live my life and what
kind of attitude I should possess when facing death. My favorite poem is “Do Not
Go Gentle into that Goodnight,” which personally reminds me that I should
struggle while facing death and I should not surrender easily.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Texts:
Bengtsson, Gunnar. “Anne Sexton.” American Poems. 2009. Web. 5 Mar. 2010
“Dylan Thomas” . Famous Poems and Poets. 2010. Web. 5 Mar. 2010
References:
“Aphrodisiac,” Hornby, A. S. Oxford Advance Learner’s Dictionary 7th Edition.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Print.
“Diction.” Def. 2. Hornby, A. S. Oxford Advance Learner’s Dictionary 7th
Edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Print.
Kennedy, X. J. and Dana Gioia. An Introduction to Poetry Tenth Edition. New
York: Longman. 2002. Print.
“Lust.” Def. 2. Hornby, A. S. Oxford Advance Learner’s Dictionary 7th Edition.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Print.
Reaske, Christopher Russell. How to Analyze Poetry. New York : Monarch Press,
1966. Print.
Internet Websites:
“Anne Sexton.” Poets. 2011. Web. 5 May 2011
“Brief Guide to Confessional Poetry.” Poets. 2011. Web. 5 May 2011
“Dylan Thomas 1914-1953.” Poetry Foundation. 2011. Web. 30 Aug 2012
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“Dylan Thomas.” Notable Biographies. 2011. Web. 10 Apr. 2010
“Dylan Thomas Biography.” Famous Poets and Poems. 2010. Web. 10 Apr. 2010
“Encyclopedia of World Biography on Anne Sexton.” Anne Sexton Biography.
2006. Web. 9 Jun. 2010
Frietscher, Lisa. “Thanatophobia.” About. 2011. Web. 10 Sept. 2011
Liukkonen, Petri and Ari Pessonen. “Dylan Thomas 1914-1953.” Kirjasto. 2008.
Web. 10 Apr. 2010
“Romans 6 (King James Version).” Bible Study Tools. 2011. Web. 22 Nov. 2011
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Dalam skripsi ini saya menganalisis tema dari tiga puisi karya Dylan
Thomas dan tiga puisi karya Anne Sexon. Masing-masing tema dari setiap puisi
didapat dari analisis diksi yang digunakan.
Dylan Thomas dalam puisi pertamanya “Do Not Go Gentle into that Good
Nightmdc” menyampaikan agar seseorang jangan menyerah begitu saja kepada
kematian. Di dalam puisi “And Death Shall Have No Dominion,” Thomas
menyampaikan bahwa seseorang akan memasuki kehidupan baru yang lebih baik
setelah ia meninggal; oleh karena itu, janganlah ia menganggap bahwa kematian
itu berkuasa. Di dalam “The Conversation of Prayer,” Thomas memaparkan
bahwa ketika seseorang memanjatkan sebuah doa, ada kemungkinan ia
menyelamatkan hidup orang lain.
Anne Sexton dalam puisi pertamanya “Wanting to Die” menggambarkan
bagaimana seseorang memiliki keinginan untuk mati, yang dapat muncul kapan
saja dan berkembang menjadi hasrat. Di dalam “Sylvia’s Death,” Sexton
menyampaikan bahwa seseorang dapat merasa terkhianati dan kecewa karena
keinginannya untuk mati belum tercapai. Selanjutnya, di dalam “The Death
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King,” Sexton menunjukkan bagaimana seseorang berpikir bahwa kematian
adalah jalan keluar dari penderitaan dan ketakutan yang ia alami dalam hidupnya.
Dari semua paparan tersebut saya menyimpulkan bahwa kedua penulis ini
dalam karya-karyanya memiliki kesamaan dan perbedaan. Kedua penulis samasama memiliki cara menulis yang deskriptif, sedangkan perbedaannya adalah
pemilihan kata-kata dalam puisi mereka ketika menyampaikan sudut pandang
mereka mengenai kematian. Kata-kata yang dipilih oleh Dylan Thomas secara
tidak langsuung menyampaikan pandangan dan sikap positif ketika menghadapi
kematian, sedangkan kata-kata yang dipilih oleh Anne Sexton secara langsung
memberikan pandangan yang menyimpulkan bahwa kematian adalah sebuah jalan
keluar bagi penderitaan.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.................................................................................. i
TABLE OF CONTENTS..................................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT .......................................................................................................... iii
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study ..............................................................................1
Statement of the Problem .............................................................................2
Purpose of the Study ....................................................................................3
Method of Research .....................................................................................3
Organization of the Thesis ...........................................................................3
CHAPTER TWO: THEME ANALYSIS OF
DYLAN THOMAS’ POEMS THROUGH DICTION ............................4
CHAPTER THREE: THEME ANALYSIS OF
ANNE SEXTON’S POEMS THROUGH DICTION ............................16
CHAPTER FOUR: CONCLUSION ..................................................................27
BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................................30
APPENDICES:
Dylan Thomas’ Poems ...............................................................................32
Anne Sexton’s Poems.................................................................................35
Biography of Dylan Thomas ......................................................................39
Biography of Anne Sexton .........................................................................40
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APPENDICES
Poems by Dylan Thomas
Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night
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 wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
5
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
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.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
10
15
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
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And Death Shall Have No Dominion
And death shall have no dominion.
Dead men naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.
And death shall have no dominion.
Under the windings of the sea
They lying long shall not die windily;
Twisting on racks when sinews give way,
Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;
Faith in their hands shall snap in two,
And the unicorn evils run them through;
Split all ends up they shan't crack;
And death shall have no dominion.
And death shall have no dominion.
No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;
Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;
Through they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;
Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,
And death shall have no dominion.
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The Conversation of Prayer
The conversation of prayers about to be said
By the child going to bed and the man on the stairs
Who climbs to his dying love in her high room,
The one not caring to whom in his sleep he will move,
And the other full of tears that she will be dead,
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Turns in the dark on the sound they know will arise
Into the answering skies from the green ground,
From the man on the stairs and the child by his bed.
The sound about to be said in the two prayers
For sleep in a safe land and the love who dies
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Will be the same grief flying. Whom shall they calm?
Shall the child sleep unharmed or the man be crying?
The conversation of prayers about to be said
Turns on the quick and the dead, and the man on the stairs
Tonight shall find no dying but alive and warm
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In the fire of his care his love in the high room.
And the child not caring to whom he climbs his prayer
Shall drown in a grief as deep as his made grave,
And mark the dark eyed wave, through the eyes of sleep,
Dragging him up the stairs to one who lies dead.
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Poems by Anne Sexton
Wanting to Die
Since you ask, most days I cannot remember.
I walk in my clothing, unmarked by that voyage.
Then the almost unnameable lust returns.
Even then I have nothing against life.
I know well the grass blades you mention,
the furniture you have placed under the sun.
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But suicides have a special language.
Like carpenters they want to know which tools.
They never ask why build.
Twice I have so simply declared myself,
have possessed the enemy, eaten the enemy,
have taken on his craft, his magic.
In this way, heavy and thoughtful,
warmer than oil or water,
I have rested, drooling at the mouth-hole.
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I did not think of my body at needle point.
Even the cornea and the leftover urine were gone.
Suicides have already betrayed the body.
Still-born, they don't always die,
but dazzled, they can't forget a drug so sweet
that even children would look on and smile.
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To thrust all that life under your tongue!-that, all by itself, becomes a passion.
Death's a sad Bone; bruised, you'd say,
and yet she waits for me, year after year,
to so delicately undo an old wound,
to empty my breath from its bad prison.
Balanced there, suicides sometimes meet,
raging at the fruit, a pumped-up moon,
leaving the bread they mistook for a kiss,
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leaving the page of the book carelessly open,
something unsaid, the phone off the hook
and the love, whatever it was, an infection.
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Sylvia's Death
for Sylvia Plath
O Sylvia, Sylvia,
with a dead box of stones and spoons,
with two children, two meteors
wandering loose in a tiny playroom,
with your mouth into the sheet,
into the roofbeam, into the dumb prayer,
(Sylvia, Sylvia
where did you go
after you wrote me
from Devonshire
about raising potatoes
and keeping bees?)
what did you stand by,
just how did you lie down into?
Thief —
how did you crawl into,
crawl down alone
into the death I wanted so badly and for so long,
the death we said we both outgrew,
the one we wore on our skinny breasts,
the one we talked of so often each time
we downed three extra dry martinis in Boston,
the death that talked of analysts and cures,
the death that talked like brides with plots,
the death we drank to,
the motives and the quiet deed?
(In Boston
the dying
ride in cabs,
yes death again,
that ride home
with our boy.)
O Sylvia, I remember the sleepy drummer
who beat on our eyes with an old story,
how we wanted to let him come
like a sadist or a New York fairy
to do his job,
a necessity, a window in a wall or a crib,
and since that time he waited
under our heart, our cupboard,
and I see now that we store him up
year after year, old suicides
and I know at the news of your death
a terrible taste for it, like salt,
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(And me,
me too.
And now, Sylvia,
you again
with death again,
that ride home
with our boy.)
And I say only
with my arms stretched out into that stone place,
what is your death
but an old belonging,
a mole that fell out
of one of your poems?
(O friend,
while the moon's bad,
and the king's gone,
and the queen's at her wit's end
the bar fly ought to sing!)
O tiny mother,
you too!
O funny duchess!
O blonde thing!
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The Death King
I hired a carpenter
to build my coffin
and last night I lay in it,
braced by a pillow,
sniffing the wood,
letting the old king
breathe on me,
thinking of my poor murdered body,
murdered by time,
waiting to turn stiff as a field marshal,
letting the silence dishonor me,
remembering that I'll never cough again.
Death will be the end of fear
and the fear of dying,
fear like a dog stuffed in my mouth,
fear like dung stuffed up my nose,
fear where water turns into steel,
fear as my breast flies into the Disposal,
fear as flies tremble in my ear,
fear as the sun ignites in my lap,
fear as night can't be shut off,
and the dawn, my habitual dawn,
is locked up forever.
Fear and a coffin to lie in
like a dead potato.
Even then I will dance in my dire clothes,
a crematory flight,
blinding my hair and my fingers,
wounding God with his blue face,
his tyranny, his absolute kingdom,
with my aphrodisiac.
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Biography of Dylan Thomas
Dylan Marlais Thomas was born in the Welsh seaport of Swansea,
Camarthenshire, Wales on October 27, 1914. Thomas could not speak Welsh but
he adopted the rhythms of the language and he started to write poetry while he
was still at school. When he was twelve, his poem was published in the Western
Mail.
Thomas was known as a precocious poet. His first book of poetry,
Eighteen Poems, was published in 1934 when Thomas was not yet twenty years
old. His second and third books of poetry were Twenty-Five Poems (1936) and
The Map of Love (1939), and the poems of his first three books were collected in
The World I Breathe (1939). Thomas’ poetic output was not large; he wrote only
six poems in the last six years of his life. His poems are marked by vivid
metaphors, the use of Christian and Freudian imagery, and the celebration of the
mystical power of growth and death. Thomas said, “My poetry is the record of my
individual struggle from darkness toward some measure of light . . . . To be
stripped of darkness is to be clean, to strip of darkness is to make clean.”
Thomas mentioned that the reason for him to become a poet was that he
had fallen in love with words. His sense of richness and variety and flexibility of
the English language shines through all of his works. The most prominent theme
of all his poems is the celebration of the divine purpose in all human and natural
process. The cycle of birth and flowering and death is found in Thomas’ poems.
He died on November 1953 shortly after his 39th birthday.
Source(s):
“Dylan Thomas” and “Dylan Thomas Biography.”
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Biography of Anne Sexton
Anne Sexton was born in Newton, Massachusetts, on November 9, 1928
under the name of Anne Gray Harvey. She attended Garland Junior College for
one year and married Alfred Muller Sexton II at the age of nineteen. She was a
glamorous woman--her early career before writing poetry included a brief stint as
a model--and she had many fans, both inside and outside academia. Many people
thought of her as a celebrity first and a poet second.
She wrote about subjects that were previously unexplored in poetry, such
as abortion, menstruation, and the allure of suicide. She made the experience of
being a woman a central issue in her poetry, and though she endured criticism for
bringing controversial subjects into her work, her skill as a poet transcended the
controversy over her subject matter. “Though she received little formal training in
poetics, claiming to learn meter by watching I. A. Richards on television, her
poetry has notable formal sophistication” (Encyclopedia of World Biography on
Anne Sexton). In 1967 Sexton received the Pulitzer Prize for Live or Die (1966)
and also received the Shelley Memorial Prize. Her best work is probably found in
All My Pretty Ones (1962), which bears an epigraph from Shakespeare's Macbeth.
In 1954 she was diagnosed with postpartum depression, suffered her first
mental breakdown, and she was admitted to Westwood Lodge, a neuropsychiatric
hospital. Sexton suffered another breakdown and was hospitalized again after
giving birth to her second daughter. She committed suicide on October 4, 1974.
Source(s):
“Anne Sexton” and “Encyclopedia of World Biography on Anne Sexton”
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
People’s ideas about death can vary. Some people will say that death is the
best way out to end life’s problems but others may think that death is not
something that can make someone feel better when they are facing problems in
their life. Some people “fear being dead, while others are afraid of the actual act
of dying” (Fritscher, par.1). In the world of poetry, there are at least two poets,
namely Dylan Thomas and Anne Sexton, who dealt with death as their subject,
with different interpretation in their poems.
Dylan Thomas was a Welsh poet who lived in the era of World War II. He
was a war witness because in that era he worked as a documentary film
scriptwriter and served as an aircraft gunner. I am interested in analyzing Thomas’
poems because he says, “My poetry is the record of my individual struggle from
darkness toward some measure of light” (Liukkonen and Pesonen, par.9). Thomas
was also one of the modern poets who helped restore the English poetry to its
basic form in its own language. One of the statements about him says, “Rather
than using long words derived from foreign languages, Thomas preferred to
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impress readers with strong, short words from native English” (“Dylan Thomas
Biography,” par. 6). His poems that I analyze are “Do Not Go Gentle into that
Good Night,” “And Death Shall Have No Dominion” and “The Conversation of
Prayer.”
The second poet whose poems I will analyze, Anne Sexton, was a
contemporary American poet who began writing poems in 1956. Her poems are
said to be “a result of an emotional breakdown that led to serious depression”
(“Encyclopedia of World Biography on Anne Sexton,” par. 2). Sexton belonged to
the confessional school of poets who wrote about “private experiences with and
feelings about death, trauma, depression and relationships . . ., often in an
autobiographical manner” (“A Brief Guide to Confessional Poetry,” par. 2). Her
poems that I analyze are “Wanting to Die,” “Sylvia’s Death,” and “The Death
King.”
In my thesis, I discuss the themes of Thomas’ and Sexton’s poems. I am
interested in their poems because they are related to how someone perceives death
in his/her life. Theme in poetry is “the central concept developed in a poem”
(Reaske 42). To reveal the theme, I analyze Thomas’ and Sexton’s poems through
diction, which is defined as “the choice and use of words in literature”
(“Diction,”def 2).
Statement of the Problem
In my thesis I am going to answer the following questions:
1.
What is the theme of each of the poems?
2.
How does the diction used by the poets help reveal the theme?
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Purpose of the Study
The purpose of my discussion is
1.
to show the theme of each of the poems;
2.
to show how the diction used by the poets help reveal the theme.
Method of Research
I used library research in writing my thesis. First, I read the poems that I
had chosen. I then searched for some print and online sources to support my
discussion. In the end, I drew a conclusion from the whole discussion.
Organization of the Thesis
This thesis consists of four chapters, which are preceded by the
Acknowledgements, the Table of Contents, and the Abstract. Chapter One is the
Introduction, which consists of the Background of the Study, the Statement of the
Problem, the Purpose of the Study, the Method of Research and the Organization
of the Thesis. Chapter Two is the Theme Analysis of Dylan Thomas’ poems,
whereas Chapter Three is the Theme Analysis of Anne Sexton’s poems. Finally,
Chapter Four is the Conclusion. The thesis ends with the Bibliography and the
Appendices, which contain Dylan Thomas’ and Anne Sexton’s poems and the
biography of each poet.
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CHAPTER FOUR
CONCLUSION
In this chapter, I am going to draw a conclusion from my analysis of three
of Dylan Thomas’ poems and three of Anne Sexton’s poems.
The three poems of Dylan Thomas that I analyze are “And Death Shall
Have No Dominion,” “Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night” and “The
Conversation of Prayer.” From each poem the reader may see that Thomas uses
some diction that represents an opposite meaning that gives a contrast between the
condition before and after death. Furthermore, Thomas uses the words
representing the passion of struggle against death and also the diction proving that
one’s life can be saved through a prayer.
Dylan Thomas’ poems mostly deal with the “divine purpose in every
human and natural process” (Dylan Thomas Biography, Par.7). The natural
human process discussed in the poems are life and death. Using his passionate and
vivid way of writing poems, Thomas shows how passion occurs while someone is
fighting against death, facing death, and facing the possibility of life or death.
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The three poems of Anne Sexton that I analyze are Wanting to Die,”
“Sylvia’s Death,” and “The Death King.” From the diction used in each poem, the
reader may see directly that one has the desire to die which turns into a passion
and then if the desire to die is not fulfilled one will feel betrayed. Furthermore, the
diction also clearly describes that one’s resignation to death may end one’s
suffering and fear.
Anne Sexton is famous for her confessional voice as she makes the reader
falsely believe that she wrote her poems based on her own life experiences. Her
poems mostly deal with taboo and shocking subjects, such as mental breakdowns,
suicide, and marital problems. In these poems the taboo and shocking subjects are
death and suicide. In all three poems, the speakers say that their desire is to die,
specifically by committing suicide.
Both Dylan Thomas and Sexton are very descriptive in writing poems
concerning death. Both of them use some words that make the poems easily
understood and imagined. For example, in one of the Thomas’ poems here, in line
2 to line 3 of “And Death Shall Have No Dominion,” the reader can easily
imagine how dead people will lay in the grave and will be united with other dead
people or how the word “care” is emphasized to reveal the idea in the poem. Yet,
Thomas uses some common words to explain the hidden idea behind the
connotative meaning present in some words of his poem. For example, the word
“rage” represents not only the struggle against death but also the act of anger.
Sexton is also descriptive, which can be seen when she explains about
someone who has a desire to die and the desire has turned into a passion. Her
description in apparent, for example, in “Wanting to Die,” which simply refers to
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the speaker’s desire to die. Different from Thomas, Sexton has used much simpler
words or everyday words in describing what happens to the speaker in the poem.
In other words, Sexton’s way of explaining the idea is quite simpler as she only
uses the denotative meaning of the words in each line of her poems. Significantly,
both of them, through their descriptive way of writing, enable the reader to feel,
smell, taste, hear, and see everything presented in the poem.
Even though Dylan Thomas and Anne Sexton share the same subject,
which is death, and also similarly use the diction in accordance to the importance
of their conveying something from their poems, they share different perspective in
seeing death. Referring to the fact that he does not make any statement about what
death is, Thomas seems to regard death as a natural thing that happens to anyone.
Moreover, he indirectly shows the general expression that encourages the reader
to have positive attitude in facing death. Different from Thomas, Anne Sexton
makes a statement that death is a solution or something desirable. Referring to the
fact that she suffers from depression and that she is one of Confessional poets, it
seems that through the diction used in the poem she directly expresses her belief
that death is a solution to her problems.
In my opinion, Dylan Thomas and Anne Sexton are both skillful in
presenting their perspectives and their perceptions of death. However, I prefer
Dylan Thomas’ idea about perceiving death positively, as it makes me feel no fear
in facing death. It also makes me think positively of how to live my life and what
kind of attitude I should possess when facing death. My favorite poem is “Do Not
Go Gentle into that Goodnight,” which personally reminds me that I should
struggle while facing death and I should not surrender easily.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Texts:
Bengtsson, Gunnar. “Anne Sexton.” American Poems. 2009. Web. 5 Mar. 2010
“Dylan Thomas” . Famous Poems and Poets. 2010. Web. 5 Mar. 2010
References:
“Aphrodisiac,” Hornby, A. S. Oxford Advance Learner’s Dictionary 7th Edition.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Print.
“Diction.” Def. 2. Hornby, A. S. Oxford Advance Learner’s Dictionary 7th
Edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Print.
Kennedy, X. J. and Dana Gioia. An Introduction to Poetry Tenth Edition. New
York: Longman. 2002. Print.
“Lust.” Def. 2. Hornby, A. S. Oxford Advance Learner’s Dictionary 7th Edition.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Print.
Reaske, Christopher Russell. How to Analyze Poetry. New York : Monarch Press,
1966. Print.
Internet Websites:
“Anne Sexton.” Poets. 2011. Web. 5 May 2011
“Brief Guide to Confessional Poetry.” Poets. 2011. Web. 5 May 2011
“Dylan Thomas 1914-1953.” Poetry Foundation. 2011. Web. 30 Aug 2012
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“Dylan Thomas.” Notable Biographies. 2011. Web. 10 Apr. 2010
“Dylan Thomas Biography.” Famous Poets and Poems. 2010. Web. 10 Apr. 2010
“Encyclopedia of World Biography on Anne Sexton.” Anne Sexton Biography.
2006. Web. 9 Jun. 2010
Frietscher, Lisa. “Thanatophobia.” About. 2011. Web. 10 Sept. 2011
Liukkonen, Petri and Ari Pessonen. “Dylan Thomas 1914-1953.” Kirjasto. 2008.
Web. 10 Apr. 2010
“Romans 6 (King James Version).” Bible Study Tools. 2011. Web. 22 Nov. 2011
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