On The Establishment Of Belief In Dylan Thomas’s Poetry

Dylan Thomas(1914-1953)is a famous Welsh poet,born in 1914,died in 1953,at the age of 39.In his short life,he wrote more than 190 poems.A collection of poems published in 1952 — Poems 1934-1952 —includes most of the poems he ever published,89 in total,which is the basis of the thesis.Many researchers have focused on the themes of life,death,love,and desire in Thomas’ s early poems,as well as the poet’s brash and passionate poetic style.However,this thesis focuses on the theme of Christian belief-building that runs through the poet’s early,middle and late poems.Through a careful study of Thomas’ s poems,the thesis writer finds that Christian imagery can be seen throughout the poet’s early,middle and late works,but the poet’s attitude toward these Christian images differs from one period to the next.In general,in the early works,the poet shows his deviation from the Christian belief;in the middle works,the poet expresses his confused attitude toward Christianity by mixing Christian doctrine with paganism,pantheism and secular language;in the late works,he shows his adherence to the Christian belief.Therefore,this thesis explores the establishment of belief in the poems from these three aspects in detail,drawing on literary theories such as Freud’s sexual instinct and the death instinct,based on the foundation of close reading.First,this thesis demonstrates the attitude of deviation from Christian belief shown in Thomas’ s early works by analyzing the de-authoritative image of God,the humanized image of Jesus,the subverted Christian view of death,and the repudiated asceticism.Second,the thesis mainly analyzes the exploration in traditional Welsh culture and modern scientific culture,the mingling of Christian doctrine with paganism and pantheism,and the ambiguous meaning of certain Christian imagery in middle works,which is the evidence of Thomas’ s confusion about Christian doctrine.Third,the thesis writer analyzes Thomas’ s later works and discovers the poet’s conversion to Christian belief.Through analyzing the celebration of entering the field of Christianity and the identification of the Christian view of death expressed in his later works,Thomas’ s recognition of Christianity is showed;then,by analyzing the trust in the power of God’s love and the worship of God expressed in his works,Thomas’ s belief in God is expressed.Through the discussion and analysis of the three chapters,it is concluded that the establishment of belief in Thomas’ s poetry mainly goes through three stages.Further,the thesis writer point out that Thomas conveys a fact through the changing themes of his poems— returning to Christianity is a path for people in modern Western society to explore a perfect spiritual life,and is also a spiritual medicine for people suffering from war.At the same time,this study also points out that some of the views that Thomas is an anti-Christian poet based on the subversion of Christian belief expressed by poets in his early poems are one-sided.In addition,it is hoped that this analysis can help fill the gap of less research on the poet’s late poems.