Dylan Thomas

Dylan Thomas was born on October 27, 1914, in Swansea, Wales. Leaving Swansea Grammar School at sixteen to work as a cub reporter for the South Wales Daily Post, Thomas filled notebooks with raw, visionary verse that broke sharply with the detached intellectualism of contemporary British poetry. In 1934, at age twenty, he published '18 Poems' in London to thunderous literary acclaim.

Possessing a resonant, thunderous baritone voice, Thomas became a celebrated cultural icon through BBC radio broadcasts and transatlantic reading tours across the United States. His poetry rejected modernist obscurity in favor of rhythmic incantations celebrating nature, mortality, passion, and the cyclical unity of creation. In 1951, faced with his dying father's failing health, he composed 'Do not go gentle into that good night'—history's most famous villanelle, urging humanity to 'Rage, rage against the dying of the light'. His playful, compassionate 'play for voices' 'Under Milk Wood' (1954) immortalized the eccentric inhabitants of the fictional Welsh fishing town of Llareggub. Thomas died in New York City on November 9, 1953, at age thirty-nine, leaving an indelible imprint on world literature.