Dylan Thomas

Author:   John Goodby ,  Chris Wigginton
Publisher:   Reaktion Books
ISBN:  

9781789149326


Pages:   240
Publication Date:   01 October 2024
Format:   Paperback
Availability:   Not yet available   Availability explained
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Dylan Thomas


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Overview

This concise biography of Dylan Thomas incorporates the most recent research, challenging the legend of the dissolute bard to reveal a diligent, professional writer, author of some of the century's greatest lyric poetry as well as short stories, film-scripts, letters and what is commonly agreed to be the greatest radio feature ever broadcast, Under Milk Wood. Thomas is viewed primarily through the lens of his writing, and his hybrid Anglo-Welsh origins are shown to be the source of his daring stylistic inventiveness. His work is set in its historical, cultural and social contexts Depression-era Wales and 1930s literary London, Surrealism, the rise of fascism, the Second World War and the Blitz, and the Cold War charting the path towards his final works, which offer a unique fusion of high art and popular culture.

Full Product Details

Author:   John Goodby ,  Chris Wigginton
Publisher:   Reaktion Books
Imprint:   Reaktion Books
Weight:   0.454kg
ISBN:  

9781789149326


ISBN 10:   1789149320
Pages:   240
Publication Date:   01 October 2024
Audience:   General/trade ,  General
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Forthcoming
Availability:   Not yet available   Availability explained
This item is yet to be released. You can pre-order this item and we will dispatch it to you upon its release.

Table of Contents

Abbreviations Introduction: An Intricate Image Chapter 1: Young and Easy: Childhood, 1914–25 Chapter 2: Eggs Laid by Tigers: The Apprentice Poet, 1925–32 Chapter 3: The Rimbaud of Cwmdonkin Drive: The Poetics of Process, 1933–4 Chapter 4: The Direction of the Elementary Town: London, Surrealism and Love, 1935–7 Chapter 5: Loving Presences, Warring Absences: Marriage, Wales and War, 1938–41 Chapter 6: Singing in Chains: Apocalypse and Fame, 1942–7 Chapter 7: Against the Dying of the Light: Pastoral and America, 1948–53 Conclusion: Afterlife and Popular Culture References Select Bibliography Acknowledgements Photo Acknowledgements

Reviews

"""In an astonishing statement Dylan Thomas declared ""So many modern poets take the living flesh as their object, and, by their clever dissection, turn it into a carcass. I prefer to take the dead flesh, and . . . build up a living flesh from it."" This describes exactly the achievement of Thomas's revivalist biographers: they have conjured away the dead heritage body and the caricature of Thomas's life and poetry as coagulated emissions, quickening both life and poems to track actively their intelligent and nervous response to their environments, social, intellectual and literary. This book is the latest stage in Thomas's restoration as a serious writer, whose work is shown newly as vital in our time.""--John Wilkinson, University of Chicago"


"""This superb new biography by John Goodby and Chris Wigginton, a distillation of their work on Dylan Thomas over 25 years, is the first to take for granted his ""acute intelligence"" in rising to the challenge of his ""inexhaustible"" poetry. Anyone eager to hear all about his rambunctious ribaldry and transatlantic antics will find slim pickings, as poem after poem - from the seismic lyrics of the inspired teenager to the magnificent 'Prologue' of his final year - comes into startling focus, in an original and convincing reading of Thomas's life and art.""--James Keery, author of 'That Stranger, ' 'The Blues' and editor of 'Apocalypse: An Anthology' ""In an astonishing statement Dylan Thomas declared ""So many modern poets take the living flesh as their object, and, by their clever dissection, turn it into a carcass. I prefer to take the dead flesh, and . . . build up a living flesh from it."" This describes exactly the achievement of Thomas's revivalist biographers: they have conjured away the dead heritage body and the caricature of Thomas's life and poetry as coagulated emissions, quickening both life and poems to track actively their intelligent and nervous response to their environments, social, intellectual and literary. This book is the latest stage in Thomas's restoration as a serious writer, whose work is shown newly as vital in our time.""--John Wilkinson, University of Chicago"


Author Information

John Goodby is professor of arts and culture at Sheffield Hallam University. The leading authority on Dylan Thomas, he has written extensively on his work and edited his Collected Poems. Chris Wigginton is pro vice-chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University. His books include Modernism from the Margins: The 1930's Poetry of Louis MacNeice and Dylan Thomas.

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