This page was created by Alison Morgan.
Fern Hill Poem
Thomas left school at the age of 16, exploring journalism, and he was fortunate to have a good number of his works published in the print in his teenaged years. In 1934 he caught a break that caught the attention of the literary world with his poem “Light breaks where no sun shines”. Thomas was fortunate to become a popular poet in his lifetime, but he struggled to make his living as a writer. To make some extra money he would do radio broadcasts for BBC and would also do reading tours, and in turn he was able to become more widely known. Tomas went on a number of tours to America, and on one of the trips he recorded his first poems to vinyl. As his popularity grew however, the fame went to his head and his drinking got worse, as did his crazy erratic behavior. While Thomas was a respected poet, he wasn’t the best person, also having a number of affairs, but none of that got in the way of his work.
I think it is the unity of all life theme in his works that makes him so unique, and that theme is one that is able to resonate with readers. Thomas would explore the process of life and death, and other cycles of that nature in his works. While I don’t think he is an environmentalist, some of his works can be seen as green pieces of poetry, especially “Fern Hill”. Dylan Thomas used his poetry to celebrate unity coming out of diversity, and the role of biology in this transformation. He was also able to provide images from a wide variety of sources such as the Bible, Welsh Folklore, preaching, Sigmund Freud, and personal experiences in his poems. His early poetry was dense with much rhyme, and using sprung rhythm to help the flow of the works[LAO3] . Thomas was greatly influence by his Welsh heritage, which he did not particularly appreciate, but nonetheless it seemed to play a significant role in his poems. His poems displayed some rooting in the geography of Wales, which I think is seen in some of the settings of his poems, especially in “Fern Hill”. I think a combination of his heritage, familiarity with the Wales setting, sources he draws from for imagery, and his fascination of “cycles” really fuel his writing. “Fern Hill” stands out as a work of his that is considered to be green because it looks at the bliss ideal of nature. The simple and pure elements of nature, secluded on the setting of a farm removed from the chaos of everyday life, are portrayed as the beautiful and pure things in which they are. This work is one that is considered to be green because of his connecting of nature to human interactions that many can relate to, the appreciation of nature and its simple beauty, and the happiness and joy it brings to the main character.
The poem “Fern Hill” starts with the main character, presumably Thomas himself, as a child under apple trees, on his family farm living in pure bliss and ignorance to the world around him. He is living his days secluded from the busyness of everyday life, and instead he is able to be the “prince of the apple towns” (Thomas 6). He describes the imagery of his farm, noting the trees, stars, rivers, hills, the sun, the animas, and everything that makes this place special and important to him. Living in his own world, he “was green and carefree, famous among the bars About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home” (Thomas 10-11). Thomas goes into great detail to describe how special this place is to him, capturing every aspect from the sun, moon and stars above him, to the crisp green grass below him. He admits that this place allowed him to play and live carefree, but towards the end he reflects on that and he notes that he was tethered to the bliss and ignorance by his young age, and he says “Time held me green and dying Though I sang in my chains like the sea” (Thomas 58-59). Thomas goes through the poem reminiscing on his life as a child, enjoying the limitations of his youth, but recognizing that he has grown up, and that life is behind him.
“Fern Hill” offers a beautiful and detailed description as to Thomas’ recollection of nature as a kid. He provides us insight into a look into nature through his eyes as a child. His recollection of nature looks at “the good old days” and while he doesn’t outright say that, I feel as though he is getting to that, especially when he says “Time held me green and dying Though I sang in my chains like the sea” (Thomas 58-59). I feel like this quote speaks to the true essence of the poem, and is a large reason as to why this is considered a green poem. It is really Thomas looking back on life as a child and realizing that things are different now that he has grown up. Nature is less important to him, he is exposed to less nature and more unpleasant things, and he knows he will never be able to go back to a time when all he knew was nature and his beauty. While he was bound to that ignorance, I feel that he prefers that to knowing what he knows about the direction the world is going in, and the unpleasant things of the world. He is advocating for a push towards a deeper appreciation of the simple and natural aspects of life.
Thomas also explores how beautiful, simple and peaceful nature was for him through all of the images of nature he offers to us. I feel that in doing so, he is also working towards expressing his ideas that this concept may not hold true today. He goes into great detail, praising nature and glorifying the simple things “it was lovely, the hay Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air And playing, lovely and watery And fire green as grass. And nightly under the simple stars” (Thomas 19-23) While we was readers may not be able to connect with everything that Thomas says, I’m sure most readers can connect with spending their nights under the simple stars. Not only is that an image that many people can relate to from some point in their lives, but is also something very simple, that carries a lot of weight when it comes to nature and peoples appreciation of nights under the stars. The way in which he describes it is as if he is seeing it as he writes the poem and from that we can conclude that this place and these memories are truly special to him, as they should be to us as well. What Thomas is doing is selecting simple aspects of nature that many of us can relate to, and that are extraordinary and beautiful to us in our own ways.
Thomas opens the poem speaking about his time as a boy, and sets the scene as to what nature and life for him used to be like, and while in the end his does not offer what life has become, he leaves that open for us to explore and interpret. Thomas continues by presumably describing his farm, in which he talks about his house, and the area surrounding it. His imagery is such that it allows us to be placed there, and feel what it was like for him to grow up there as a kid, especially when he says “to awake, and the farm, like a wandered white With dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all Shining” (Thomas 28-30) . This imagery, along with much of the other similar imagery he uses, is imagery that I can easily visualize in my mind, and I am also to make some associations to it as well. Also, I recognize how simple and basic those lines were, and yet I still feel a deepening of my appreciation for both the setting I’m visualizing in my head, and nature on the whole. Rather than simply describe the place and value of it, Thomas goes so far as to talk about his personal experiences and feelings, allowing us as readers to connect with the place on a more personal level since we can associate human experience to that place. His own personal touch allows us to relate to it, and think deeper about his message and feeling towards nature.
While at his core Dylan Thomas is not a true “green” or environmentalist writer, this poem by him certainly falls into the green art/ environmentalist category because of how it emphasizes the beauty that can come out of the simplistic aspects of nature by connecting it to early childhood experiences of nature. Overall, “Fern Hill” is a poem that very highly respects nature as it carefully describes every aspect of Thomas’s farm, glorifying nature, examining a free and peaceful lifestyle that can only be found living with nature. Thomas mentions being “green and carefree, famous among the barns About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home” (Thomas 10-11) expressing the positive impact in which nature had on him, and consequently, the impact it can have on others as well. Everything on the farm seems to be in harmony, the people, their living quarters, the animals, and nature. Thomas continues though, saying “Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shallow of my hand…” (Thomas 46-47) indicating that he was carefree, and possibly even blinded or ignorant to the real world, but he is content with that, and rather, he prefers that.
Thomas provides a very detailed account of his life experience with nature, but that version of nature may be only an ideal that very few get to experience. While he does not outright say that it is an ideal, and one that is tough to achieve as society grows into a more urban and fast paced world, he does conclude his poem by saying “Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means, Time held me green and dying Though I sang in my chains like the sea”. I believe Thomas is concluding his poem by telling us that even though he was lucky enough to live a life surrounded nature, and also immersed in nature, it is something that cannot last forever, and it is naive of us to think that way.
I think Thomas is trying to tell us that for only a limited period of time in our life can we stay “chained” to the idea that nature is our way of life, for there comes a point in our lives when we require more than nature can offer. Additionally, we can only hold this glorified image of nature in our minds for so long, as there is more to life that we are bound to experience in one way or another that will in some way change how we think of nature. That being said, I don’t think Thomas is telling us that nature is gone all together. I think he is saying that there are aspects of nature that can hold steadfast in our lives forever, but there are some aspects on nature that cannot, and we need to come to terms with that and recognize what those are. I don’t think it is about giving up or giving in, but rather a give and take relationship. We need to embrace some of the new changes to society, but we need to hold on to some of the beautiful aspects of nature in which Thomas describes.
While Thomas does love the nature and the environment he was raised in, and I do not think he is warning us of societal changes, I do think he wants to open our eyes to resist some of the changes that come about which would completely destroy nature. I think that he would like us to resist some change as he says at the very end of the poem “Time held me green and dying Though I sang in my chains like the sea”. Thomas is suggesting to us that there will be things that take place that hinder our love for nature, and we should voice our opinions on the issues. To do nothing is to let nature slip between our fingers and be lost forever, but if we voice our love for what nature has to offer, and express to people what nature means to us, we will likely be able to preserve nature. Not giving up on the ideal of nature in certain areas is important for us as a society, as to lose nature is to lose ourselves.
I think that it takes a lot of digging to find how Thomas truly feels, but it is clear that he has a strong love for nature due to the impact it had on his life as a child. I would argue that he feels as though everyone deserves some similar experience, and thus, when the time calls for it, he would want people to speak up to save what parts of nature they can. Thomas is able to take every aspect of the farm and describe it as something that is beautiful, despite how simple or ordinary it is. His respect and care for nature really irradiates throughout the poem, and it evokes a sense of care and interest on the part of myself, the reader, as well. It makes me want to see out a place like this, where I can escape the busy chaos of modern society and be free. I think that really speaks to how he feels about nature, as he takes nature, something we have come to take for granted and lose interest in, and really depict it in such a way that it connects with us as readers and makes us interested. Not only the way in which he describes nature, but also his ability to be able to connect nature to human bliss, interactions and sensations makes the environment he creates come alive, and thus he has been able to formulate a strong green poem. The fact that he can relate it so much to human interaction with nature, especially as a child, resonates with readers, making them think about their childhood experiences with nature versus their experiences as an adult. I believe that his ability to make those human connections with nature through his descriptions and own accounts of nature make this poem clearly green.
