[Dylan Thomas Omnibus] [By: Thomas, Dylan] [May, 2014]

by Dylan Thomas

'In the beginning was the three-pointed star, One smile of light across the empty face; One bough of bone across the rooting air, The substance forked that marrowed the first sun; And, burning cophers on the round of space, Heaven and hell mixed as they spun.' This is a rich collection of Dylan Thomas's best-loved poems and stories, as well as pieces he wrote for radio and magazines. The selection spans Thomas's writing lifetime, and it shows the full range of this tempestuous and meticulous artist who once cheerfully claimed that he had beast, angel and madman within him.

Genres: Poetry, Short Stories, Fiction, Classics, Plays, Modern Classics, Anthologies

Paperback Bunko

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Dylan Marlais Thomas (1914-1953) was a Welsh poet who wrote in English. Many regard him as one of the 20th century's most influential poets.

In addition to poetry, Thomas wrote short stories and scripts for film and radio, with the latter frequently performed by Thomas himself. His public readings, particularly in America, won him great acclaim; his booming, at times, ostentatious voice, with a subtle Welsh lilt, became almost as famous as his works. His best-known work includes the "play for voices" Under Milk Wood and the celebrated villanelle for his dying father, "Do not go gentle into that good night." Appreciative critics have also noted the superb craftsmanship and compression of poems such as "In my craft or sullen art" and the rhapsodic lyricism of Fern Hill.

Reviews

[Dannii Elle · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a collection of some of Dylan Thomas' most beloved poetry and stories, as well as his infamous play, 'Under Milk Wood'.

The majority of the poems focused on natural imagery and heightened emotion, which I greatly appreciated. The stories, however, were focused on more personal, small town recollections. These had a distinctly Welsh feeling to them and, being Welsh myself, I could greatly connect to that.

[E. G. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brief Chronology

POEMS

18 Poems
--I see the boys of summer
--When once the twilight locks
--A process in the weather of the heart
--Before I knocked
--The force that through the green fuse
--My hero bares his nerves
--Where once the waters of your face
--If I were tickled by the rub of love
--Our eunuch dreams
--Especially when the October wind
--When, like a running grave
--From love's first fever
--In the beginning
--Light breaks where no sun shines
--I fellowed sleep
--I dreamed my genesis
--My world is pyramid
--All all and all

Twenty-Five Poems
--I, in my intricate image
--This bread I break
--Incarnate devil
--Today, this insect
--The seed-at-zero
--Shall gods be said
--Here in this spring
--Do you not father me
--Out of the sighs
--Hold hard, these ancient minutes
--Was there a time
--Now
--Why east wind chills
--A grief ago
--How soon the servant sun
--Ears in the turrets hear
--Foster the light
--The hand that signed the paper
--Should lanterns shine
--I have longed to move away
--Find meat on bones
--Grief thief of time
--And death shall have no dominion
--Then was my neophyte
--Altarwise by owl-light

The Map of Love
--Because the pleasure-bird whistles
--I make this in a warring absence
--When all my five and country senses
--We lying by seasand
--It is the sinners' dust-tongued bell
--O make me a mask
--The spire cranes
--After the funeral
--Once it was the colour of saying
--Not from this anger
--How shall my animal
--The tombstone told
--On no work of words
--A saint about to fall
--If my head hurt a hair's foot
--Twenty-four years

Deaths and Entrances
--The conversation of prayers
--A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London
--Poem in October
--This side of the truth
--To Others than You
--Love in the Asylum
--Unluckily for a death
--The hunchback in the park
--Into her lying down head
--Paper and sticks
--Deaths and Entrances
--A Winter's Tale
--On a Wedding Anniversary
--There was a saviour
--On the Marriage of a Virgin
--In my craft or sullen art
--Ceremony After a Fire Raid
--Once below a time
--When I woke
--Among those Killed in the Dawn Raid was a Man Aged a Hundred
--Lie still, sleep becalmed
--Vision and Prayer
--Ballad of the Long-legged Bait
--Holy Spring
--Fern Hill

In Country Sleep
--In Country Sleep
--Over Sir John's hill
--Poem on his Birthday
--Do not go gentle into that good night
--Lament
--In the White Giant's Thigh

STORIES

--After the Fair
--The Tree
--The Dress
--The Visitor
--The Vest

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog
--The Peaches
--A Visit to Grandpa's
--Patricia, Edith, and Arnold
--The Fight
--Extraordinary Little Cough
--Just Like Little Dogs
--Where Tawe Flows
--Who Do You Wish Was With Us?
--Old Garbo
--One Warm Saturday

--The Followers
--A Story

BROADCASTS

--Memories of Christmas
--Holiday Memory
--The Festival Exhibition
--A Visit to America
--Return Journey

--Under Milk Wood

[Lily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poetry 5/5, but the stories lowered the quality for me. Not a fan of his tales as much as I am his poetry.

[Niko Airaksinen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dylan Thomas´ poetry is a challenge I like to tackle every now and then. Under Milk Wood is a radio play but if features Dylan´s innovative use of language. It is a powerful flood of words that pours over the reader and one just has to go with the flow. It is a work of a literary genius and I will continue exploring those mysterious sequences of words in maybe vain hope of a better understanding of his work.

[Jojanneke Bosch · Rating 5 out of 5]

Always, always Dylan Thomas.

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit cheeky marking this as read as it probably won’t be fully “read” for many years.

I was tempted by this when I saw it on sale as I really love Under Milk Wood and some of Dylan’s most famous poems (we probably all know the one I’m talking about) so I wanted to have my own copy. I picked out a range of other poems to read, some of them I really enjoyed but it’s safe to say his work can be impenetrable to the average reader without some written context or additional notes. I think this collection is really missing that. Nevertheless, I love the way he writes about nature and about Wales - his words read beautifully even when you aren’t sure what he’s writing about. I l enjoyed his stories being included as well and it’s nice to have it all in one book.

Anyway, I’m gonna go listen to Under Milk Wood now. To begin at the beginning...

[Aaron · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was difficult getting through the poetry with significant amounts of symbolism that wasn’t terribly transparent. However, the stories were ideal. Very enjoyable and a pleasure to read. The plays/broadcasts were slightly odd, but they did hold my interest like the stories. Overall, fairly decent.

[Katheryn Thompson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phew! This one took me a long time to get through, partly because of other commitments and time constraints, and partly because I chose to read the entire book in one go. It's quite a meaty book, as it includes poems, short stories, broadcasts, and Under Milk Wood, which is mainly why it appealed to me; I've never really read anything by Dylan Thomas before, and I wanted to try a bit of everything. And, despite how long it took me, I'm so glad that I did.

Dylan Thomas has such a way with words. There were so many phrases and lines that I couldn't resist reading out loud and savouring. He also has a wonderfully dark sense of humour. Definitely one I will return to.

[Owain · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really like Dylan Thomas' work. Even if a lot of the meaning of his works goes right over my head, it's still entertaining to read. The poetry is really good. Some of it is immense, and most of it isn't understandable. The prose is excellent throughout very descriptive generally quite depressing and nostalgic. Nearly everything revolves around south/southwest Wales and often has a seaside theme (more holiday towns and days on the beach rather than full-on nautical) which isn't always what people think of as a stereotypical Welsh theme (think Tenby though I suppose). There is also a lot of pastoral themes too very urbane themes of ordinary people going about their daily lives, very respectable middle and working class characters. Everything is set in an era which seems to be between the 1920's and the 1950's. The era of bank holidays in seaside resorts, quiet roads, butchers, grocers, vicars, the wireless, those (now vintage) railway travel posters etc. Mundane images of a quiet, overlooked time that's now gone and has left us with not much but decrepit seaside towns, declining local newspapers, boarded-up highstreets and empty churches.

Surprisingly the author mentions little of things I, in particular, and I guess a lot of others would associate with his time and place. I tend to think of rugby and coal mining as overriding themes from south Wales and Thomas mentions neither very much. Which is fair enough. We aren't all stereotypical representatives of where we come from.

Everything is generally very gentle and melancholic but some of the poems build into huge, emotional crescendos particularly Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night-possible one of my favourite poems and a sentiment I wholeheartedly agree with. Some of the short stories are quite disturbing and they don't really go anywhere. But I like them and wish there were more of them because they're right up my street.

Anyway, Dylan's definitely worth a read. No idea what Under Milk Wood's all about though.

[Lewis · Rating 3 out of 5]

A manageable introduction to a potentially daunting writer. It’s easy to dip in and out or to read chronologically to get a feel for his development. I really liked the autobiographical stories of Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog, which despite the title reminded me more of Joyce’s Dubliners than the Irish writer’s own Portrait of his younger self. Under Milk Wood is as wonderful as I remembered it and is interesting to read alongside earlier pieces written for radio broadcast. However the poems are impenetrable for the most part, and need some notes or at least an introduction to give the reader some bearings. Consequently I skipped most of them apart from a few I had read before. I don’t say full academic apparatus is necessary, as this will be available elsewhere, but dense metaphorical and reference-laden poetry isn’t comprehensible on its own like this.

[7jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars.

I know some people have become interested in this author through Taylor Swift; in my case, I have owned this book before she started her career (I’m fairly sure – this is a 2001 reissue and I think I bought it not long after that). Still, her mention made me finally start reading this collection (and I do like most of her records *lol*).

This is a collection of his poems, stories, broadcasts (for radio), and the play ”Under Milk Wood”. There’s a brief life chronology at the start. For me, I think some of the stories didn’t work much, but majority of all the writings here were great, thus my rating.
His poetry is very rich in imagery, with some repeating and rhythm clear especially in the earlier poems. I think ”Do Not Go Gentle...” poem is perhaps the most known of them. The imagery collection includes many elements of nature, especially the seaside, different kinds of people, elements of supernatural, the Bible, and various literature. Life, death, love. There is some work for the reader to understand the poems, but some are clearer, certainly.

The stories have no doubt many elements from his own childhood and youth, experiences both good and bad, things that still are and things that are gone. Some are funny, some very busy, some eerie or sad.
- I think his not-poetry writings here have strong feeling of his poetry’s richness: the imagery, the adjectives, the details.-
The broadcasts have more realism included, and talk about various celebrations, traveling America (ship travel more common then), and a story commenting on marks of WWII left around visitor’s old home town as the character searches for a young man he knew (same name as author).

”Under Milk Wood” gets the deserved last place in the book, a picture of a Welsh small town, Llareggub, from quiet middle of the night to the next quiet middle of the night in early spring. Starting with dreams of people things move on to everyday actions and sounds, and the individual eccentric behaviors, joys, and sorrows. And though there are many people, the repeat built into the story makes them appear increasingly three-dimensional. I think this play would be nice to hear.

So: although I didn’t expect much, this collection impressed me, convinced me it would work as a future reread too, and introduced me to many things now past, in the past world of mostly Welsh surrroundings. Well worth it.

[Cbx · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one was on my shelf for years, and I put off reading it because of the daunting "omnibus" in its title. Very glad I got around to it now. The words and phrases and rhythms in all of his work make you want to read it out loud, to savor the particular choices and combinations he made. I do not read much poetry, and found myself often not being sure what the poems were about, but I found myself thinking of bits and pieces of them after closing the book. The stories were abstract fables that left you with feelings more than understandings.

My favorite sections were the stories from "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog" and the broadcasts. The stories from "A Portrait" were episodes from his boyhood and youth, whirled together with poetry and abstraction, to provide vibrant glimpses of another life in another time. The people and their habits, the sounds, the scents, the feelings of being young are all here, and the language, dipping into the fantastical here and there, holds it together. The broadcasts had a similar feel, but with a wider lens - no longer one life, but a snapshot of many lives all interacting and interweaving. Throughout, there is a sense of joy and life, with the sadder occasions being commented on, and then the drinking, dancing, loving, continuing on. This is one I will be revisiting.

[You're Finally Home · Rating 3 out of 5]

Poetry Highlights - When once the twilight locks, the hand that signed the paper, Grief thief of time, The hunchback in the park, It is the sinners' dust tongued bell, After the funeral, A Winter's Tale, Fern Hill, In Country Sleep, Over Sir John's hill, Do not go gentle into that good night, Lament

Stories' Highlights - N/A

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog Highlights - A visit to Grandpa's, Extraordinary Little Cough, Who Do You Wish Was With Us? (favourite work in general by Thomas), A Story

Broadcasts' Highlights - Holiday Memory

Under Milk Wood - Highly enjoyable

[Carol Waterkeyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book from back to front as I love Under Milk Wood, which is at the back, next I read his broadcasts and short stories, which I also loved and lastly I read some of the poems but gave up as some are quite sad/depressing. I will tackle those again when I am in a happier state of mind. Dylan Thomas's descriptive powers, though, I feel are second to none. I love the language he uses and the images he invokes.

[Élie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beaucoup d'anglophones sont très attachés à Dylan Thomas, mais je dois dire qu'à part les nouvelles de Portrait of the Artist as à Young Dog, que j'ai beaucoup appréciées, je suis resté assez hermétique à sa poésie, qui est assez incompréhensible, et je ne suis pas du tout rentré dans Under Milk Wood, qui est pourtant parmi ses œuvres les plus connues. J'attendais pas mal de cette lecture, donc je suis vraiment déçu...

[Tony Lawrence]

When in Rome - well Wales really - time to reacquaint myself with the Welsh Bard himself. A second-hand find from a charity shop in Porthmadog.

(review for 'Under Milk Wood' only)

If all seems to make more sense reading this in Wales! A day in the life of the living and dead residents of Llareggub Hill in Thomas's peerless unique style, both poetic and whimsical but with bucketloads of comedy touches, pathos and bathos. A joy to be read and heard with a Welsh accent!

[N. Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dylan Thomas has some great experimentation with form and structure in some of his work, but the lyrical quality is really when it's read - especially by either Thomas or Burton. I would suggest listening to his radio recordings and, if you desire, use this to read along with.

[Kevin K · Rating 3 out of 5]

Under Milk Wood: Three stars

[Emily Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfect, wonderful, completely underrated!
Welsh beauty meets London's smokey alleys.

[Ely · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked the poetry and stories in here a lot—there are some really beautiful lines. I wasn't so fussed on the broadcasts or Under Milk Wood.

[Blake Kluender · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great omnibus that I will return to time and time again.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

The main play Under Milk Wood was disappointing, bordering upon insane. But many of the poems contained here were genius. Brilliant writing and wordplay, lively verse and quite dark.

[Emmapettitt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some lovely poetry, and not too inaccessible (I read this as part of a language group).

[Simon Worlding · Rating 3 out of 5]

Struggled with this one and put it down a lot of times, mainly because I cant get on with either poetry or plays (at least in written form). A couple of the short stpries were good though.

[⭑ ࣪ ٠before you and i die٠ ࣪⭑]

i need to reread under milk wood 🙂‍↕️

(back when i was in first year of undergrad, my school’s theatre group put on under milk wood and i remember it leaving such an impression)

[Victor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book to keep dipping into for whatever mood one is in.

[Aggie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great boyo

[Evan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of this was material I had already read.
To me, Thomas's poetry relies on sound, and what he calls 'word-music'. It is about the mixture of vague images and sounds. It seems like you could extract some specifics but for me this misses the point most of the time. It is far more enjoyable to experience the vague and evocative silhouettes.

[V. Tomurura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sublimely written with angelic musicality.
Alliteration, assonance and eye-rhyme are found in almost every single line, voices of more than 60 characters merging, to speak of the little tragedies and comedies of their own in the town named Llareggub.

Best play ever.

[Kitty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Absolutely love Dylan's 'Vison and Prayer' poems, their shape serves to beautifully emphasize key words - very though provoking content.

It was my first reading of 'Under Milk wood' and I was impressed with its structure, its narration style and how it brought characters to life and used others as background.

Excellent collection under one roof.