19 pages • 38 minutes read
Dylan ThomasI See the Boys of Summer
Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1939A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Literary Devices
Form and Meter
Each stanza in “I see the boys of summer” is six lines long, a sestet, and each sestet follows the same syllabic pattern: eleven, seven, ten, eight, eight, ten. The back and forth between longer syllabled sentences with shorter ones creates an ebb and flow rhythm, and the sustained syllabic pattern creates unity across the stanzas. Structurally, no one stanza deviates from the others, allowing the rhythm to remain relatively consistent. Most lines follow iambic pentameter, beginning with unstressed syllables, but some of the shorter lines are trochaic, or starting with stressed syllables. The second lines of each stanza, in particular, tend to be trochaic. For example, in the fifth stanza (26):
In-to I a I chim-ing I quart-er
Punctuation differs throughout the stanzas, too, creating pauses, or caesuras. The third lines of the fifth and sixth stanzas, for example, while the same syllables, are punctuated differently: “Where, punctual as death, we ring the stars;” (27) and “A muscling life from lovers in their cramp” (33). Line 27 has two commas and a semicolon, whereas Line 33 has no punctuation at all. Thomas stays in his established pattern, but crafts unique lines within that pattern to change the momentum throughout the poem.
The first section, and the first four stanzas, also follow an established pattern that is later broken. The fourth and fifth lines of each of the first four stanzas begin with “There” and “Of,” but the following sections deviate from this. The established
“There” and “Of” pattern is appropriate for the first four stanzas, as they are from the same narrative voice, and breaking the pattern adds further emphasis that the other sections come from a different narrative voice.
The final lines of each section also follow a similar structure to one another with slight variations. The fourth stanza ends with “O see the pulse of summer in the ice.” (24), the eighth stanza with “O see the poles of promise in the boys” (48), and the final line with “O see the poles are kissing as they cross” (54). Again, each section of stanzas is unique, but their similar conclusions keep them unified in a single poem.
Figurative Language
“I see the boys of summer” is filled with evocative language, breaking away from strict realism. The boys feed their nerves with doubt and dark in the second stanza, and love and light bursts from their throats in the fourth stanza. In the second section, the boys speak of holding up the sea and choking the desert in the seventh stanza. Often, the poem depicts the boys performing outstanding, impossible tasks, giving “I see the boys of summer” a sense of grandeur. Man’s relationship to nature becomes epic and wonderous.
Nature is also personified and given fantastic imagery. In the fifth stanza, winter becomes a sleepy man pulling black-tongued bells, and the moon and darkness are a woman blowing into the world. Thomas’s use of figurative language depicts nature in ways unseen in everyday life. By attaching natural events to active people, the poem further departs from realism and embraces an imaginative quality.
Narrative Voice
Thomas uses multiple narrative voices in “I see the boys of summer.” By breaking the poem into three sections, he prepares the reader to see each section as distinct from the others. The first section features a singular first-person perspective, seen in the opening lines of the poem: “I see the boys of summer in their ruin” (1). The second section doesn’t start the same way, and by the third line of the fifth stanza, the first “we” appears (27). Lines 31 and 37 reiterate the change in perspective, both beginning with we: “We are the dark derniers let us summon” (31) and “We summer boys in this four-winded spinning,” (37). Thomas uses the change in narrative voice to give his thematic commentary nuance. The first speaker looks at the boys and is critical of them. The boys function as the second speaker, full of will and desire.
The final section, a single stanza, combines both singular and plural first-person voices: “I am the man your father was. / We are the sons of flint and pitch.” (52-53). The combined voices bring the previous sections together, ending the poem with a stronger sense that the different sections are working together rather than existing separately from one another.
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By Dylan Thomas
