By Andrea Guachalla
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Those are the verses that start the journey of Joseph Cooper, Amelia Brand, Doyle, and Rom in the film Interstellar. They will be traveling for years in a spaceship in search of a new planet where humanity has a better chance of surviving.
Professor Brand, who from earth guides them and leads the research being done in order to ensure the survival of humankind, tells them: “do not go gentle into that good night” echoing the poem once written by Dylan Thomas in 1947. It’s his way of saying that they ought not to wait for death passively but fight against it. It’s his way of saying that he, from the other side of the universe, will be helping them and taking them by the hand like he would a blind man.
A blind man…
Dylan Thomas would be taking his father by the hand. For the past years, he had been losing his sight, the most precious thing for a man like David J. Thomas who enjoys reading stories to his son Dylan and writing when inspired. Now it’s too late… They travel with the whole family to Italy in 1947 where Dylan writes the most renowned poem of the 20th century for his father. However, don’t be silly, his father can’t read the poem, because he doesn’t know he’s dying. The last verse of it reads like this:
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Life leaves his lungs after five years of fighting against the dying of the light in December 1952. Dylan discovers by his father passing away, that the eyes of dying men reflect all that men are and will ever be. He discovers that in the end, we all fear, and for that reason, we must fight. Because fighting keeps us alive.
We fear disaster, we fear oblivion, we fear war, we fear the DNA chains that carry disease, chains that carry the very illness that killed David J. Thomas and thousands of others in our postmodern world: Pneumonia.
We fear the virus that can get the brightness of life and suddenly make it seem dark.
The fear that dominates the world right now is not caused by humanity undergoing imminent apocalypse due to crop blights and dust storms that are forcing scientists to look for other inhabitable planets, and is not about a blind man slowly losing life: It’s about the world, our world. It’s about the three hundred thousand people who faced the same destiny: the dying of the light. If they were rich, if they were poor, highly educated, or analphabet; the virus didn’t care.
Our fear is the “not knowing”. Not knowing when the pandemic will end, or how much time we’ll still be in lockdown, or what will happen after it. There is no Professor Brand telling us that getting to the wormhole will take two years, and we don’t have a Dylan Thomas taking the sick men by the hand. There is no Michael Caine reciting the first lines of Dylan’s poem announcing the beginning of a star travel that would be the hope for the survival of the human race, and we don’t have a Dylan Thomas whispering the poem to a blind man laying in his deathbed. But the message for all of us seems to be the same:
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
However, no matter how strong we think we are, we cannot do that alone. The astronauts exploring the unknown universe had Professor Brand guiding them all the way through, and not only that, but they also had the blazing sun and the shiny stars giving them a firm sense of purpose. David J. Thomas had his son willing to take him by the hand when he couldn’t see beyond one step, he had a son sitting by his bed understanding through his deathly vitality what it means to fight. And we…
We have something greater: a God who is sovereign, a Creator that is knowable not only through his Word but through all nature, and all of the complexities of the universe and life that show a perfect design even to the smallest detail. We have the greatest of all beings taking care of the weakest of all beings. We have a God who knows the purpose of all things that come to pass, and who knowing our weaknesses and limitations gracefully tells us: Don’t be afraid.
Humanity might be shaken by something we can’t even see, and the whole world might be paralyzed from one day to the other, but there is One who is never shaken, and is never paralyzed. There is One who never changes, who is all-knowing and all-loving. There is One who can graciously tell us: “do not go gentle into that good night, I will give you the strength to fight.” Its He who not only assures that but also that we don’t need to rage against the dying of the light because WE CAN BE THE LIGHT.
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Andrea, you have a way of capturing your reader’s attention. After reading the first few sentences, I was compelled to read more. Glad I did. A great reminder during this current crisis that we can be the light!
Glad you read it and enjoyed it Theron! 🙂