Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas
"Under Milk Wood" is a radio play by Dylan Thomas that unfolds in the fictional seaside village of Llareggub during the span of a single day and night. The narrative begins with the village shrouded in darkness, where its inhabitants are lost in dreams that reflect their desires, regrets, and relationships. Characters such as Captain Cat, a blind former sea captain, and Mog Edwards, a draper in love, reveal the complexities of love and longing within their dreams. As dawn breaks, the residents awaken to a new day and engage in their daily routines, each carrying the weight of their dreams into reality.
The play features a diverse array of characters, showcasing the humanity within their struggles and aspirations, from Mrs. Ogmore-Pritchard's obsession with cleanliness to the whimsical musings of the Reverend Eli Jenkins. Through its poetic language and rich imagery, "Under Milk Wood" explores themes of memory, love, and the intertwining of dreams and reality. The village itself becomes a character, reflecting both the mundane and the extraordinary in the lives of its residents. Ultimately, the work offers a snapshot of life that celebrates the beauty and complexity of ordinary existence.
Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas
First produced: 1953, public reading; first published, 1954; first staged, 1956
Type of work: Drama
Type of plot: Domestic realism
Time of plot: Indeterminate
Locale: Llareggub, Wales
Principal Characters
Captain Cat , a blind, retired sea captainThe Reverend Eli Jenkins , one of God’s innocentsPolly Garter , the village wantonMog Edwards , a draperMyfanwy Price , a dressmaker and sweetshop proprietorMr. Pugh , a schoolmasterMrs. Pugh , his wife, a shrewMr. Waldo , a barber, herbalist, and lecherMrs. Ogmore-Pritchard , the twice-widowed owner of Bay View, a house for paying guestsButcher Beynon , a butcherMrs. Beynon , his wifeGossamer Beynon , their daughter, a schoolteacherOrgan Morgan , a musicianCherry Owen , a tipplerMrs. Owen , his wifeWilly Nilly , the postmanMrs. Willy Nilly , his wife, who reads all the mail before her husband delivers itSinbad Sailors , a young pub keeperMary Ann Sailors , his grandmotherLord Cut-Glass , an eccentric recluseNogood Boyo , a fishermanOcky Milkman , a milkman
The Story
Night’s deep shadows lie over sleeping Llareggub, a small, decayed seaside resort village—or so a guidebook might describe the town, a place of no particular interest to the sportsman, the health seeker, or the tourist. Under the black, moonless sky, the cobblestone streets are silent, and Milk Wood is empty of lovers, the darkness disturbed only by the secret, rustling animal life. In their darkened houses, the people of Llareggub sleep, their dreams filled with love or hate, desire or dismay.
Captain Cat is a blind former sea captain. Through his dreams echo the voices of sailor friends lost long ago, with whom he shared the same girl, Rosie Probert. Mog Edwards, the draper, in sleep loves Myfanwy Price more than all the cloths and weaves in the great Cloth Hall of the world. Myfanwy, secretly in love with Mog, promises in her sleep to warm his heart beside the fire so that he can wear it under his vest after he closes his shop. Mr. Waldo lies in a drunken slumber beside his unhappy, unloved wife; other women he has known pass through his dreams. Mrs. Ogmore-Pritchard gives orders to the two husbands she has bossed into their graves. Inspectors fly into the dreams of Mrs. Beynon, the butcher’s wife, to persecute her husband for selling the meat of cats and owls. Her daughter, Gossamer, a schoolteacher, dreams of her lover, a small, rough man with a bright bushy tail like a fox’s. Sinbad Sailors hugs his pillow and imagines that he is embracing Gossamer Beynon. His grandmother dreams of the garden of Eden. Willy Nilly, the postman, walks fourteen miles in his sleep. Polly Garter dreams of babies.
Day breaks, and the people arise and go about their business. The Reverend Eli Jenkins, whose God is a god of innocence and wonder, goes to his door and, in the bright sunshine, sings his morning service, a lyric that might have come from Robert Herrick. Mrs. Ogmore-Pritchard, whose god is cleanliness, does not care to have boarders in her clean rooms and starched beds, their breath all over the furniture, their feet trampling her carpets. Ocky Milkman puts water in the milk before he delivers it. Mr. Pugh, the schoolmaster, daydreams of feeding his wife an arsenic-and-weed-killer biscuit; at breakfast, he reads Lives of the Great Poisoners, the title of his book concealed by a brown paper wrapper. Polly Garter nurses the youngest of her brood. Sinbad Sailors opens his pub, the Sailors Arms, and drinks a pint of beer. (The hands of the ship’s clock in the pub have stood at half past eleven for half a century, so that it is always opening time.) Mr. Cherry Owen hears how, while drunk, he hurled sago at the wall, just missing his wife and the picture of Auntie Blossom, and danced on the table. Mrs. Willy Nilly, the postman’s wife, steams open letters and reads them aloud. Nogood Boyo, lying on his back among crabs’ legs and tangled lines in the unbailed bottom of his dinghy, looks at the sky and says that he does not know or care who might be up there looking down. Sinbad Sailors continues to dote on Gossamer Beynon. Lord Cut-Glass, in his kitchen filled with clocks, one for each of his sixty-six years, squats to eat from a dish marked “Fido.” Captain Cat remembers the rowdy long ago of his youth.
Night falls, and Llareggub prepares to return to sleep. Mog Edwards and Myfanwy Price, a town’s length between them, write to each other the daily love letters that they never mail. Mrs. Ogmore-Pritchard seals her house against the night air and the damp from the sea. The Reverend Eli Jenkins recites his sunset poem, asking God to look after and bless the people of Llareggub, a town where no one is wholly good or wholly bad. Mr. Cherry Owen goes off to get drunk at the Sailors Arms; his wife has two husbands, one drunk, one sober, and she loves them both. Captain Cat, secure in his bunk, goes voyaging in his dreams. In Milk Wood, where lovers stray, drunken Mr. Waldo hugs Polly Garter in the warm silence under the trees, but it is not Mr. Waldo or any of her lusty, six-foot lovers Polly is thinking of, but Willy Weazel—little Willy Wee—who is dead and six feet underground.
Bibliography
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