After the first death, there is no other-
This line appears to be highly cryptic and ambiguous. It has given rise to manifold interpretations. All these interpretations are correct and these are as follows:
i) That death is death. There is no other death because once dead, one is dead forever. There is no other death to face.
ii) One dies but once, and through that death one becomes reunited with the timeless unity of all things.
iii) Death is not the end, but thë beginning. It is the renewal of life. When one dies, one is born into a new life. Death is followed by resurrection. So “after the first death, there is no other death.”
iv) The first death referred to in this line is either birth or deäth. What Thomas is saying is what he says so often that “Death shall have no dominion”. And, as usual, he is saying it in terms of a scientific’ humanism rather than in old Testament or New Testament terms.
(v) Barbette Deutsch has given an interesting interpretation of this line. The last line gives the clue to the poem: “After the first death, there is no other.” After this early death, the child will not have to die again, as we who
grow up to adulthood repeatedly die; first the child in us, then the young man or woman: oneself after another. But this child dying without the experience of the meanness of life without having to watch the brightness leak away, in Spender’s phrase will not répeatedly die like a’ full-grown man or woman.’
(vi) Dylan Thomas’ last line returns us to the idea of a tragic and irreversible fact: that in Abel’s death. the human race first died, so that no death thereafter could be new or different or more grievous.
(vii) The Christians believe in the immortality of the soul. So after. the first death, that is, after the bodily death one does not die again for the soul is immortal, indestructible and imperishable.
(viii) The line is a rejection of the biblical doctrine of the second death inflicted upon those who will be found irredeemable in the Day of Judgement. In other words, the irredeemable will be hurt by the second death from which there is no further awakening or resurrection. In the case of the child, the question of the ‘second death’ does not arise at all for she-is already ‘unbound’ from this eternal death.
ix) “The last line provides elegiac consolation for the simple reader and the alert, a pleasing doubt. ‘The first death recalling the first death could be that of Adam, Eve, Jesus, this child or anybody…that ‘there is no other deäth after the first means, as the context demands; that death is followed by perpetual life: Christian heaven or natural rebirth in bird or flower.”
I’ve always read it to mean that once a child or teenager experiences the death of someone close, death itself becomes real in a shocking way that cannot be repeated. The fact of death can never again be new; the loss of loved ones can ache profoundly, but can never again surprise the way the first permanent loss can surprise. To me the line’s poignance comes from its evocation of the deep and permanent disorientation a person experiences the first time someone close to them dies — and they suddenly realize the ramifications of everything else around them dying, and themselves. ‘After the first death, there is no other’ — no other death will have the effect the first big death has. As the singer formerly known as Cat Stevens put it, ‘The first cut is the deepest.’
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I absolutely agree with your interpretation! I was 40 when my dead died and it was an experience I had never gone through. I am now 80 and have seem my Mon, one brother, and two sisters die. I loved them with all my heart but the grief I felt was nothing compared to my Dad, because after he died, I was no longer innocent.
through and
Yep. Bill got it exactly right.
I cannot agree with the thrust of Supriya Maity’s interpretations ( maybe apart from (v)). Her viewpoint is clearly that of a Christian believer and my belief is that Dylan Thomas has written this from his own experience of deaths – the first death to occur of someone significant in your life is the most tragic , possibly overwhelming and very painful. Subsequent deaths are all different and affect you differently – but none has the shock of that first death you experience.
I agree with Bill Brazell’s interpretation – and to a certain extent Noni’s although the phrase ” I was no longer innocent ” strikes me as a bit odd.
Thank you Supriya for your views on this – but your responses maybe do not have resonance for atheists , agnostics , or humanists – and I don’t know what those of different faiths will feel about your comments .
This line was just used in a British murder mystery. A mother said it after a second son died. The way the detective took it was that she had had a first terrible loss. I lost a grown daughter, and the grief is so overwhelming. This quote might mean that the first overwhelming death of a loved ones is worse than any deaths after that.
To experience the death of a parent when one is a young child colors all future expectations.
A child who has yet to develop any sort of philosophy or coping strategy has no resources
to understand that death comes to all. It seems as though one has been singled out for some
unique punishment. The child wonders how his peers can live normal lives and thinks
he knows something dire that none of the children around him understand that their joy
can be snatched away in a moment.