Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog

First the young schoolboy, gloriously immersed in make-believe in a shabby farmyard or beginning to interpret the urgent rituals of old age and courtship. Then the budding poet with his thrilling friendships and dreams of fortune. Finally, the neophyte reporter roaming suburban Swansea for momentous material. In these stories Dylan Thomas shows the exuberance of youth maturing into a fine celebratory compassion and the poet's sheer ironic relish for the eccentricities of common life.