Death of a Whale
"Death of a Whale" is a poem by Australian poet John Blight.
It was first published in The Bulletin magazine on 7 April 1954 and later in two of the author's poetry collections and a number of other Australian poetry anthologies.
Outline
The poem compares the death of a whale on reef with that of a mouse and wonders if the level of human compassion is determined by the size and/or proximity of a dead animal. Are those that go to see the whale carcase drawn by idle curiosity of a spectacle, or by grief?Critical reception
In his commentary on the poem in 60 Classic Australian Poems Geoff Page noted "like most good poems, Blight's sonnet raises more questions than it answers..there is little doubt that 'Death of a Whale' is a masterful sonnet"Further publications
After its initial publication in The Bulletin in 1954 the poem was reprinted as follows:Australian Poetry 1954 edited by Ronald McCuaig, Angus and Robertson, 1954The Penguin Book of Australian Verse edited by John Thompson, Kenneth Slessor and R. G. Howarth, Penguin Books, 1958A Beachcomber's Diary : Ninety Sea Sonnets by John Blight, Angus and Robertson, 1963The Penguin Book of Australian Verse edited by Harry Heseltine, Penguin Books, 1972Australian Verse from 1805 : A Continuum edited by Geoffrey Dutton, Rigby, 1976Selected Poems, 1939-1975 by John Blight, Nelson, 1976What's Yours? : An Anthology of Australian Poetry edited by Alvie Egan, Victorian Foundation on Alcoholism & Drug Dependence, 1977The Collins Book of Australian Poetry edited by Rodney Hall, Collins, 1981Cross-Country : A Book of Australian Verse edited by John Barnes and Brian MacFarlane, Heinemann, 1984The Illustrated Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Beatrice Davis, Nelson, 1984Two Centuries of Australian Poetry edited by Mark O’Connor, Oxford University Press, 1988The Penguin Book of Modern Australian Poetry edited by John Tranter and Philip Mead, Penguin, 1991Selected Poems 1939-1990 by John Blight, University of Queensland Press, 199250 Years of Queensland Poetry : 1940s to 1990s edited by Philip Neilsen and Helen Horton, Central Queensland University Press, 1998The Indigo Book of Modern Australian Sonnets edited by Geoff Page, Indigo, 2003100 Australian Poems You [Need to Know] edited by Jamie Grant, Hardie Grant, 200860 Classic Australian Poems edited by Geoff Page, University of NSW Press, 2009Australian Poetry Since 1788 edited by Geoffrey Lehmann and Robert Gray, University of NSW Press, 2011The poem was also translated into Indonesian in 1991.