Poet’s Freewill in Nirat Phukhaothong and Nirat Mueng Pet of Sunthornpu

Abstract

            This research paper was undertaken to study Poet’s Freewill in Nirat Phukhaothong and Nirat Mueng Pet of Sunthornpu. The research found that Sunthornpu was regarded as the Greatest Poet of Ratnakosin Period. In his two epoch-making journey literature or called in Thai language as ‘Nirat’, i.e. Nirat Phukhaothong and Nirat Mueng Pet the ‘Poet’s freewill’ was entirely utilized by him in the forms of word-selection, imaginative presentation and strong emotional expression.  Since both Nirats were of the same poet, but created in different contexts of his life and the different distances of his journey to both destinations, thus both Nirats can reflect Sunthornpu’s Freewill’s as follows; Nirat  Phukhaothong evidently reflected his emotional poetry and his terrible destiny from rich to rags. His sorrowful feeling to King Rama II who was his patron and passed away was wholeheartedly condensed into some metres in this Nirat.  Meanwhile, Nirat Mueng Pet obviously reflected his observation of nature he passed along the canals and roads in his journey and his retrospect of Pet Buri, the city where he ever lived in. It is evident that both Nirat, Phukhaothong and Mueng Pet, were entirely overwhelmed with the Poet’s Freewill of Sunthornpu to continuously create and transfer his strong feelings in the form of poetry regardless of the poet’s traditions.