I've wondered why the title is "Dead Poets Society."
Keating says "The name simply referred to the fact, that to join the organization, you had to be dead. Full membership required a lifetime of apprenticeship. The living were simply pledges.
Their real goal in studying poetry is to study beauty and life. You cannot be an expert in life until you've lived all of it, therefore full membership involves finishing life (being dead). It also indicates that the apprentices were focused on learning, not merely socializing aimlessly. By Chris from Yahoo Answers
It's a little apart from the title, but it also reminds me of a British dead poet and my college literature class. You can sometimes draw people's attention and gain popularity after your premature death like John Keats received. I was lucky to lament his loss right in the room-turned-into-museum in Rome where his deathbed had existed. I've always wanted to go there since I first got to know about the young poet and his poems from the English lit class in the freshman year of college.
I'm fond of this book because there are several poetry excerpts shown, and below is my favorite:
I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life.
I've finally bought a copy of Walden. Walden is a thick book and I don't know when I can finish it. It's a new goal worth challenging enough. Some day I will surely go to Walden Pond in Concord, Mass. It's only a site, but on the day when I stand there I have to evaluate that I have lived well.
