Summary
The next shot is of Keating’s class, where from his desk Keating tells Neil to read from the introduction to their textbook. The text details a way of mathematically measuring the excellence of a poem based on perfection and importance. At first, Keating illustrates the lesson on the board, which Cameron copies into his notebook. Keating then calls it “excrement” (Cameron crosses it out in his notes) and instructs the boys to rip the entire introduction out of their books. After hesitating, the boys begin doing so, beginning with Charles Dalton. Keating’s voice rises as he insists that they destroy the textbook’s entire introduction. He goes to his office to get a trash bin as the boys rip away, and while he’s gone, another teacher named Mr. McAllister sees the commotion from the hall and comes in yelling. He apologizes and retreats when Keating returns with the bin, saying he didn’t think Keating was there. Keating tells the boys to “keep ripping” as McAllister leaves, saying that they must learn to think for themselves and “savor words and language,” though some students are skeptical that poetry matters when they plan to become doctors and lawyers. Keating huddles them up and explains that while science and medicine are “noble pursuits,” art, poetry, love and the like are what the human race stays alive for. He quotes from Whitman’s “O Me! O Life!” The boys are enraptured, including Todd.
In the next scene, the students and faculty of Dalton say a prayer over their lunch and sit to eat. Mr. McAllister sits beside Mr. Keating and warns him that his lesson that day involving textbook ripping was misguided, as teaching the boys that they can be artists will make them hate Keating when they realize they’re not. Keating argues that the boys should be freethinkers, but McAllister disagrees. He quotes Lord Alfred Tennyson, saying that only men without dreams are happy. Keating fires back with an original line, saying that only in dreams can men truly be free.
At their table, Neil shows the others an old annual from Keating’s time at Welton. They see that he was a member of something called the Dead Poets Society. A teacher reprimands them and they put the annual away. Outside on the Welton lawns between the campus and lake, Neil, Todd, and the others catch a strolling Mr. Keating’s attention with an “O captain, my captain!” They show him his old annual and ask him about the Dead Poets Society. Swearing the boys to secrecy, he tells them that the Society was dedicated to “sucking the marrow out of life,” a quote from Thoreau that its members used to say at the start of each meeting. They would gather at the old Indian cave nearby and read from famous poets as well as their own compositions. He returns the book to them and jests that they should burn it before walking away whistling. The bell calls the boys back inside, and as they go, Neil suggests they go to the cave that night. Dalton is on board, while Cameron is aghast at the thought. Todd appears conflicted. As Dr. Hagar ushers them to class, Neil tries to confirm that they’re all going to go. Pitts is also conflicted, but they tell him he’s coming. They run inside together, with Dalton reminding Knox that Chris will swoon over him if he comes.
In the next scene, the boys whisper over a map during a study session. Mr. McAllister reprimands them and tells them to sit down. Neil comes over to Todd and tries to convince him to come with them, though Todd is extremely hesitant to read aloud in front of the other boys. Neil tells him he doesn’t have to read, and then goes to the other boys to confirm that that’s okay before Todd can protest. Mr. McAllister tells them all to shut up.
In the washroom, Neil tells Todd that he’s “in” as the boys prepare for bed. Dr. Hagar yells for the boys to be quiet. Neil goes to his room and retrieves a flashlight from his closet, then opens his book “Five Centuries of Verse” and reads the handwritten quote from Thoreau that Keating mentioned earlier. In the next shot, the boys' shadows move through the halls past the painting with which the film opened. Dr. Hagar seems to hear something. The boys throw treats to a dog in the hallway. Dr. Hagar comes into the hall with a flashlight but sees nothing. The boys sneak out the door and run cloaked into the night as eerie music fills the scene. They head through the forest and eventually come upon the old Indian cave.
They light a very smoky fire (a hole in the cave’s roof lets out the smoke). Neil calls the meeting to order, mentioning that Todd will take minutes because he prefers not to read, and reads the opening Thoreau quote. The boys pile snacks onto a jacket in the center of them. Neil tells a story of a woman who pieces together a jigsaw puzzle only to see that the image it formed is of herself finishing the puzzle, with a demented face at her window. Cameron tries to tell a story, but the boys have all heard it before. Pitts recites a poem about a man slitting his wife’s throat, and then Charles Dalton pulls out a poster of a naked woman and recites an original poem that he’s written on the back of it. Neil reads from Tennyson, and then Meeks reads a poem in rhythm which gets the boys clapping and chanting in a circle. They leave the cave, still chanting, and run back to Welton. They are silent and hooded again as they approach the school and a bell tolls.
In Keating’s class, Keating helps the boy expand their vocabularies. He asks Todd to contribute, but Todd is silent. He gets the boys excited about reading Shakespeare by impersonating famous actors delivering the lines. He then stands on his desk and tells the boys that they must always look at things from a different perspective. He has the boys come stand on his desk one at a time, telling them they must find their own voices and dare to break new ground. As the bell rings, he gives them their next assignment: compose an original poem to read in front of the class the following week. He singles out Todd, telling him that he knows how much this assignment scares him, and shuts the light off, leaving Todd in the dark atop his desk as the other boys chuckle.
The next shots feature the boys engaging in various activities. Oars slice through the lake as they row crew. Meeks and Pitts dance on a roof, having finally gotten their radio to work. Two boys fence through the trees. Then we switch to Todd writing his original poem in bed, with the radio music muffled in the distance. Neil comes in excitedly and shows Todd a poster for auditions for A Midsummer Night’s Dream, saying he really wants to audition. He is beside himself with eagerness to become an actor, though his father will protest. Todd suggests he call him and ask, and Neil becomes angry, knowing that his father won’t like it. They change subjects, talking about why Todd isn’t inspired by Keating like the rest of them. Todd says he isn’t able to capture attention like Neil and asks Neil to leave him alone, but Neil says no, grabs Todd’s poem from him, and reads it aloud as Todd chases him. Cameron comes in to investigate and Neil grabs his books and makes him join in the chase. The hall fills with boys watching the shenanigans.
Analysis
Mr. McAllister and Mr. Keating share a telling exchange over lunch after Mr. McAllister witnesses Keating’s students tearing apart their textbooks. McAllister’s warning that dreams will make the boys unhappy exemplifies the mentality of the Welton administration: that the boys should focus on doing what is practical, rather than trying to change what is possible. It’s perhaps unsurprising that Keating calls McAllister a cynic, but McAllister’s response that he’s a realist illuminates just how certain he and the other faculty are that the only thing in store for the boys is boring lives following the footsteps of their academic predecessors. Keating’s vision for them, by contrast, is much more inspired.
At the beginning of the first meeting of the Dead Poets Society, the boys read Thoreau’s famous quote, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately…” The quote comes from Thoreau’s 1854 book Walden, which details the more than two years he spent alone in a small cabin by Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts. The quote refers to living simply and with purpose, and reflects what the boys themselves do through the Society: going to the woods to recite poetry to one another, and eventually expressing themselves in other ways, including storytelling, dancing, and playing the saxophone. Many of the boys feel that the academic shackles that hold them are unjust, and some, especially Neil, fear that when it's their time to die and begin "fertilizing daffodils," as Mr. Keating so glibly put it, that they will "discover that [they] had not lived." The quote therefore highlights a parallel between the boys' and Thoreau's own desire to be self-reliant and deliberate about their lives.
Robin Williams’ comedic side, for which he was already famous when Dead Poets Society was released, comes out during his class on Shakespeare, when he reads famous lines in the voices of prominent actors. Despite delivering what has been called a stirring, dramatic performance in a more serious role like Keating, Williams’ humorous tendencies help him to portray a teacher of great wit and theatrics.
Keating’s lesson about perspective in which he has the boys stand on his desk to see things differently is one of many examples of how he encourages them to think differently than the more traditional Welton values would have them do. Nolan, McAllister, and the others believe in teaching the boys what they should think and believe, whereas Keating demonstrates through this lesson that he wants the exact opposite for the boys.
Keating's powerful influence on many of his students' personalities and aspirations begins to come across concretely through Neil's enthusiasm about auditioning for A Midsummer Night's Dream. In the first part of the film, the viewer saw how callous and unyielding Neil's father is with regard to Neil's personal endeavors and goals. Neil vocalizes his certainty that his father won't approve of acting as either an extracurricular or career path. Nevertheless, he displays determination to audition (despite Todd momentarily deterring his momentum), a testament to how passionately he feels about it—a passion that Mr. Keating helped to spark.
