Catholic Love in Utcheni’s Collected Poems Khop Fa Khlip Thong

Abstract

This article aims to study Utcheni’s collected poems Khop Fa Khlip Thong from a Catholic perspective to show that Utcheni, a Thai Catholic poet, conveys the idea of Catholic love in different ways. Utcheni's poems present three types of Catholic love, i.e. the love for Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, and humankind, through two important literary techniques. First, the poet employs the symbolism of the Virgin Mary, which includes the morning star, the crescent moon, and the rose, in ways congruent with Thai culture. Second, the poet uses specific words to communicate Catholicity and Christian meanings. In this manner, this article demonstrates a different approach to study Thai poetry by using Catholicism as an analytical lens, through which other Thai poems can also be studied.