unknown citizen essay questions

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The Unknown Citizen by W.H Auden

All of you would agree with me that poetry is not easy to understand. The poet is a gifted man, an inspired person who packs all his emotions and thoughts into small little words. It is for us to understand the meaning of words, their association with other words and the feelings of the poet in order to understand the message that he wants to convey to us in the poem especially in a poem like The Unknown Citizen . Many questions arise in our mind.

Why has the poet chosen a title that he has? Why does he want to talk about a citizen who is unknown?

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Why doesn’t he use as many metaphors and similes as other poets do?

Now these questions I think come up in your mind but I’m sure you will get the answers as we proceed with the poem. My objective today is to give you an in-depth analysis and understanding of this poem.

All of you would have read poetry that would have touched your hearts where the poet has transported you into another world- a world of imagination which takes us away far away from the real world in which we live. Keats, for example, in the opening line of one of his most famous odes ‘Ode To a Nightingale ‘ says ;

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,

Now this line captures our hearts and takes us along with the poet into the world of the nightingale to listen to the song of the nightingale which is so melodious , so happy and so free. Wordsworth defined poetry as spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings. He said that amidst nature he could hear the still sad music of humanity. Don’t we also hear it along with him? We do of course but if we go to The Unknown Citizen with these expectations we are in for a surprise.

W.H Auden does not transport us into another world. he transfixes us to the here and now he talks about the mechanical, the monotonous life that we lead.He succeeds in doing what he sets out to do to tell us how immense is the control of the state over the individual.

The poet in this poem talks about the absolute necessity for man to safeguard his freedom and to protect his happiness from the clutches of the state. He tells us how important it is for man to devote a little bit of time for himself for his freedom and for his little happiness. W. H Davies in his poem Leisure says:

WHAT is this life if, full of care, We have no time to stand and stare?— No time to stand beneath the boughs, And stare as long as sheep and cows: (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});

W. H Auden in his The Unknown Citizen seems to be completely in compliance with W.H Davis.

Summary of The Unknown Citizen

The poet in this poem tells us how very difficult it is for men to retain his individuality and his identity in a fast-changing techno-savvy world of today. Auden comments on human nature and talks about the endeavor of man to try to fit into the world to which he belongs. He tries to conform to the utmost and in return for that what does he get he is reduced to a number and a statistic. The subtitle of the poem is very ironic. The poet sarcastically alluding to the make-believe concept that the government enforced that every individual should be classified by an alphanumeric tag. He is very critical of the relentless pursuit of the state of the individual. He says that the state does not allow any freedom to the individual, any freedom to enjoy the little acts of unremembered pleasure that Wordsworth speaks off in his poems. The unknown citizen too is ironic. The poet says that everybody knows everything about the citizen but nobody knows his name. Is that possible question? Suppose we also feel this question arising in our mind.A modernist W.H Auden was very concerned about the modern idea of man losing his identity in the fast-paced technological world of today.He is very critical of the state taking control over the individual. In the unknown citizen he tells us that all the organizations of the government and research agencies are very happy with the unknown citizen because he does everything right at the right time. He is a model of compliance. He listens to every dictate of the state. He is a loyal and a friendly man. He generates revenue to the government because he believes in the installment schemes. He has everything that a modern man needs to have – a gramophone, a radio, a car and a frigidaire. The poet mocks the citizen who relinquishes his identity in order to serve the state.The state expects these sacrifices from the individual.

W.H Auden a modernist was very concerned about the modern idea of man losing his identity in the fast-paced world of today. The three dangers that Auden mensions in this poem and which are really the dangers that man has to face today are anonymity conformity and the state control over theindividual. The man has to really fight against these forces in order to retain his happiness and his individuality.The state-run organizations and research agencies that the poet mentions are all very happy with the unknown citizen because he does all the right things at the right time. He is a loyal worker very sincere and faithful. He generates a lot of revenue to the government because he understands the benefits of the installment schemes. He spends a lot of money in buying things which are taxable and in this way he helps the government. He is a very sociable and friendly man and he also has the right number of children. The poet criticizes the individual who relinquishes his happiness and his freedom in order to serve the state. The state expects these sacrifices from the modern-day Saint. A saint who does not like in the past lead a holy life or seek profound truths but the one who sacrifices his all for the sake of the state. This is the gist of The Unknown Citizen It is very clear from this to understand what Auden wanted us to understand.

Analysis of The Unknown Citizen

Now we will go into detailed analysis of the poem. At the very beginning of the poem we get a sense of the immense control of the state over the individual. The poet talks about how indifferent and impersonal the attitude of the government towards the individual is. The poem is written from the point of view of a fictional bureaucrat who sits at his desk shuffling papers all day little knowing or caring that the decisions that he makes affect the lives of individuals -the individuals that he hasn’t even seen in his lifetime. The state assumes a Big Brother like attitude much like Orwell’s 1984 or Aldous Huxley’s a brave new world in that that the state pretends to be all-knowing except for the things that really matter.

The very first line of the poem introduces us to the Bureau of Statistics and its findings. What has the Bureau of Statistics found about the unknown citizen that his conduct was excellent and that there was no written complaint ever about him. In a modern sense of an old-fashioned word he was a saint said the poet. We should understand from this line that the modern meaning of the word Saint meant one who sacrificed as everything to listen to the dictates of the state. The poet then goes on to tell us about the work history of the unknown citizen. He worked for a company which was called Fudge Motors Incorporated and in the day of retirement he was he worked loyally for this company except during the time of war when he went to war. The poet then talks about the trade union to which the unknown citizen belonged. The Union acknowledged his loyalty and as attained his normalcy.The union reported that he wasn’t a scab or odd in his views. He also paid his dues.

The next line of the poem that our reports on the union said that the opinion of the union was sound tells us of the immense control of the state over the individual. It doesn’t leave him any privacy, any freedom to be on his own. That the citizen was an amiable and sociable man is reported by the Social Psychology workers .The Social Psychology workers, researchers report that he loved to share a drink with his mates it was. It should be noted that it was the pastime of the era that when workers worked for long hours in the factory while returning home stopped at a pub and had a drink as attains the normalcy of the unknown citizen.

The word popular further enhances the citizens compliance with the given and the accepted. As a conscientious man he bought a newspaper every day and his reaction to advertisements were normal in every way. The policy is taken out in his name proof that he was fully insured. His health card said that he was only once in hospital but he left it cured. Producers Research and High-Grade Living reported that he was fully sensible to the installment plan. He had everything that a modern man needed to have to lead a comfortable life. He had a gramophone, a car, a frigidaire and a radio.

The next few lines talk about the family of the unknown citizen. He was married and he had five children- the right number of children according to the population expert that a parent of his generation needed to have. The poet says that all the government agencies and research organizations were happy with the individual like the Bureau of Statistics, Producers Research and High-Grade Living, the medical department, the press and so on and so forth.

The last couplet which speaks about the individuals own happiness and freedom is very hard-hitting. The poet asks us, despite fulfilling all the expectations of the state, is the individual happy? Is he free? and the last line of the poem which says that had anything been wrong we should certainly have heard tells us of the suffocating control that the state puts the individual under.

The clinical tone which the poet adopts is very apt to describe the flawed methods of the government which based their judgment of an individual on reports and documents of his conformity and his normalcy.

The poem was written in early years of the 20th century. Today we are into the early years of the 21st century. The so many years have elapsed since the writing of the poem The poem still rings true today. The poet tells us that man in his earnestness to fulfill the expectations of a good citizen becomes an unknown citizen.

The poem is very ironical in its tone. What is irony? Irony is a mode of speech where the real meaning is exactly the opposite of what is literally conveyed. I give you an example of irony. My class today all of you know is from 10:00 to 11:00 o’clock. All of you are seated when I come into the class but there is one student who enters a class at 10 minutes to 11. I look at the student and I say this ‘ Oh! good morning, I’m so happy that you’re in time for the next class!’ Actually, I’m not happy with the individual for coming late but in fact I’m angry and I’m ironical in my tone. The best example of irony from literature that I can quote is from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. I would like to read a few sentences of the speech of Antony from Julius Caesar :

Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest– For Brutus is an honourable man; So are they all, all honourable men– Come I to speak in Caesar’s funeral. He was my friend, faithful and just to me: But Brutus says he was ambitious; And Brutus is an honourable man.

What better example of irony can we get than this. After reading of the poem we conclude that the poem is extremely ironic. From the title to the subtitle to the content of the entire poem the poet means one thing and says another.I hope all of you have enjoyed the poem along with me.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

SHORT ANSWERS

1. What does the title of the poem ‘unknown citizen’ signify? The title of the poem ‘unknown citizen’ signifies that the citizen is thoroughly unknown because he doesn’t have any personality or individuality of his own. His name doesn’t bear any importance and it has reduced to a mere identity number.

2. What does the sub-title of the poem ‘Unknown Citizen’ suggest? The sub-title of the poem suggests that the citizen doesn’t possess any individuality of his own. He has reduced himself to be a mere number – the number of his identity card.

3. What according to Auden does the word ‘Saint’ mean in the modern age? According to Auden, the word ‘Saint’ in the modern age means any man who is subservient to the wishes and aspirations of the government.

4. Where was the unknown citizen working? When did he leave his job? The unknown citizen was working in a factory named Fudge Motors Inc. He left his job only once. It was to join the army to fight for his country. (Fudge Motors Inc.)

5. What did the social psychology workers find about the Unknown citizen? The social psychology workers found that the Unknown citizen was popular among his fellow-workers and enjoyed the company of friends

6. What did the press say about the Unknown citizen? The press said that the unknown citizen bought a newspaper everyday and responded to the advertisements properly.

7. What did the health card of the unknown citizen show? The Health card of the unknown citizen showed that he was hospitalized only once in his lifetime. He had left the hospital after getting his disease cured completely.

8. What did Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare about the unknown citizen? Producers Research and High-Grade Living declared that the unknown citizen was fully aware of the advantages of the instalment plan. They said that he had bought phonograph, radio, car, fridge etc on instalment basis.

9. What did the Eugenist say about the unknown citizen? The Eugenist said that the unknown citizen had begotten five children and it was the right number of children the government needed then.

10. What did the teachers say about the Unknown Citizen as a parent? The teacher said that the children of the Unknown Citizen were getting the proper education that the government had insisted. As a father, the Unknown Citizen never interfered with their education.

11. Who is being attacked in this satire? The bureaucratic society where the individual is reduced to a cipher; where conformity is promoted instead of individuality.

PARAGRAPH QUESTIONS 1. Short note on the unknown citizen. As far as the modern dictatorial government is concerned, the unknown citizen is the ideal citizen. The government wants all the citizens to be like him. He has surrendered his own individuality in order to conform himself to the wishes of the government. He hasn’t ever created any problems to the government. He has performed everything that the government wanted from every citizen. He has worked in a factory until his retirement. He has been a member in the trade union and paid all his dues properly. He has availed himself of the instalment system and purchased the essential amenities for the house- hold. He has five children and he hasn’t interfered with their education as the government desired. The Unknown Citizen has been healthy, free and happy. The government has erected a monument for the Unknown Citizen for being an ideal citizen.

2. Irony in the poem ‘The Unknown Citizen’. The poem ‘The Unknown Citizen’ is a satire. W. H. Auden employs irony in the poem which is reflected even in the title. It is about the unknown citizen who is hard to find in the society. It is the wish of the dictatorial government to have such a citizen. The sub-title of the poem says ironically that the unknown citizen doesn’t have any individuality. He has lost even his name. He has reduced himself to an inanimate thing. The dictatorial government has made a number of agencies to maintain their policies. We hear about the citizen not through his individuality but through the Bureau of Statistics. The citizens are being controlled by the secret agencies of the government. These agencies hold the public opinion of the government. The government dictates what a citizen should do and what he should not. It is very ironically said that the unknown citizen is free and happy. It means that if any citizen conforms to the wishes of the government by sacrificing his individuality, he will be free and happy. The government will erect marble monument for him as a token of its gratitude.

ESSAY TYPE QUESTION 1.Critical appreciation of the poem ‘The Unknown Citizen’ W. H. Auden was one of the famous poets of the Twentieth Century. He had written a large number of poems and won many prizes. He had been a professor of poetry at Oxford. He is remarkable for his versatility and fluency. He explores the social and political problems and makes the people think in a rational and moral way. The poem ‘The Unknown Citizen’ is a satire. It ridicules the average citizen who surrenders his own individuality and accepts the wishes or the policies of a dictatorial government. It is about the ideal citizen as seen by the government. The dictatorial government has erected a marble monument for the unknown citizen for conforming the views and policies of the government promptly and completely. This poem is written on the marble in the form of a valuable inscription. It is abundant with irony or ironical statements. In large cities, monuments are erected for the memory of the unknown soldiers who have sacrificed their lives for the sake of the country. These monuments are the pride of the nation. The poet says very ironically that the government has erected a marble monument in the memory of an unknown citizen. The name of the citizen is not written on the marble. But, the number of his identity card is used instead of his name. This shows that the unknown citizen doesn’t possess any individuality of his own. But, as far as the government is concerned, the unknown citizen is their ideal hero. Hence, his life history is inscribed on the marble for others to imitate. The Bureau of Statistics says that the unknown citizen is like a saint. They do not like to call him a saint because they think that the word saint has lost its significance in the modern age. It says also that the conduct of the unknown citizen is agreed by all agencies of the government. It is also agreed that the government can never raise any complaint against him as a citizen. The unknown citizen was working in a factory named fudge Motors Inc. until his retirement. He left his job only once to join the army to fight for his country. As a worker, he made all his employers satisfied and he had never got punished or dismissed. He was a member in a trade union. He paid all his dues promptly and never worked against his union. He was perfectly normal in his attitude to people and was popular among his friends and enjoyed their company. The press remarked that the unknown citizen had good habits. He bought a newspaper everyday and read the advertisements. His health card showed that he had insured his life fully. He had fallen ill only once in his life-time and left the hospital after curing the disease. This showed that he was a healthy person. The commercial institution remarked that he was aware of the instalment system and bought essential things through hire-purchase system as the government wanted. In addition to that, the unknown citizen was satisfied with the public-opinion held by the government agencies. He simply accepted peace when it was a peace-time and joined the army for the country when war was declared. This shows that he was not at all self-reliant. The unknown citizen had five children. He added his share to the population of the country as the government wanted. Even the education of his children were left to the government’s decision or policies. Auden ends the poem sarcastically. He says that he does not know whether the unknown citizen has been free or happy. The government is of the opinion that the citizen who conforms the ideas or the policies of the government without any question will always be happy and remarked that if he had complaints, they would have known it earlier through their different spies or agencies. The qualities prescribed by the government for becoming an ideal citizen is quite ironic. They want their citizens to be passive or conforming so that the government can last for a long time.

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The Unknown Citizen Summary & Analysis by W. H. Auden

• Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis
• Poetic Devices
• Vocabulary & References
• Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme
• Line-by-Line Explanations

"The Unknown Citizen" was written by the British poet W. H. Auden, not long after he moved to America in 1939. The poem is a kind of satirical elegy written in praise of a man who has recently died and who lived what the government has deemed an exemplary life. This life, really, seems to have been perfectly ho-hum—exemplary only insofar as this man never did anything to question or deviate from society's expectations. On the one hand, the poem implicitly critiques the standardization of modern life, suggesting that people risks losing sight of what it means to be an individual when they focus exclusively on the same status symbols and markers of achievement (like having the right job, the right number of kids, the right car, and so forth). The poem also builds a frightening picture of a world ruled by total conformity and state oppression, in which a bureaucratic government dictates and spies on its citizens' daily lives.

• Read the full text of “The Unknown Citizen”

The Full Text of “The Unknown Citizen”

“the unknown citizen” summary, “the unknown citizen” themes.

Oppression, Surveillance, and the State

• Before Line 1

Standardization and Conformity

• Lines 18-24
• Lines 25-29

Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “The Unknown Citizen”

Before line 1, lines 1-5.

​​​​​​ ... ... the Greater Community.

Except for the ... ... Fudge Motors Inc.

Yet he wasn't ... ... liked a drink.

Lines 14-17

The Press are ... ... left it cured.

Lines 18-21

Both Producers Research ... ... and a frigidaire.

Lines 22-27

Our researchers into ... ... with their education.

Lines 28-29

Was he free? ... ... certainly have heard.

“The Unknown Citizen” Symbols

Bureaucratic Departments

• Line 1: “Bureau of Statistics”
• Line 5: “Greater Community”
• Line 10: “Union”
• Line 11: “Union”
• Line 12: “Social Psychology”
• Line 14: “The Press”
• Line 17: “Health-card”
• Line 18: “Producers Research and High-Grade Living”
• Line 19: “Instalment Plan”
• Line 22: “Public Opinion”
• Line 26: “Eugenist”

The Modern Man

• Lines 20-21: “And had everything necessary to the Modern Man, / A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.”

“The Unknown Citizen” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

Alliteration.

• Line 7: “factory,” “fired”
• Line 8: “Fudge”
• Line 14: “Press,” “paper”
• Line 16: “Policies,” “prove”
• Line 17: “his Health-card,” “he,” “was once,” “hospita,” “cured”
• Line 20: “Modern Man”
• Line 23: “he held”
• Line 24: “peace,” “peace,” “war,” “went”
• Line 25: “population”
• Line 26: “parent”
• Line 28: “Was,” “he,” “Was,” “he happy”
• Line 8: “Fudge Motors Inc.”
• Line 8: “employers, Fudge”
• Line 21: “phonograph, a,” “radio, a”
• Line 24: “peace, he,” “peace: when,” “war, he”
• Line 28: “free?,” “ Was,” “happy? The”
• Line 29: “wrong, we”

End-Stopped Line

• Line 2: “complaint,”
• Line 4: “saint,”
• Line 5: “Community.”
• Line 7: “fired,”
• Line 8: “Inc.”
• Line 9: “views,”
• Line 10: “dues,”
• Line 11: “sound)”
• Line 13: “drink.”
• Line 15: “way.”
• Line 16: “insured,”
• Line 17: “cured.”
• Line 20: “Man,”
• Line 21: “frigidaire.”
• Line 23: “year;”
• Line 24: “went.”
• Line 25: “population,”
• Line 26: “generation.”
• Line 27: “education.”
• Line 28: “absurd:”
• Line 29: “heard.”
• Lines 1-2: “be / One”
• Lines 3-4: “agree / That”
• Lines 6-7: “retired / He”
• Lines 12-13: “found / That”
• Lines 14-15: “day / And”
• Lines 18-19: “declare / He”
• Lines 19-20: “Plan / And”
• Lines 22-23: “content / That”

Rhetorical Question

• Line 28: “Was he free? Was he happy?”

“The Unknown Citizen” Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• Fudge Motors Inc.
• Instalment Plan
• (Location in poem: Line 1: “Bureau”)

Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “The Unknown Citizen”

Rhyme scheme, “the unknown citizen” speaker, “the unknown citizen” setting, literary and historical context of “the unknown citizen”, more “the unknown citizen” resources, external resources.

In Auden's Own Voice — "The Unknown Citizen" read by the poet himself. 

Auden's Life and Work — A valuable resource from the Poetry Foundation. 

The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier — More information about the Tomb that exists in Arlington National Cemetary.

The Elegy Form — Ten brilliant elegies, taken from the classical era all the way up to the contemporary. 

The Five-Year Plans — An educational resource looking at the way Russia restructured its society in the 20th century. 

LitCharts on Other Poems by W. H. Auden

As I Walked Out One Evening

Epitaph on a Tyrant

Funeral Blues (Stop all the clocks)

In Memory of W. B. Yeats

Musée des Beaux Arts

Refugee Blues

September 1, 1939

The More Loving One

The Shield of Achilles

Everything you need for every book you read.

W. H. Auden: Poems

By w. h. auden, w. h. auden: poems summary and analysis of "the unknown citizen".

The poem begins with an ironic epigraph, “To JS/07 M 378 / This Marble Monument / Is Erected by the State.”

The Bureau of Statistics and all other reports show that he will complied with his duties to “the Greater Community.” He worked in a factory and paid his union dues. He had no odd views. The Social Psychology investigators found him to be normal, as did the Press: he was popular, “liked a drink,” bought the daily paper, and had the “normal” reactions to advertisements. He was fully insured. The Health-card report shows he was in the hospital only once, and left cured.

The Producers Research and High-Grade Living investigators also showed he was normal and “had everything necessary to the Modern Man”—radio, car, etcetera. The Public Opinion researchers found “he held the proper opinions for the time of year,” supporting peace in peacetime but serving when there was war. He was married and had the appropriate number of five children, according to the Eugenicist. He never interfered with the public schools.

It is absurd to ask whether he was free or happy, for if anything had been wrong, “we should certainly have heard.”

“The Unknown Citizen” (1940) is one of Auden’s most famous poems. Often anthologized and read by students in high school and college, it is renowned for its wit and irony in complaining about the stultifying and anonymous qualities of bureaucratic, semi-socialist Western societies. Its structure is that of a satiric elegy, as though the boring, unknown citizen was so utterly unremarkable that the state honored him with a poetic monument about how little trouble he caused for anyone. It resembles the “Unknown Soldier” memorials that nations erect to honor the soldiers who fought and died for their countries and whose names have been lost to posterity; Britain’s is located in Westminster Abbey and the United States’ is located in Arlington, Virginia. This one, in an unnamed location, lists the unknown man as simply “JS/07 M 378.”

The rhyme scheme changes a few times throughout the poem. Most frequently the reader notices rhyming couplets. These sometimes use the same number of syllables, but they are not heroic couplets—no, they are not in iambic pentameter—they are often 11 or 13 syllables long, or of differing lengths. These patterns increase the dry humor of the poem.

Auden’s “Unknown Citizen” is not anonymous like the Unknown Soldier, for the bureaucracy knows a great deal about him. The named agencies give the sense, as early as 1940, that a powerful Big Brother kind of bureaucracy watches over its citizens and collects data on them and keeps it throughout one’s life. This feeling makes the poem eerie and prescient; one often thinks of the dystopian, totalitarian states found in the writings of George Orwell and Aldous Huxley or the data-driven surveillance state of today. In Auden’s context, one might think of the state-focused governments of Hitler, Stalin, and Mussolini.

The Big Brother perspective begins from the very outset of the poem, with its evocation of a Bureau of Statistics. The man has had every aspect of his life catalogued. He served his community, he held a job, he paid union dues, he did not hold radical views, he reacted normally to advertisements, he had insurance, he possessed the right material goods, he had proper opinions about current events, and he married and had the right amount of children. It does not appear on paper that he did anything wrong or out of place. In fact, “he was a saint” from the state’s perspective, having “served the Greater Community.” The words used to describe him—“normal,” “right,” “sensible,” “proper,” “popular”—indicate that he is considered the ideal citizen. He is praised as “unknown” because there was nothing interesting to know. Consider, in comparison, the completely normalized protagonist Emmet in The Lego Movie .

At the end of the poem, the closing couplet asks, “Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd: / Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.” With these last lines comes the deeper meaning of the poem, the irony that despite all of the bureaucratic data gathering, some aspect of the individual might not have been captured. It becomes clear that the citizen is also “unknown” because in this statistical gathering of data, the man’s individuality and identity are lost. This bureaucratic society, focused on its official view of the common good, assesses a person using external, easily-catalogued characteristics rather than respect for one’s uniqueness, one’s particular thoughts, feelings, hopes, fears, and goals.

Interestingly, and ironically, the speaker himself is also unknown. The professionals in the poem— “his employers,” “our Social Psychology workers,” “our researchers into Public Opinion,” “our Eugenicist”— are just as anonymous and devoid of personality. While a person might be persuaded that he is free or happy, the evidence of his life shows that he is just one more cog in the faceless, nameless bureaucratic machine.

W. H. Auden: Poems Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for W. H. Auden: Poems is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Q) Discuss WH. Auden's vernacular language in the poem " Funeral Blues?

Check this out:

https://www.gradesaver.com/w-h-auden-poems/study-guide/summary-funeral-blues-stop-all-the-clocks

How does the poem the Shield of Achilles contrast the ancient and the modern times?

Critic Scott Horton argues that the poem has contemporary resonance for Auden and his audience, reflecting a warning about the Cold War and the authoritarian warmongering of the 1950s: “Auden is not portraying the tragedies of the last war as...

The Nabarra

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Study Guide for W. H. Auden: Poems

W. H. Auden: Poems study guide contains a biography of Wystan Hugh Auden, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, character analysis, and a full summary and analysis on select poems.

• About W. H. Auden: Poems
• W. H. Auden: Poems Summary
• Character List

Essays for W. H. Auden: Poems

W. H. Auden: Poems essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of W. H. Auden's poetry.

• Communist Poetry of the 1930s and Modernism
• Three Examples of Auden’s Wartime Poetry: In Time of War: Sonnet XVI, Spain 1937, and 1st September 1939
• Auden's Poetry and "Home and Away": Art in Wartime
• Recycling Art; the Reuse of Artistic Thought and Theme in Auden, Joyce, and Eliot
• Understanding Rejection in “Disabled” and “Refugee Blues”

Wikipedia Entries for W. H. Auden: Poems

• Introduction
• Published works

Cummings Study Guide

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Study Guide Prepared by Michael J. Cummings ... © 2012

....... The speaker of the poem is a government worker who addresses readers and listeners in first-person-plural point of view (using our and we ) to indicate that he is speaking on behalf of his fellow government employees.

Tone ....... The tone of the poem is objective and businesslike.

Main Theme: Conformity

Our researchers into Public Opinion are content That he held the proper opinions for the time of year; When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went.

1, 3, 5 : be, agree, community 2, 4 : complaint, saint 6, 7 : retired, fired 8, 13 : Inc., drink 9, 10 : views, dues 11, 12 : sound, found 14, 15 : day, way 16, 17 : insured, cured 18, 21, 23 : declare, frigidaire, year 19, 20 : Plan, Man 22, 24 : content, went 25, 26, 27 : population, generation, education 28, 29 : absurd, heard

• Generally, citizens of a democracy should abide by government laws. For example, they should respect the rights of others to freedom of speech and freedom of religion, and they should pay their fair share of taxes. However, under certain circumstances, citizens have a right—perhaps even a moral duty—to oppose the will of the government and its laws. Write an essay that explains circumstances under which citizens ought to oppose a government policy or law. To support your thesis, use examples from the past and cite issues in the present with the potential to arouse the wrath of the people.
• Identify a government policy or law with which you disagree. Explain why you disagree with it.
• The words of the poem are an epitaph inscribed on the monument over the tomb of the Unknown Citizen. What would you like your epitaph to say about you when you are lying at eternal rest?
• Write a poem about a deceased person who, unlike the Unknown Citizen, was not afraid to speak out against government policies.

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The Unknown Citizen Questions

Bring on the tough stuff - there’s not just one right answer..

• Is the poem a criticism of American life in particular, or could it apply to other cultures? Does America have equivalents to a "Bureau of Statistics," a "Eugenist," and "researchers into Public Opinion"?
• The poem was written in 1939, and some critics have found parallels with the rise of fascist, authoritarian governments in Europe. Is the "State" of the poem a fascist state, or is it merely a subtle parody of democratic and socialist governments?
• If someone were to write a poem on a monument dedicated to you, what would it say? How are you like or unlike the Unknown Citizen? Do you have any "odd views"?
• How would you describe Auden’s style? Does it sound like anything you have read before? Is it consistent? Did you laugh out loud at any parts of the poem?
• Parts of the poem obviously sound old-fashioned ("frigidaire," "Eugenics," etc.). But, on the whole, is it still relevant today? Do governments know more or less about citizens before than they did in the 1930s? What about corporations?

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Home / Essay Samples / Literature / Poems

The Unknown Citizen Essay Examples and Topics

by W. H. Auden

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The Unknown Citizen by W. H. Auden. Literary Analysis

“The Unknown Citizen”, a poem written by W.H. Auden, reflects a period of vast change in Americas history, making “The Unknown Citizen” an example of the governments view of the perfect modern man in an overrated, unrealistic society. During the time period that this poem…

W. H. Auden

Dystopian literature

January 6, 1940

The poem describes the life of an unknown man. The author criticizes standardization and the modern state's relationship with its citizens by describing the "average citizen" through the eyes of various government organizations.

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The Unknown Citizen Essay

The foremost reason why I think W.H. Auden’s poem The Unknown Citizen represents a particularly high literary value is that themes and motifs, explored in it, reflect the discursive realities of a modern living. At their turn, these realities are being concerned with the process of people growing increasingly disfranchised from their sense of self-identity.

This, however, causes them to experience the emotionally disturbing sensation of an existentialist ‘anonymousness’. In my paper, I will aim to explore the validity of this suggestion at length.

When readers get to be exposed to The Unknown Citizen for the first time, many of them end up experiencing the sensation of a cognitive dissonance. This is because, even though the name of this poem implies the lack of a factual information about the citizen in question, the poem’s actual body contains a detailed description of what kind of a man the concerned individual was:

“He worked in a factory and never got fired,

But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc…

And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,

A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire…

He was married and added five children to the population” (Auden par. 1).

Nevertheless, after having read the poem, they begin to realize the actual rationale that prompted Auden to name his poetic masterpiece, in the way he did. Apparently, the author wanted to advance the idea that our possession of the statistical data about a particular deceased individual, does not provide us with an insight as to what were the qualitative aspects of his or her stance in life.

This is the reason why, even after having found out about the ‘unknown citizen’ just about everything they could, readers usually do not get closer to understanding what accounted for his actual individuality:

“Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd: Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard” (par. 1).

Hence, the philosophical implication of Auden’s poem – despite the fact that in today’s world people can well enjoy a number of life-comforts (due to their ability to afford buying technological gadgets), they nevertheless remain ‘anonymous, in the existentialist sense of this word. This simply could not be otherwise, because nowadays, it is specifically people’s willingness to suppress their individuality, while leading thoroughly conventional lifestyles, which defines their chances of securing well-paid jobs and attaining a social prominence.

However, the same willingness, on these people’s part, makes them less likely to leave a mark in history, while increasing their likelihood to be turned into a nameless ‘cannon meat’, during the time of war – just as it happened to Auden’s ‘unknown citizen’. Therefore, there can be few doubts, as to the thoroughly humanistic sounding of The Unknown Citizen . This is because this poem subtly promotes the idea that the cost of one’s eagerness to lead a conventional lifestyle is his or her ahistoricity (anonymousness).

This is exactly the reason why, I believe this particular Auden’s novel should be recommended for reading – it resonates perfectly well with the discourse of post-modernity, which defines the specifics of a contemporary living in the West. Moreover, it also contains insights as to why, despite their conventional happiness, many of our contemporaries nevertheless continue to experience a number of deep-seated anxieties, in regards to what they really are, as individuals.

I believe that the provided line of argumentation, as to what I consider contributing to Auden poem’s actual value, is being fully consistent with the initial thesis.

Works Cited

Auden, Wystan Hugh. The Unknown Citizen . 13 Dec. 2012. Web. < http://www.geocities.ws/dspichtinger/otexts/auden.html >

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IvyPanda. (2019, June 20). The Unknown Citizen. https://ivypanda.com/essays/the-unknown-citizen/

"The Unknown Citizen." IvyPanda , 20 June 2019, ivypanda.com/essays/the-unknown-citizen/.

IvyPanda . (2019) 'The Unknown Citizen'. 20 June.

IvyPanda . 2019. "The Unknown Citizen." June 20, 2019. https://ivypanda.com/essays/the-unknown-citizen/.

1. IvyPanda . "The Unknown Citizen." June 20, 2019. https://ivypanda.com/essays/the-unknown-citizen/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "The Unknown Citizen." June 20, 2019. https://ivypanda.com/essays/the-unknown-citizen/.

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UNKNOWN CITIZEN- BASIC ENGLISH NOTES - SEMESTER I - QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

UNKNOWN CITIZEN

Answer the following questions in a sentence or two.

1) Why is the unknown citizen unknown?

Ans: "The  Unknown Citizen " is a parody of the symbolic Tomb of the  Unknown  Soldier commemorating  unidentified  soldiers; tombs of  unknown  soldiers were first created following the First World War.

2) What is the number given to unknown citizen?

Ans: the number, “JS/07/M/378.” This number is much like a social security number.

3) How does the state identify the unknown citizen?

Ans: the  citizen  is  identified  by his social  identification , the number, “JS/07/M/378.” This number is much like a social security number. It leads investigators to various data banks that provide details regarding the  citizen's  life, and this is the irony upon which the poem turns.

4) Is unknown citizen free and happy?

Ans: The  citizen  in "The  Unknown Citizen " was neither  happy  nor  free . Had the  unknown citizen  been either of these things during his lifetime then the government would've known about it.

5) What is the theme of the “Unknown Citizen”?

Ans: unknown citizen  is a model of conformity in a society where everyone must follow the rules if things are to run smoothly.

6) How does the epitaph help to introduce the theme of the poem?

Ans: The  poem  is a satirical eulogy of a citizen who is praised because of his mediocrity and his compliance. In his life, he had done what was expected of him; he made no waves, ruffled no feathers, and rocked no boats. Based on the title, the reader can already assume that the  poem  is going to be negative toward the government's view of citizens.

7) On what basis unknown citizen was popular?

Ans: he was  popular  with his mates and liked a drink. The Press is convinced that he bought a paper every day. And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.

8) How many children unknown citizen has?

Ans: Unknown citizen has five children.

9) What is the irony in the poem “Unknown Citizen”?

Ans: The  Tone  of Irony in the Unknown Citizen. “The Unknown Citizen,” a poem written by W.H. Auden, alludes to a time of great change in American history, where the poem is meant to mock the government's viewpoint of the perfect role model for an unrealistic, impractical citizen.

10) What does the title of the poem “Unknown Citizen’ signify?

Ans: Unknown Citizen is a satire on modern governance system. It is satire on the way in which the average man in the street is controlled by the conventions of bureaucracy and the welfare state.

11) What according to Auden does the word “Saint” mean in the modern age?

Ans: Saint in the modern age means any man who is subservient to the wishes and aspirations of the government.

12) Where was the unknown citizen working?

Ans: The unknown citizen was working in Fudge Motors Inc.

13) What did the social psychology workers find about the unknown citizen?

Ans: Social Psychology workers found that he was popular with his mates and like a drink.

14) What did the press say about the unknown citizen?

Ans: The press said that they were convinced that he bought a paper every day and that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.

15) What did the health card of the unknown citizen show?

Ans: The health card of the unknown citizen showed that he was once in hospital but left it cured.

16) What did the Eugenist say about the unknown citizen?

Ans: Eugenist said that he had contributed the right number for a parent of his generation.

17) What did the teachers say about the unknown citizen as a parent?

Ans: The teachers said that he never interfered with their education.

18) Who is being attacked in this satire?

Ans: Modern Governance is being attacked in this satire.

Explain the following statements with reference to their context.

1)   He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be.

One against whom there was no official complaint.

Ans:   According to the Bureau of Statistics, the unknown citizen was a model worker who served the greater community well. The poem begins by describing a person referred to as, simply, "He." We take this to be "The Unknown Citizen," which makes sense, because his name isn’t known. For simplicity’s sake, we’re going to refer to him as "The UC."  The Bureau of Statistics has found that "no official complaint" has been made against our guy, the UC. Now, this is a strange way to start a poem of celebration. It’s a total backhanded compliment. It’s like if you asked someone what they thought of your new haircut, and they replied, "Well, it’s not hideous." Um, thanks…? But here’s a question: what on earth is the Bureau of Statistics, and why is it investigating the UC? There isn’t any Bureau of Statistics in any country that we know of, but most "bureaus," or government offices, deal with statistics every day. The Bureau of Statistics seems to be a parody of such "bureaucracies," which are large, complicated organizations that produce a lot of red tape and official paperwork. If the Bureau of Statistics has information about the UC, then it probably has information about everyone, because, in a certain sense, the UC  represents  everyone. He’s the average Joe. The fact that there was no "official" complaint against the UC doesn’t tell us much. Were there "unofficial" complaints? We don’t know, and from the poem’s perspective, it doesn’t seem to matter. Auden subtly pushes back on the anonymity of the UC in one interesting way, however. The first word of the second line is "One," which produces a minor joke if you stop reading there: The UC was found to be…One, as in he was found to be a single person: an individual. This is funny, because an individual is exactly what the idea of an "Unknown Citizen" is  not .

2) That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint,

Ans: Get out your highlighters and reading glasses: we’re still poring through the paperwork of the lovable Bureau of Statistics. Now we have in front of us the "reports on his conduct." Let’s see: ah, yes, it appears the man was a saint. But not a saint like St. Francis or Mother Teresa: those are "old-fashioned" saints, who performed miracles and helped feed the hungry and clothe the poor. No, the UC is a "modern" saint, which means that he always served the "Greater Community." This community could include the poor and the hungry, but somehow we think that’s not what the speaker has in mind. And the words "Greater Community" are capitalized as if it were a proper name, though it’s not. As in the first two lines, these lines raise more questions than they answer. Who issued these "reports"? His friends? Lovers? Co-workers? Some guy in an office somewhere? We don’t have an answer.

3) That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink,

Ans:   Now the poem shifts from his employment to his social life. But, don’t worry: there are still comically absurd bureaucrats to provide us with unnecessary information. Stop the presses! Headline: "Average Joe Enjoys Drinking With Pals." Even in his carousing with friends, though, the UC takes things in moderation. He likes "a drink," and the singular form implies that he doesn’t drink too much and isn’t an alcoholic. At the time when Auden wrote the poem, "Social Psychology" was still a relatively new field. Social psychologists study the behavior of humans in groups. This sounds good in concept, but in practice, a lot of the early work done in this field simply pointed out things that were so obvious they didn’t need to be pointed out. (Don’t worry, psychology majors, the field has gotten quite a bit more complicated since then.) It’s like when you read about some scientific study that says that unhappy people are more likely to drink a lot, and you wonder why on earth they needed a study to support such an obvious conclusion. Nonetheless, we have to think that the UC might have been flattered to be getting so much attention from all these intellectual types. That is, if he were still alive.

4) The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day.

Ans: This is starting to sound like an infomercial you might see for some exercise machine on cable at 3 a.m. There are testimonials galore. Now "The Press," or news media, offers its take. Of course, they don’t really care about the UC as a person; they’re just glad he seems to have bought a paper every day. Or, rather, they are "convinced" that he did. We’d like to know what convinced them. Not only that, but he also had "normal" reactions to the advertisements in a paper. ("Hey! An inflatable kayak! I sure could use one of those…")  In short, he’s a good American consumer.

5) Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured.

Ans: We’re starting to suspect that the government must have an entire room full of paperwork on this guy. Now we are rifling through his health insurance policy, looking for any evidence that he wasn’t a totally straightedge, middle-of-the-road personality. He was "fully insured," which is sensible. This guy wasn’t exactly a risk-taker. Even though he had insurance, he only went to the hospital once, which means he wasn’t too much of a burden on the health system. He left the hospital "cured".

6) That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;

When there was peace, he was for peace; when there was war, he went.

Ans: The "researchers into Public Opinion" are like the people nowadays who call your house during dinnertime to ask you who you’re voting for and whether your jeans are stone-washed or boot-cut. The UC didn’t have any weird or "improper" opinions. He was a conformist, which means that he believed what the people around him seemed to believe. He was like a weather vane, going whichever way the wind blew. Indeed, the UC’s beliefs were partly determined by the seasons or "time of year." Line 24 is also pretty funny. We imagine a pause for comic suspense after word "war." "When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war…(pause)…he went." The line leads us to expect that it will end "he was for war," but we actually get something much more hesitant. Because, really, who could be "for war"?

7) Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:

Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

Ans: The poem ends on a final, rhyming couplet that takes a big detour from the conventional topics that have occupied the speaker so far. Now he asks two questions – "Was he free? Was he happy?" – that really do seem interesting. These questions are not interesting to the speaker, though, who calls it "absurd." It’s interesting that these two questions are referred to in the singular, as "the question," as if being free and being happy were the same thing. In the final line, the speaker explains why the question is absurd: if things had been going badly for the UC, the State ("we") would have known about it, seeing as they know everything. The speaker’s confidence in this line – "we certainly should have" – is downright chilling. But, of course, the big joke here is that the speaker defines happiness in the negative, as things not going wrong, instead of as things going right. From the perspective of the State, it is much more important that people are not desperately unhappy – so they don’t rock the boat and stop buying things – than it is that they experience personal fulfillment.

Answer the following questions in 300 words.

1) What does the poet want to convey about the modern society through the poem?

Ans: The poet is sending out a warning in many ways. The anonymous nature of the unknown citizen is a comment on governments encouraging communalism versus freedom through the poem “The Unknown Citizen,” Auden wants to convey the idea that modern society is overly regimented and controlled by the state. As a result, people have become dehumanized, treated as nothing more than cogs in a gigantic machine. The poem critiques the way modern society instrumentalists’ human beings. To instrumentalist a person is to use them merely to extract as much value or profit from them as possible. It is considered unethical, for instance, to have a second child so that that child's bone marrow can be extracted to treat an illness in the first child. A person should not be birthed simply to be used. In this poem, however, the state finds in the unknown citizen the model citizen because he is utterly instrumental. He completely conforms and does everything he is supposed to do, without deviation. He comes to work regularly and without complaint, so society is able to extract maximum value from his labor. He also does exactly what he is supposed to do with his leisure time: he was "popular with his mates and liked a drink." In other words, he doesn't do anything to create headaches or require the state to expend extra resources "fixing" him. In fact, by drinking, he drowns any disquiet he might feel. He also does his part in having a family to provide more instruments for the state to use: in fact, he has five children. Finally, not only does he work efficiently, he also consumes, keeping the machinery of capitalism profitable. His lack of a name symbolizes that he is valuable to the state only for what he does for it, not for himself as a unique being. Auden ends the poem by asking the more abstract question of whether such an individual is free or happy and having the state dismiss such musings as "absurd." Auden wants to convey that it is dehumanizing for people to be treated as if they are little more than machines to be programmed and worked until they wear out.

2) Give a critical appreciation of the poem “Unknown Citizen”.

Ans: W. H. Auden , an English author, wrote this poem while living in the United States.  “ The Unknown Citizen ” is a satirical poem based on the very serious military  Unknown Soldier  which is a tribute to those soldiers who died fighting for their country could not be identified.  The title establishes the subject of the poem but  is never mentioned again. The poem is supposedly written on a statue somewhere built by the state. The poem is intended to show a humorous approach to the modern world of 1938 which takes itself too seriously.  Narration The point of view is third person with the narrator including himself in the poem by using some first person pronouns: our Eugenist; our teachers. The speaker is someone who works for a fictional government who makes decisions that impact lives that he has never or will never meet.  The poem uses few literary devices other than it is a  parody  for the pretense of celebrating a life of a man that does not exist.  It does rhyme with the rhyme scheme varying throughout the poem.  The only  metaphor  that is obvious is the unknown citizen compared to a saint. Called a modern saint, it is apparent that this is a facetious statement since he appears to be just an ordinary man. Ironically like the Big Brother concept, the poem predicts or even warns about the future that could have many organizations that watch over and check on citizens.  The unknown citizen is declared a saint because of his behavior and lack of breaking the rules. Part of the poem’s  irony  comes from the list of accomplishments of the citizen which are not really achievements at all.  They are an ordinary life.   The statue that supposedly built really celebrates the ordinary man who does not want to cause any problems and follows the accepted pattern for a man's life.  The poet really does not want man to be like the unknown citizen but more independent and creative.

3) What are the views of the narrator on the bureaucracy and welfare state?

Ans: The Unknown Citizen is a poem that Auden wrote at a turning point in his life, when he left England for the USA and left behind the idea that his poetry could make anything happen in the world. The year was 1939, Hitler had plunged Europe into darkness and the young Auden was horrified. But he had already done his bit for the cause, having married Erika Mann, the daughter of famous writer Thomas Mann, to help save her from the brutality of the Nazis. His move to America helped broaden his artistic output. He began to concentrate on religion and relationships in his poetry, as opposed to left-wing politics, and he also ventured into writing drama and libretti. Auden was a gifted craftsman as a poet, writing long, technically astute poems but he also embraced the move towards free verse, combining both modern and traditional elements. The human condition was his main focus, but he did say that: The Unknown Citizen  is both satirical and disturbing, written by Auden to highlight the role of the individual and the increasingly faceless bureaucracy that can arise in any country, with any type of government, be it left-wing or right-wing. The tone of the poem is impersonal and clinical, the speaker more than likely a suited bureaucrat expressing the detached view of the state. The unknown citizen is reduced to a mere number, a series of letters; there is no name, no birthplace or mention of loved ones. It is clear from the first five lines that the state is in total control and has planned and structured this individual's life in order to create a complete conformist, someone who has a clean identity, who serves the greater good.

The state even calls him a 'saint', because he kept to the straight and narrow and was a good role model, not because he was holy or carried out religious acts. He maintained the standards expected of him by those in power. He worked hard, was part of the union but never strayed or broke the rules. Only the war interrupted his working life which made him a popular member of the workforce. There is mention of the Social Psychology department, part of the state who no doubt investigated his background when he died, and found all was normal according to his mates. He bought a newspaper each day, that is, he read the propaganda dished out by the bias press, and had no adverse reaction to the advertisements in that paper. There is some sound corporate brain-washing going on here and this citizen has one of the cleanest in the Greater Community. He's not a critical thinker but a solid type of guy who you would want living next door. He keeps up with his household goods, he adheres to all societal rules. This man is averages Joe, a perfect citizen who is conditioned to routine and will never question the settled life, unless the state calls on him for purposes of war. This citizen is treated like a little boy himself, patted on the head for being a good if unquestioning person. But note that the speaker mentions the Eugenist - a person who investigates eugenics, the genetic makeup of this man's family - and coldly says that his 5 children was the 'right number' for his generation.

4) Explain the irony presented in the poem “Unknown Citizen”.

Ans: “The Unknown Citizen,” a poem written by W.H. Auden, alludes to a time of great change in American history, where the poem is meant to mock the government’s viewpoint of the perfect role model for an unrealistic, impractical citizen. The author, W.H. Auden, writes and intends for the historical context of his poem to be in the late 1930’s, when America was going through the Great Depression. Citizens were losing a sense of nationalism for America and had begun to negatively view the government . During this time period, the government had also begun to distribute Social Security cards with personalized federal numbers to American citizens, which was the mark of depersonalization in America’s political system. As a result, the tone is one of mockery, satire, and most importantly, irony. The ironic outlook is evident in some of the following aspects of the poem: the speaker, the portrayal of the speaker, the audience, the speaker’s situation, incongruity between the character’s words and the situation, use of diction, use of humor, and unique characteristics of the poem. The author’s poem is told from the viewpoint of a member of the State, or American government; however, the author and speaker are different people in this particular poem. Textual evidence for the speaker of the poem is evident in the parenthetical title of the poem: “This Marble Monument is erected by the State.” In this case, the “State” is the American government, as the speaker is a member of the State. The State closely monitors an American citizen who serves as a perfect role model for his fellow citizens in the view of the government. Thus, "The Unknown Citizen" reveals irony. The poem is a bitter satire against forms of government that only want their citizens to conform to the governments' norms. The State recognizes the unknown citizen for his abiding by the government's and carefully examines and records all aspects of his life.

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The Unknown Citizen

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(To JS/07 M 378 This Marble Monument Is Erected by the State)

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be One against whom there was no official complaint, And all the reports on his conduct agree That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint, For in everything he did he served the Greater Community. Except for the War till the day he retired He worked in a factory and never got fired, But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc. Yet he wasn't a scab or odd in his views, For his Union reports that he paid his dues, (Our report on his Union shows it was sound) And our Social Psychology workers found That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink. The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way. Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured, And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured. Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Instalment Plan And had everything necessary to the Modern Man, A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire. Our researchers into Public Opinion are content That he held the proper opinions for the time of year; When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went. He was married and added five children to the population, Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his generation. And our teachers report that he never interfered with their education. Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd: Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

From Another Time by W. H. Auden, published by Random House. Copyright © 1940 W. H. Auden, renewed by the Estate of W. H. Auden. Used by permission of Curtis Brown, Ltd.

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In Memory of W. B. Yeats

He disappeared in the dead of winter: The brooks were frozen, the airports almost deserted, And snow disfigured the public statues; The mercury sank in the mouth of the dying day. What instruments we have agree The day of his death was a dark cold day.

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Preliminary Report from the Committee on Appropriate Postures for the Suffering

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Home — Essay Samples — Literature — The Unknown Citizen — Analyzing W.H Auden’s Poem, The Unknown Citizen

Analyzing W.h Auden’s Poem, The Unknown Citizen

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The essay analyzes W. H. Auden's poem "The Unknown Citizen." The poem explores the theme of anonymity and conformity in modern society. The title itself, "The Unknown Citizen," highlights the key idea that the identity of the man described in the poem remains concealed. The speaker appears to be delivering a eulogy, but the tone is characterized by irony and sarcasm.

The poem provides extensive information about the man's life, but it lacks personal details, emphasizing the dehumanizing effect of conformity. The speaker uses complex diction and syntax, leaving room for multiple interpretations and inviting readers to fill in the gaps. The vocabulary used in the poem, such as "phonograph," "radio," "car," and "Frigidaire," reflects the time period in which it was written, likely during World War II.

Auden's poem employs limited similes and metaphors, favoring straightforward language. The metaphor comparing the Unknown Citizen to a saint serves to highlight the man's conformity to societal norms. Hyperbole is present when the poem mentions the man having "everything necessary to a Modern Man" but omits basic survival necessities like food and water.

Sound devices are sparingly used in the poem, with occasional instances of alliteration, such as in the repetition of the vowel 'A' in "phonograph," "radio," "car," and "Frigidaire." The poem's rhyme scheme deviates from a standard pattern, alternating between different rhyme schemes as the poem progresses.

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The Unknown Citizen by W. H. Auden Questions and Answers

• What does the number to JS/07/M/378 suggest?

Ans. It is a number by which the state identifies the unknown citizen. After his death, this number was inscribed on the marble monument created on his grave. But here Auden severely satirizes the modern state policy where the value of a man is reduced to a numerical number and people lose their individuality. What is more striking is that such number is given to a prisoner in jail. Perhaps, here Auden knocks at the human brain to know to what extent we have degraded as a result of which we lose our dignity and bureaucracy rules our country.

• What do you know about unknown citizen?

Ans. The unknown citizen was a man against whom there was no official complain. He worked in a factory and satisfied his employers. He paid his dues duly. Trade union reports in favour of him. He was preferred by his mates. He liked drinking and like a modern man, he possessed a gramophone, a radio, a car and a refrigerator. He was aware of the installment plans. He added 5 children to the population of the world. He had health card and insurance policies. All these show that he was a saint like man in modern sense of the old fashioned word. But, what is tragic is that inspite of having all these qualities, he was not regarded as a good man by the state authority.

• Give the meaning of ‘eugenist’ and ‘scab’. Where did the unknown citizen work?

Ans. Eugenist means an expert on race improvement. Actually, there are some specialist scientists who always work on the specialisation of human breeding and are given this term. This is purely a biological term.

The term ‘scab’ means slang or rascal. It also means one who refuses to join his fellows in a strike.

The unknown citizen worked in The Fudge Motors Inc., a modern factory undoubtedly.

• What question made about the unknown citizen is absurd? Was he free and happy?

Ans. The unknown citizen was a slave to his duties. He performed them duly. He always worked in such a style so that none could question him. As a result of which, forgetting all the affairs, he had to move within a routined boundary wherefrom no escape was possible. He never thought of going beyond that to retain his dignity. Now, if anybody ask “Was he free?” or “Was he happy?” undoubtedly, these will be absurd questions. Because, there was no question of freedom or happiness in his life. In spite of doing good deed, he was not valued as a man. So, if he looked for those things, then his condition is simply perceptible to us. As he was a mere puppet in the hands of bureaucracy, his freedom or happiness are unquestionable.

• What is the main theme of “The Unknown Citizen” by W. H. Auden?

Ans. The main theme of the poem is the dehumanizing and conformist nature of modern society, where individuality is sacrificed for the sake of societal norms and expectations.

• Who is the speaker of the poem?

Ans. The speaker is a government official or bureaucrat who is assessing the life and accomplishments of the “unknown citizen.”

• What does the poem suggest about the relationship between the individual and society?

Ans. The poem suggests that in a conformist society, individuals are expected to fit into prescribed roles and adhere to societal norms. Individuality and personal expression are sacrificed for the sake of conformity.

• What are some specific accomplishments and qualities attributed to the “unknown citizen” in the poem?

Ans. The poem lists several accomplishments and qualities, such as being “a saint,” “a good patriot,” and having “a grade A for breeding.” It also mentions his conformity to societal norms, including his marriage, children, and consumption habits.

• How does the poem comment on the role of government in shaping the lives of its citizens?

Ans. The poem implies that the government in this society plays a significant role in shaping the lives of its citizens by promoting conformity and evaluating individuals based on their ability to conform to societal norms.

• What is the overall message or moral of “The Unknown Citizen”?

Ans. The poem serves as a warning about the dangers of conformism and the loss of individuality in modern society. It encourages readers to question societal expectations and value individuality and personal expression.

• What is the purpose of the poem “The Unknown Citizen”?

Ans. The poem serves as a satirical critique of a society that values conformity and bureaucratic efficiency over individuality and personal freedom. Auden uses this poem to comment on the dehumanizing effects of modernity and the loss of individuality in a highly regulated and controlled society.

• What are some of the characteristics and achievements of the “Unknown Citizen” mentioned in the poem?

Ans. The poem lists several characteristics and achievements of the “Unknown Citizen,” including:

He held a job for 20 years.

He was a member of various organizations and unions.

He paid his dues promptly.

He never got fired from his job.

He had the correct opinions on various political and social issues.

He was married and had children.

He insured his life and property.

He didn’t engage in radical behavior or dissent.

These characteristics are meant to emphasize how thoroughly he conformed to societal norms.

• What is the significance of the title “The Unknown Citizen”?

Ans. The title “The Unknown Citizen” is significant because it underscores the idea that despite all the conformity and compliance with societal expectations, the individual remains unknown and uncelebrated as a unique person. The poem challenges the notion that being an “unknown” in the eyes of society is a measure of success.

• What is the message or lesson conveyed by the poem?

Ans. The poem conveys a message about the dangers of conformity and the loss of individuality in a highly regulated and bureaucratic society. It suggests that when individuals prioritize fitting into societal norms at the expense of their own uniqueness and freedom, they become “unknown” even though they have followed all the rules. The poem serves as a warning against the dehumanizing effects of such a society.

• How does the poem use irony to convey its message?

Ans. The poem uses irony to highlight the discrepancy between the “perfect” life of the Unknown Citizen as seen by the government and the true, complex nature of the individual. For example, the poem lists the Citizen’s conformity to various societal expectations as if they are achievements, but the reader can see the hollowness of these accomplishments in the context of his individuality being erased.

• Who is the “Unknown Citizen” in the poem?

Ans. The “Unknown Citizen” in the poem is an average, conforming citizen whose life is thoroughly documented and controlled by the government and society. He represents the ideal citizen from the perspective of the government, but he is also nameless and devoid of individuality.

• What is the tone of the poem?

Ans. The tone of the poem is satirical and critical. Auden uses irony and sarcasm to mock the idea of a perfectly conforming citizen as an ideal. He suggests that this conformity strips away individuality and leads to a meaningless, controlled existence.

• What is the significance of the marble monument mentioned in the poem?

Ans. The marble monument represents the government’s desire to immortalize the “Unknown Citizen” as a model of conformity and ideal citizenship. It symbolizes the way the state reduces individuals to statistics and uses them to bolster its image of efficiency and control.

• What are some examples of the government’s control and surveillance in the poem?

Ans. The poem mentions several ways in which the government exercises control and surveillance over the “Unknown Citizen.” These include the detailed records of his life, his conformity to social norms, his good behavior, and the fact that he held the right opinions. All of these aspects are meticulously documented and celebrated.

• What is the central message or critique that Auden conveys through “The Unknown Citizen”?

Ans. The central message of the poem is a critique of the dehumanizing effects of bureaucracy, conformity, and the relentless pursuit of an idealized citizen. Auden suggests that in striving for this ideal, society and the government strip individuals of their unique identities and turn them into mere cogs in a machine. The poem warns against the loss of personal freedom and individuality in the pursuit of a highly controlled and regulated society.

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