Poem Analysis: The Unknown Citizen Essay

In “America the beautiful” the author’s use of diction creates an uplifting spiritual tone in the poem.The author uses the same words “oh beautiful for…”focusing not on America's flaws but on the beauty. For instance the start of stanza 4 she writes “o beautiful 4 heroes proved in liberty strife who more than self her country loved and marymor than life”.She apads for the people who believe in freedom of america by sacrificing their lives for their

Richard Blanco is a Cuban- American poet who was given the oppurunity to write an inaugaration poem for Barack Obama's second swearing-in. He wrote a poem titled "One Today" that praised the good and unique things about the United States and also the everyday people who's daily routines help to make America the proud country that it is.

Lorna Dee Cervantes' poem, “Poema para los Californios Muertos” (“Poem for the Dead Californios”), is a commentary on what happened to the original inhabitants of California when California was still Mexico, and an address to the speaker's dead ancestors. Utilizing a unique dynamic, consistently alternating between Spanish and English, Cervantes accurately represents the fear, hatred, and humility experienced by the “Californios” through rhythm, arrangement, tone, and most importantly, through use of language.

“It’s not easy to be a hero. You do it because of what you believe, not because of what other people deserve.” Anyone can face a challenge or a hardship. But what makes a true hero is how the person takes on the challenge. Often, heroes show feats of ingenuity and acts of bravery. Two heroes that acted during the American Civil Rights Movement, were Martin Luther King Jr, and Rosa Parks. A hero is a person who has demonstrated behaviors to ethically receive our appreciation and respect. A hero is an ordinary person who finds the strength within themselves to persevere and undergo hardships and calamity.

Courage and selflessness are words that describe heroes. Mundane people can be heroes when they have enough perseverance to do extraordinary tasks. They sacrifice their needs for others. Frederick Douglass was a brave, honorable and bold abolitionist, his heroism was impactful and it changed the mindset of many people.

The title itself alludes to “The Unknown Soldier,” almost parodying it. According to Georgia Virtual School, an unknown soldier died in battle, however, the body is unrecognizable. It is also known that soldiers are tagged. The fact that the title is the way it is and the subtitle mimics a tag implies that the lives of common folk is so insignificant and uneventful that they might just as well be unknown since they are just another face in the vast crowd of people. This relays a metaphor in the eyes of the reader.

Prompt: In a brief essay, identify at least two of the implications implicit in the society reflected in the poem. Support your statements by specific references to the poem.

It is clear that there is a resistant and rebellious theme of the poem, that tells the truth about human problems. This is made clear by the writer saying, “but who do you see in the mirror when there’s only yourself and you. Who really knows the truth of the fascist, that lives inside of you.” So, majority, if not all of the poem does not relate to the traditional stereotype and forces the readers to look beyond the

The writing styles of Claudine Rankine and Colson Whitehead vary significantly, but both manage to address the issue of race in America in profound ways. In Citizen: An American Lyric, the former utilizes a combination of images and poetry to convey a sense of open-endedness, while the latter follows a traditional historical fiction narrative in his novel, The Underground Railroad. The books build on historical and modern events to evoke emotion and convey criticism. *Rankine uses an experimental style to allow introspection, and Whitehead’s traditional writing blurs the line between fiction and nonfiction.

The author describes this citizen as being an overall regular man in society, who did not change or impact the world by any means. He was a normal man who bought a paper every day

Interest is further maintained throughout the poem by the use of unique literary techniques. Unlike other poems, ‘Famous’ does not rhyme nor does it follow any specific structure. It does, however, correspond with the spontaneity of incorporating everyday objects by not following a set structure. Throughout the poem, sibilance, anaphora, parallelism and allusion have been incorporated to achieve a constant face paced movement throughout the initial seven stanzas of the poem. These stanzas reflect a constant change in setting, replicating the insightful thoughts of an everyday person throughout their day, passing insignificant objects yet subconsciously identifying their importance. This fast paced movement is maintained through the use of anaphora in lines one, two, five and seven. In conjunction with anaphora, personification is used to enhance the already vivid image

Was he happy?”. He follows this up with a satirical answer, “The question is absurd: Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard”. This is a joke on the state. Auden is showing that the state knew nothing about this man. All they know is that he did not complain. Auden is showing that modern life is all about just going through the motions and conformity. People can be heroes if they just follow the mold that the government has set forth. This is what Auden is upset about. This man that just went along with everything, he followed and conformed to what the state desired. He was not free; he was “normal in every way”. The only way that the state can judge this man is by statistics, they have no idea if he was happy or believed in what he was doing. They know that he was very normal, he was conventional. The poem satirizes how the government is using statistics to judge weather someone is a hero or not. Everything he did was morally acceptable, and that is why he is a hero.

     In the final lines of the poem Auden uses irony to show the government’s role in creating a certain society. In Auden’s eyes the government considers a working-class income, good credit, and a sense of national loyalty and social duties to be the only things necessary to make one’s life complete. He seems to feel that, by insisting on material wealth, society has given government an opportunity to control its actions by creating a world in which a “desirable” lifestyle can only be obtained by adhering to a strict set of ideals and philosophies. The poem can also be viewed as a spoof on certain aspects of the typical middle-class lifestyle. It mocks what many feel are necessities of modern life and points out man’s lack of true feeling for himself and others. But, most importantly, it paints a picture of a world in which people are willing to give up their personal dreams,

Auden presents an allegory in The Unknown Citizen that begins even before the poem itself. The phrase “Unknown Citizen” appears only once—in the title. This term is an immediate allusion to and parody of the “Unknown Soldier,” especially considering the details of who the poem is dedicated to and the fact that it is found on a marble monument, much like those one might expect to see in Washington, D.C. where the United States is home to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The “Unknown Solider” is a soldier who cannot be recognized after being found in battle. This sometimes-controversial idea can be interpreted to mean that many people die as unknowns because they lived uninfluential lives. Aside from this large allegory, the poem uses only a few rhetorical devices. In line four, for example, “…in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint” is quite an exaggeration because being “one against whom there was no official complaint” is hardly saintly (2). Another

Some of the poems and essays I have read during this class were relatable to me. Being away from college, I have struggled with not being at home. I have become a different person when I am at school, but when I am home, I feel like I am my normal self again. Some of these authors of the poems and essays that I have read throughout this class has struggled with being somewhere where they don’t belong and that they are someone else when they are not home. Unlike the other poems and essays we have read throughout the course. I enjoyed reading the ones about “home” because I actually understood what they are going through and that I can relate. Some of these poems and essays include “Going Home” by Maurice Kenny, Postcard from Kashmir”, by Agha Shahid Ali, “Returning” by Elias Miguel Munoz and “Hometown” by Luis Cabalquinto. All of these poems deal with duality.