Though we remain impressed by your emaciation and your hunger and, frankly, find you photogenic and think your images both alarming and aesthetically pleasing, to do anything more than sigh will require a complex process of application and review, a process that is currently in the development stage. Meanwhile, may we suggest you moderate your public suffering at least until the Committee on Appropriate Postures for the Suffering is able to produce guidelines.
Do not be alarmed. The committee has asked me to assure you that they are sensitive both to the aesthetic qualities of your suffering—the blank stares, the neotonous beauty as the flesh recedes and the eyes seem to grow larger, the haloes of flies—and to the physical limitations of human endurance and the positioning of limbs.
They will, I am certain, ask that you not lift your naked children like offerings to the gods. On this topic, discussion has centered around the unfair advantage such ploys give the parents of such children. The childless, whether by choice or fate, are left to wither silently in the doorways while those with children proffer and gesticulate in the avenues unabated.
This offends our cherished sense of fairness, the democratic impulse that informs and energizes our discussions. Therefore, we ask for restraint, and where restraint is lacking, we will legislate. Please be forewarned.
In addition, the committee will recommend that the shouting of slogans, whether directed at governments or deities, be kept to a minimum. Not only is such shouting displeasing aesthetically, but it suggests there is something to be done.
Believe me, no one is more acutely aware of your condition than we who must ignore it everyday on our way to the capitol.
In this matter, we ask only that you become more aware of your fellow citizens, who must juggle iPods, blackberries, briefcases and cell phones, lattes. Who must march steadily or be trampled by the similarly burdened citizens immediately behind them. Your shouting and pointing does not serve you well. Those of us employed by the agency are sworn to oversee you. If we seem, as you suggest, to have overlooked you instead, that is an oversight and will be addressed, I am certain, in our annual review.
Please be aware: To eliminate your poverty, your hunger, your aesthetically pleasing, yet disturbing, presence in our doorways, above our heating grates, in our subway tunnels and under our freeways would mean the elimination of the agency itself and quite possibly a decline in tourism.
Those of us employed by the agency have neither the stamina, persistence, nor the luminous skin tones that you present to the viewing public. Finally, to those who would recommend programs, who would call for funding and action, I must remind you that we have been charged not with eliminating your suffering but with managing it. Jon Davis Academy of American Poets Educator Newsletter.
Teach This Poem. Follow Us. Find Poets. Poetry Near You. Jobs for Poets. Read Stanza. Privacy Policy. Auden satirizes the kind of approach to human behavior which judges the citizens according to their usefulness for the greater good. Being a supporter of the leftist school of thought, he criticizes the capitalist exploitation of society.
Conformity has created apathetic and obedient citizens which is exactly what the government wants. During the late 's in the U. Citizens were moulded into forms determined by the state like a commodity; productive and obedient. The unknown citizen was in favor of war when there was war, and for peace when it was peaceful; this suggests that his convictions are not of his own and are formed by the political institutions which dictate his conformity to a standard way of living.
The poem is intensely ironic and the greatest irony of the poem is that in many ways the audience is the unknown citizen, for whether we realize it or not, our lives are largely shaped and dictated by the great social, political, and economic forces that seek to establish conformity to the attitudes and beliefs that they produce.
This is the central irony that the poem stands upon. In this regard the title itself is ironic. Aside from the multiple interlinked themes, the poem also uses the language and vocabulary to aid in the creation of an overall ambiance. In the very beginning of the poem, the 'marble monument' hints towards the political nature of the poem. The state has erected an expensive and large marble monument for a bland, unknown citizen without a name who always followed the status quo.
Throughout the narrative, from start to finish, there are countless allusions used to refer to fictitious statistics and government procedures. Humankind, then, can be seen as just another unit of the state. This use of 'our' shows that the speaker is government itself.
The words 'Our teachers' make it seem like the state owns the teachers as if they are a product created by the state, as if they are not human beings masters of their own lives. The reference to Fudge Motor as being incorporated Inc. The name 'Fudge Motors' can also be taken as a parody of the name of the automobile giant Ford Motors Inc. The words and phrases which serve to create irony are abundant in the poem and have deeper, layered interpretations.
In the earlier times a person who submitted to God was a saint, now the one who conforms to society is. The modern-day- definition of the saint therefore suits the citizen aptly. Perhaps, then one can say that he is a saint not because he devoted himself to God but because he devoted himself to the servitude of the 'Greater Community'.
The sense of irony here, is created when the speaker commented it to be an old-fashioned word of a modern sense; since a saint is supposed to be someone who stands alone and steadfast in defending his beliefs and personal convictions, he has an extraordinary life. Yet, the ordinary citizen is a kind of saint whose life is the complete opposite. We are not told who decides the interests of this Greater Community which the unknown citizen serves so perfectly. The citizen wasn't 'a scab or odd in his views'.
This phrase confirms the extent of the citizen's conformity and passivity. Scab is a reference to a workman who refuses to join the union on a strike. The connotation of the word 'odd' here, is negative, showing us that the speaker admires lack of independent thought. It is also told to the readers that the citizen worked in the factory till the day he retired, except for the brief respite from this dull routine when he went to war.
The deeper meaning that is sought here is that the citizen worked like a machine and perhaps did not even take a vacation or a day off. One is repeatedly reminded of a situation of slavery or a prison in which the citizen's routine is trapped. An exaggeration or hyperbole is created when it is revealed that there are reports made on the institutions e.
The citizen 'liked a drink' and 'bought a paper everyday', which is an allusion to his consumer habits. The connotations associated with the phrase 'Modern Man' are the same ones that form the theme of the image of a modern man. It is said that he 'added five children to the population', a phrase which gives off an impression that perhaps the Eugenist is pleased only because this addition in population will ensure a substantial soldier count in the case of another war. Apart from the several poetic devices used such as irony, exaggeration or hyperbole, and metaphor such as the word 'saint' , the poem also follows rhyme, however, it is not a conventional rhyme scheme.
The rhyming words 'Inc. The length of lines varies as well. Profound changes in rhythm and in context are a feature of modern poetry. The speaker's language can be seen as a reflection of his values.
The level of diction is consistently formal and remote, almost computerized. The speaker is clearly pleased with what he considers exemplary behavior on the part of the citizen, but the poem leads us to question the standards by which the citizen is being judged.
Through dramatic irony we find how Auden and the speaker differ in attitude toward the citizen. A clue to Auden's attitude towards the speaker comes in the two words 'happy' and 'free'. The questions of citizen's happiness and freedom are said to be absurd by the speaker; absurd in the sense that it is far-fetched to even consider finding out the true answer or in the sense that there is absolutely no chance of the citizen being unhappy.
This ambiguity shows that speaker possibly holds negative views for happiness and freedom. The overall tone of the poem is mocking and satirical. Auden's poem warns us about the dangers of modern society in much the same way as the novel '' by George Orwell. Conformity is dangerous. Allowing ourselves to be reduced to faceless numbers is dangerous. Allowing the government too much control is dangerous.
As Platizsky says, "In essence, the satiric speaker seemingly praises but, of course, actually mocks the kind of citizen who blindly relinquishes his individuality to the 'Greater Community' line 5 and the kind of society that insists and depends on such sacrifices from its modern-day Saint line 4 , a saint who does not seek higher truth but merely exists to perpetuate the status quo" Platizsky. But, it also serves as a warning about the coming threat of government intervention into the lives of its citizens.
Words are capitalized like Greater Community, Installment Plan, Modern Man, and Public Opinion to show the emphasis that the government puts on these concepts. The government does not care about people's happiness or freedom as evidenced by the last lines. As Platizky says in Explicator, "The agencies are content with empirical evidence about his life" Platizky. There is no need to ask for any more. Time is a silent and inevitable force that disrupts even the most joyful moments.
Another important theme that is presented in this Poem is the theme of Transience. According to Auden, all things on the earth are the subject of change.
Everything has to end and no one can escape death. The poet says that the beauty and youth cannot last forever and they have to end with the passage of time so we can say through the use of seasonal imagery, the poet talks about the ephemeral nature of things. Similarly, in stanza 11, the poet says that the time does not remain same for everyone, it changes and brings change in the life of human being.
So, it can be said that Time has the ability to change everything: poor to rich, enemy to friend, child to adult, innocent to experienced. In stanza 10, the poet says that the movement of time is slow and imperceptible. In these lines natural phenomena are presented with manmade thing. Here desert and glacier symbolize barren land, the inevitability of time march and death. Love cannot stop it neither a nice home with well stocked cupboard. The natural order will always win out.
In stanza 11, Auden once again tells us about the inevitability of Time's march and ultimate death, Auden gives us the image of a cracked tea cup that "opens a lane to the land of the dead. In ancient time, Tea was a beverage often associated with a healthy life, meditative qualities and the ability to cure certain ailments. So, that tea leaking out of cracked cup can be equated with all life-supporting elements or, drink, even life itself draining away over time.
That cracked tea-cup is just a small sign of what awaits us all. One minute we are whole and useful, the next we are aged and cracked. According to the poet no matter how much we appeal, we are powerless to bless ourselves to escape time ultimate triumph over earthly life. In this line the poet says life is full of precious things though it is mixture of joys and worries but we cannot overcome mortality.
The last stanza also deals with the theme of death and triumph of time over life. The repetition of this word late has been used for emphasis and the poet wants to say that death will conquer love and life. In the next line , lovers are gone in a literal as well as in a figurative sense, too. Since Darkness has overtaken the scene Darkness symbolizes death. The lovers are gone from the scene, but they are also, figuratively, dead.
The theme of Time is again presented in the last line of the poem. In concluding line -the river seems to be symbolic of time's unyielding onward motion. The river appears to have little concern for the human world and is unchanged by joy and grief.
In spite of the of human fate, nature and time will continue to move forward with or without us, as it has done for innumerable years. Musee de Beaux Arts by W. The casual, easy going argument the tone suggests is ironic for the topic of discussion, the human position and its seeming indifference to suffering, is anything but light and easy going. The poem 'Musee des Beaux Arts' by W.
Auden keep his language pretty simple and straightforward and build up a fairly elaborated network of references and allusions to place, people and things behind the scene. The wise people are shown waiting for that moment and in the last stanza of the poem, the reference to the myth of Daedalus and his son Icarus is given.
He does not use superfluous words or stick to traditional rhyme or meter. The poem is not didactic; its moralizing is delicate.
Auden elucidates in this poem that suffering occurs everywhere while not always seen, however, when seen everyone is apathetic. The different pieces in the poem gives a general idea of ignorance, suffering, the idea that people undergo pain and distress.
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