Dover Beach- MATTHEW ARNOLD  (24 December 1822 – 15 April 1888) The sea is calm tonight.The tide is full, the moon lies fairUpon the straits; on the French coast the lightGleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!Only, from the long line of sprayWhere the sea meets the moon-blanched land,Listen! you hear the grating roarOf pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,At their return, up the high strand,Begin, and cease, and then again begin,With tremulous cadence slow, and bringThe eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long agoHeard it on the Ægean, and it broughtInto his mind the turbid ebb and flowOf human misery; weFind also in the sound a thought,Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of FaithWas once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shoreLay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.But now I only hearIts melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,Retreating, to the breathOf the night-wind, down the vast edges drearAnd naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be trueTo one another! for the world, which seemsTo lie before us like a land of dreams,So various, so beautiful, so new,Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;And we are here as on a darkling plainSwept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,

Where ignorant armies clash by night.

-Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until herdeath on 22 January 1901. 

Central IdeaThis poem condemns the loss of faith, religion and the meaning of life resulting from the industrialization and advancement in science and technology.

Arnold describes the difference between the appearance and reality of the Victorian world. It looks new and beautiful like a land of dreams but in realitythis world does not really have joy, love, light, peace, certitude or any help for pain. He describes the world as a dark plain which is becoming even darker asthe time passes.

SummaryThe speaker looks out upon a calm sea, and observes the fullness of the tide and the 

moon reflecting on the water. Looking across the English channel, the speaker seesthe lights of the French coast fade away, while the cliffs of the English coast stand tall and bright, and the bay seems calm. Suddenly, the speaker addresses someone else, and implores this person to come and look at what the speaker is looking at, and to enjoy the night's pleasant air. The speaker senses something is not quite right, and describes the spray where the water meets the moonlit land. The speaker instructs the other person to listen to the sound of the pebbles as the waves shift them back and forth, up the beach and down again. The speaker notes this slow repeating action, and identifies it with eternal sadness.

All of a sudden, the speaker thinks about the ancient Greek playwright, Sophocles, 

and imagines Sophocles hearing the same sadness in the Aegean Sea as the speaker

hears now on the English coast. Sophocles, in the mind of the speaker, likens the 

sad sound of the waves to the general sorrow of humanity, which moves like the 

waves. The speaker then notices another thought that comes with the sound of the 

sea.

Explaining this next thought, the speaker describes religious faith as a sea that was 

once full like the tide. At that time, it reached around the earth like a girdle. Now, 

though, the speaker just hears that sea's sad retreat. As the Sea of Faith becomes 

smaller, says the speaker, it disappears into the atmosphere and leaves the edges of 

the world naked.

The speaker suddenly addresses the companion as "love," and states desperately 

that the two of them need to treat each other with honesty and authenticity. This is 

because the world, though it has a dream-like quality of variety, beauty and 

newness, doesn't actually offer joy, love or clarity. Neither, claims the speaker, can

it provide certainty, peace, or relief from pain. The speaker then compares their 

collective situation to standing on a flat and dark piece of land, which is caught up 

in the chaos of fighting. Here, battles between unknowing groups continue under 

the cover of darkness.

Theme

Loss of Faith and Certainty

Written during the Victorian era, Matthew Arnold’s “Dover Beach” admits to and 

laments the loss of religious faith that came with advances in various fields at the 

time: evolutionary biology, geology, archeology, and textual analysis of the Bible, 

to name a few. The poem senses the turn of a historical epoch and finds this change

echoed in the transitional figure of the beach—the blurry border between land and 

sea. The poem thus asks the reader to consider what is lost in humankind’s 

movement away from the (debatable) certainties of the Christian faith.

For the speaker, loss of faith equates to loss of certainty. The Dover beach itself 

seems to embody this loss, both in its sights and its sounds. At first, the poem 

offers no clues that its main subject is the loss of faith. Instead, it begins by 

describing the atmosphere in which the speaker stands. The descriptions of the sea 

and the sound of the pebbles on the beach are lyrically beautiful at first, but they 

mask “the eternal note of sadness” that is revealed at the end of stanza 1. This 

sudden intrusion of sadness hints at the speaker’s sense of loss, which finds fuller 

expression later in the poem. Through the symbol of the sea, the poem suggests 

two key ideas: firstly, that major shifts in the fabric of society occur subtly—the 

beach’s slow, repetitive movements symbolize the gradual but inevitable loss of 

faith that the speaker senses in this historical moment.

Secondly, mapping the loss of religious faith onto the movement of the waves 

implies that these kinds of historical changes come in cycles—waves, in other 

words. Indeed, the speaker imagines the ancient Greek playwright Sophocles 

hearing the same sadness in the sea that the speaker hears now. That is, the speaker

sees an analogy between the irrelevance of the classical Greek Gods in the 

speaker’s time with the coming irrelevance of the Christian God in the near future. 

That doesn’t mean that religious faith will return, but more that something will 

come along to take its place (in this case, the dominance of science).

The speaker's position on this loss of religious faith becomes clear in the third 

stanza. Faith once made the world “full” and “bright”—that is, it offered comfort 

and joy in its certainty. Its loss, then, represents “melancholy.” What’s more, the 

“Sea of Faith” once touched the shores of the entire world, but is now 

“withdrawing.” The poem is essentially saying that this loss of faith is global, in 

turn suggesting the vast reach of scientific advancements at the time. The speaker 

doubles down on the idea that scientific advancement represents a loss rather than 

a gain in the poem’s final couplet, saying that the new era will herald “confused 

alarms of struggle and flight,” and “ignorant armies clash[ing] by night.” In other 

words, the speaker believes that scientific advancement will bring only scientific—

not spiritual—certainty and will lead to more doubt and questioning (which is, in 

fact, an important part of the scientific method of inquiry). Overall, then, the poem 

expresses a kind of resignation. The speaker fully admits the change that is in 

process—it is as inevitable as the waves rising and falling—and challenges the 

reader to consider whether this loss of faith is progress or a wrong turn. “Dover 

Beach,” then, is a deeply pessimistic poem that questions the dominant values of 

its day and embodies the sense of grief that some felt at the prospect of the loss of 

religion. This questioning still stands up in the 21st century, calling on its readers 

to examine whether their own lives are spiritually fulfilled.

Love

With the retreat of religion causing a crisis of spiritual faith, the speaker turns to 

love as an answer for the loss of God. Perhaps, the poem suggests, love between 

people can compensate for the loss of the connection between God and mankind. 

But the poem only argues that love has the possibility of creating the certainty that 

religion once did—it doesn’t make the case that this is inevitable.

Looking for a Rain God-Bessie Head, South Africa

Setting

The story takes place in rural Botswana, Africa, where the people basically farm off the vast bush land. The year is 1958.

Summary

“Looking for a Rain God” is about an African family’s desperate struggle against a drought that results in tragic outcome. An African village is plagued by a 7-year drought. The villagers, who are mainly farmers, suffer from starvation as they are dependent on the rain to grow their crop. The rain finally comes and many families rush out to resume farming. Mokgobja and his family are one of the first to clear and plough their land. Their hopes are dashed when the rain only lasts for 2 weeks. Fearing the starvation that they have to face the following year, Mokgobja’s daughter-in-law and her sister, become hysterical. Mokgobja remembers an ancient rain-making ceremony which involves the ritual sacrifice of young children to appease Rain God. Mokgobja and his son Ramadi, sacrifice Ramadi’s two young daughters. Unfortunately, the rain does not come. Eventually, Mokgobja and hisfamily return to the village, filled with despair, guilt and fear. The other villagers become suspicious about the missing children. Soon the police arrive and Tiro, the children’s mother, breaks down and confesses. Finally, Mokgobja and his son are sentenced to death.

Theme

1.      Man’s survival against the forces of nature

The entire farming community is dependent on nature (the land, crops, animals and rain) for their survival. When the drought comes, the farmers become absolutely helpless.

Nature remains merciless and unrelenting even after the family sacrifices their most precious possession – their children.

When nature becomes unkind to man, man too becomes unkind and there is a loss of humanity. Thefear of death and suffering brings out a type of survival instinct in man which transcends the limits of sanity and rationality. Consequently, what is considered as unnatural (the ancient custom of sacrificing children to a Rain God) becomes natural and acceptable.

2.      Hope and desperation

For the people in this farming community, hope is all that is left for them to hold on to. They can only hope for the rain to come in order to relieve them from their misery. Some men lose this hope and commit suicide. Mokgobja and his family carry on, hoping for the rain. When the rain finally comes they rush to their farm, full of hope, excitement, anticipation and joy. They think that their problems will be resolved. However, their happiness is short-lived. The rain stops falling, shattering all their dreams.

Nevertheless, they do not lose hope. They wait for the rain again. After a long wait, their hopes turn to desperation, and they reach a point where they are willing to grasp at anything that might resolve their problem. Hoping that the rain will come if they offer the “ultimate” sacrifice, the family does the

ritual killing of the 2 children. Pushed to the very limits of desperation and hope, these people lose their sense of humanity and rationality.

3.      Nature’s law, man’s law and tribal law

Nature’s law is independent to man’s law. The concept of justice, as perceived in man’s law, is meaningless in nature’s law. Man’s law comprises modern law and tribal law. Sometimes what is acceptable in one might be unacceptable in another. The community represents modern law. Though tribal law once accepted the ritual killing of the children, modern law does not accept it anymore. The 2 men are sentenced to death.Character analysis

Character Description of characters Evidence from text

Mokgobja Hardworking farmer, 70 years old. Believes in tradition. Head of the family who decides to start farming after the rainfall – a decision-maker. Maintains self-control. The desperation of the situation drives him to an irresponsible act– he convinces the others to sacrifice his two granddaughters.

-Mokgobja, who was 70 years old.-The men sat quiet and self-controlled.-He began consulting in whispers with his youngest son.-The two men began whispering with the two women.

Ramadi Mokgobja’s filial son. Farmer, and supporter of his family. Initially he is in despair but maintains self-control as he believes that man has to be strong. The absence of the rainfall and the wailing of the 2 women affect his self-control. He becomes irrational and agrees to his father’s suggestion to sacrifice his 2 children.

..supporter of the family.-The two men sat quiet and self-controlled.

-Ramadi’s nerves were smashed.

Tiro and Nesta Ramadi’s wife, Tiro and her sister, Nesta are hardworking women and good home-makers. Strict. When confronted with the prospect of another year of starvation, they become emotionally weak and disillusioned. They eventually break down.

..making home like their mother.

..scolded them (the rag dolls) severally like their own mother.-It was the women of the family who finally broke down under the strain of waiting for the rain.

Neo andBoseyong – the

2 children

Innocent and cheerful. They imitate the adult world when they play with each other. Their innocent and untainted nature results in them being considered as appropriate sacrifices to appease the Rain God.

-Neo and Boseyong, were quite happy in their little girl world...adults..did not even hear the funny chatter.-a certain Rain God who accepted only the sacrifice of the bodies of children.

Sequence of events

The narrator sets the background of the story against the African bush where a village faces a 7-year drought.

Hopes of the farmer are raised with the arrival of the rain.

Mokgobja and family are oneof the few to rush out to clearand plough the land.

Complication and conflict setin when the rain stops after about 2 weeks.

The family in despair waitingfor the rain to come.

Tiro and Nesta break down completely and start a strange, frenzied wailing. This sets off a further conflict in the men, who first try to be self-controlled but who slowly become affected.

To find a solution, Mokgobjaremembers an ancient rain-making ceremony whereby children are sacrificed to appease the Rain God.

The climax of the story occurs when the 2 children are sacrificed. Unfortunately the rain does not come.

The family is ridden with guilt and fear when the rain does not come. Unable to bear the deathly silence, theyflee back to the village.

The villagers become suspicious over the absence of the 2 children.Soon the police come and demand to see the graves of the children. The mother,

Tiro, breaks down and confesses.

There is a resolution as the 2 men are sentenced to death.

On the other hand, there is noresolution to the problem of the drought as the rain still does not come.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6SnAvkENk1U/UOkxdwmR_mI/AAAAAAAAK8A/-cTiB-vJEcs/s1600/lfrg.png

Techniques – Some examples

Techniques Quotations/ExamplesContrast and imagery - shady watering places full of lush tangled

trees with delicate pole-gold and purple wild flowers springing up between soft, green moss.- as dismal as the dry open thorn-bush country; the leaves of the trees curled up and withered;- the moss became dry and hard

Foreshadowing - a number of men just went out of their homes and hung themselves to death from trees. (hints at death)- Only the charlatons, incanters and witch-doctor made a pile of money during this time because people were always turning to them in desperation for little talisman and herbs torub on the plough for the crops to grow and the rain to fall. (hints at the importance and hope people place on supernatural beliefs to solve problems)

Personification - the rain clouds fled away and left the sky bare- the sun danced dizzily in the sky, with a strange cruelty- the sun sucked up the last drop of moisture out of earth

Simile - as dismal as the dry open thorn-bush

Symbolism - the children represent new lifeIrony - the act (sacrifice) that the 2 men perform

to ensure their survival which eventually becomes the cause of their own deaths.- the desperation to have rain to grow crops that leads to the killing of the two growing children – the future generation is sacrificed for the growing of the crops.- the sun that is usually a life-giving sourcebecomes the cause of death.

Shooting an Elephant- George Orwell  (25 June 1903 – 21 January 1950)

Central Idea

‘Shooting an Elephant’ is a 1936 essay by George Orwell (1903-50), about his time as a young policeman in

Burma, which was then part of the British empire. The essay explores an apparent paradox about the behaviour of

Europeans, who supposedly have the power over their colonial subjects. (the racist behaviour: domination)

Summary

George Orwell works as the sub-divisional police officer of a town in the British colony of Burma. He is hated by

much of the village. Though the Burmese never stage a full revolt, they express their disgust by taunting Orwell at

every opportunity.

Orwell is caught between considering the British Raj an “unbreakable tyranny” and believing that killing a

troublesome villager would be “the greatest joy in the world.”

One day, an incident takes place that shows Orwell “the real nature of imperialism.” A domesticated elephant has

escaped from its chains and gone berserk, threatening villagers and property. The only person capable of controlling

the elephant—its “mahout”—went looking for the elephant in the wrong direction, and is now twelve hours away.

Orwell goes to the neighborhood where the elephant was last spotted. The neighborhood’s inhabitants give such

conflicting reports that Orwell nearly concludes that the whole story was a hoax. Suddenly, he hears an uproar

nearby and runs to find a “coolie”—a laborer—lying dead in the mud, crushed and skinned alive by the rogue

elephant. Orwell orders a subordinate to bring him a gun strong enough to shoot an elephant.

Orwell’s subordinate returns with the gun, and locals reveal that the elephant is in a nearby field. Orwell walks to

the field, and a large group from the neighborhood follows him. The townspeople have seen the gun and are excited

to see the elephant shot. Orwell feels uncomfortable—he had not planned to shoot the elephant.

The group comes upon the elephant in the field, eating grass unperturbed. Seeing the peaceful creature makes

Orwell realize that he should not shoot it—besides, shooting a full-grown elephant is like destroying expensive

infrastructure. After coming to this conclusion, Orwell looks at the assembled crowd—now numbering in the

thousands—and realizes that they expect him to shoot the elephant, as if part of a theatrical performance. The true

cost of white westerners’ conquest of the orient, Orwell realizes, is the white men’s freedom. The colonizers are

“puppets,” bound to fulfill their subjects’ expectations. Orwell has to shoot the elephant, or else he will be laughed

at by the villagers—an outcome he finds intolerable.

Orwell must kill the beast otherwise he will be humiliated. He aims the gun where he thinks the elephant’s brain is.

Orwell fires, and the crowd erupts in excitement. The elephant sinks to its knees and begins to drool. Orwell fires

again, and the elephant’s appearance worsens, but it does not collapse. After a third shot, the elephant trumpets and

falls, rattling the ground where it lands.

The downed elephant continues to breathe. Orwell fires more, but the bullets have no effect. The elephant is

obviously in agony. Orwell is distraught to see the elephant “powerless to move and yet powerless to die,” and he

uses a smaller rifle to fire more bullets into its throat. When this does nothing, Orwell leaves the scene, unable to

watch the beast suffer. He later hears that it took the elephant half an hour to die. Villagers strip the meat off of its

bones shortly thereafter.

Orwell’s choice to kill the elephant was controversial. The elephant’s owner was angry, but, as an Indian, had no

legal recourse. Older British agreed with Orwell’s choice, but younger colonists thought it was inappropriate to kill

an elephant just because it killed a coolie, since they think elephants are more valuable than coolies. Orwell notes

that he is lucky the elephant killed a man, because it gave his own actions legal justification. Finally, Orwell

wonders if any of his comrades understood that he killed the elephant “solely to avoid looking a fool.”

Analysis

‘Shooting an Elephant’ is a 1936 essay by George Orwell (1903-50), about his time as a

young policeman in Burma, which was then part of the British empire. The essay explores an

apparent paradox about the behaviour of Europeans, who supposedly have the power over

their colonial subjects.

‘Shooting an Elephant’ is obviously about more than Orwell’s killing of the elephant: the whole incident was, he tells us, ‘a tiny incident in itself, but it gave me a better glimpse thanI had had before of the real nature of imperialism – the real motives for which despotic governments act.’ The surprise is that despotic governments don’t merely impose their iron boot upon people without caring what their poor subjects think of them, but rather that despots do care about how they are judged and viewed by their subjects.

Among other things, then, ‘Shooting an Elephant’ is about how those in power act when theyare aware that they have an audience. It is about how so much of our behaviour is shaped, not by what we want to do, nor even by what we think is the right thing to do, but by what others will think of us. Orwell confesses that he had spent his whole life trying to avoid beinglaughed at, and this is one of his key motivations when dealing with the elephant: not to invite ridicule or laughter from the Burmese people watching him.

To come all that way, rifle in hand, with two thousand people marching at my heels, and then to trail feebly away, having done nothing – no, that was impossible. The crowd would laugh at me. And my whole life, every white man’s life in the East, was one long struggle notto be laughed at.

Note how ‘my whole life’ immediately widens to ‘every white man’s life in the East’: this is not just Orwell’s psychology but the psychology of every imperial agent. Orwell goes on to imagine what grisly death he would face if he shot the elephant and missed, and he was trampled like the hapless coolie the elephant had killed: ‘And if that happened it was quite probable that some of them would laugh. That would never do.’ The stiff upper lip of this final phrase is British imperialism personified. Being trampled to death by the elephant might be something that Orwell could live with (as it were); but being laughed at? And, worse still, laughed at by the ‘natives’? Unthinkable …

And from this point, Orwell extrapolates his own experience to consider the colonial experience at large: the white European may think he is in charge of his colonial subjects, but ironically – even paradoxically – the coloniser loses his own freedom when he takes it upon himself to subjugate and rule another people:

I perceived in this moment that when the white man turns tyrant it is his own freedom that he destroys. He becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy, the conventionalized figure of a sahib. For it is the condition of his rule that he shall spend his life in trying to impress the ‘natives,’ and so in every crisis he has got to do what the ‘natives’ expect of him. He wears amask, and his face grows to fit it.

So, at the heart of ‘Shooting an Elephant’ are two intriguing paradoxes: imperial rulers and despots actually care deeply about how their colonised subjects view them (even if they don’t care about those subjects), and the one who colonises loses his own freedom when he takes away the freedom of his colonial subjects, because he is forced to play the role of the

‘sahib’ or gentleman, setting an example for the ‘natives’, and, indeed, ‘trying to impress’ them. He is the alien in their land, which helps to explain this second paradox, but the first ismore elusive.

“The Unknown Citizen”-WH Auden  1907-1973

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

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to beOne against whom there was no official complaint,And all the reports on his conduct agreeThat, 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 retiredHe 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 foundThat he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every dayAnd 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 declareHe was fully sensible to the advantages of the Instalment PlanAnd had everything necessary to the Modern Man,A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.Our researchers into Public Opinion are contentThat 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.

This marble monument has been created by the State to commemorate JS/07 

M378.

One sentence summary

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. 

Summary

According to the Bureau of Statistics, nobody ever made a formal complaint about 

him. The other reports about his behavior all say that he was basically the perfect 

citizen, because he did everything he was supposed to do in order to serve his 

society. He worked the same job his entire life until he retired, apart from a break 

when he served in the War. His employer, Fudge Motors Inc., was fine with 

him. He had a totally normal outlook on life and politics, and he contributed to his 

Union (which, we've checked, was not a threat). Our Psychology institution also 

established that his friends liked hanging out with him. According to the Official 

Media, he bought a paper regularly and responded to adverts as was to be 

expected. He had the proper insurance, and our official health records show he 

only needed to stay in the hospital one time. The departments in charge of 

organizing society agree that he approved of the State's vision and that he had all 

the possessions that a modern individual needs—like a record player, radio, car, 

and fridge. Our Public Opinion department asserts that he always held the right 

view on the big issues: if it was a peaceful time, he approved, but he also went to 

war when we needed him to. He had a wife and five children, contributing the 

correct number of new human beings to society according to our governmental 

official who aims to optimize the gene pool. He let the children's teachers do their 

work without questioning their teachings. It's ridiculous to ask if he was free or 

happy, because we would have known if there was anything wrong with him.

Theme

Oppression, Surveillance, and the State

“The Unknown Citizen” is a parody of an elegy (a poem to commemorate someone

who has recently died). This elegy is delivered by "the State"—the government and

its institutions—rather than by a loving friend or family member. Through this, the 

poem pokes fun at and implicitly critiques the modern world for granting too many

far-reaching powers to the state, showing how the state oppresses those unlucky 

enough to live within its grasp.

In particular, the poem looks at how this oppression is achieved through 

surveillance—through the state knowing everything about its inhabitants. The title 

is thus ironic, as there's little that the state doesn't seem to know about the dead 

man. Overall, the poem argues that freedom is impossible in a society that so 

closely watches its citizens, even under the guise of helping them live a supposedly

good life.

Though on the surface the poem is praising the life of the dead “unknown citizen,” 

it only does so because this person lived a textbook example of an obedient, non-

questioning life. In the poem’s world, a good citizen is one who does everything 

they’re is supposed to. Indeed, that’s why the speaker—the creepy “we” of the 

poem—begins by offering what is probably the highest compliment in this 

dystopia: “there was no official complaint” against the dead man (according to the 

Bureau of Statistics). In other words, he never did anything wrong. If he had, the 

state would “certainly have heard” about it—revealing the frightening reach of 

their view into people's lives.

This points to one of the poem’s main criticisms of the state: its over-reaching 

surveillance. The state treats life as a kind of science, improvable only through 

increasingly detailed data sets—and denying life any sense of mystery, joy, or 

freedom in the process. There is one way to be, this implies, and the surveillance is

there to help (or, more likely, force) the individual to be that way.

Accordingly, the state encroaches on every aspect of the dead man’s life. Indeed, 

the poem reads pretty much as a list of all the ways that a state can violate its 

citizens’ freedoms. The state approves of the dead man’s life because it knows so 

much about him: his working life, sociability, opinions on the news, his personal 

possessions, his attitude to his children’s education, and so on. There is a kind of 

parable at work here, as the poem implies that a state with too much power will 

only use that power to sink its claws deeper and deeper into people’s everyday 

lives.

And not only does this oppressive state spy on its citizens, it also co-opts their 

language. So while an alternative view of humanity might prioritize, say, 

happiness, a tight-knit community, and moral virtue over everything being done 

correctly and by the book, the state here has already got that covered. 

“Community,” “saint[lines],” and happiness have all been re-defined to fit what the

state wants, not just taking away people’s freedoms but eroding the ways in which 

they can even conceive of those freedoms.

Overall, then, Auden’s “The Unknown Citizen” reads as a cautionary tale to 

modern society—asking people to question the relationship between the state and 

the individual, and to examine whether their government upholds the right values 

in terms of what it means to live a good life. Ironic and a little funny, yes, the poem

nevertheless offers a stark and bleak picture of a sinister world in which genuine 

freedom is impossible.