Thesis: The author, W.H. Auden, uses literary devices
to characterize the government’s ideal citizen during the mid 1900’s.
Paradox
Title: The Unknown Citizen
The title implies that the speaker knows
nothing about the person spoken about since the person is unknown. Unknown implies lack of knowledge about all
facets of the citizen, which includes identity and identifying factors such as
behavior, occupation, and family.
“Policies taken out in his name
prove that he was fully insured” (Auden 15)
When the speaker references an insurance
policy in the name of the person being described, it means that the speaker
knows factual information about said person; a name can’t be made up. If the speaker actually knows the name of the
person being described in this poem, it sets up a paradox with the title since
the title implies that the speaker knows nothing about this person, especially
not his name.
“Had anything been wrong, we should
certainly have heard” (28)
The last line of the poem serves to
explain the paradox. As the reader
reaches the end of the poem they are troubled with the idea that the title of
the poem implies that nothing is known of the person while the actual content
of the poem serves to describe every facet of the life of this “unknown”
man. What this last line does is present
this idea that “we,” the government, would know if something was wrong with
this man, so even if we don’t know who he is, we know what he was like because
we know nothing was wrong with him. To a
government, nothing wrong with someone implies that this person was the ideal
member of society; someone who fits every idea the government has of its
citizens. Therefore, if a government
doesn’t know who someone is, it means that they actually know everything about
that person.
Capitalization
“Except for the War till the day he
retired/He worked in a factory and never got fired” (6-7)
“Our researchers into Public Opinion are
content/That he held the proper opinions for the time of year” (21-22)
“our Eugenist says was the right number
for a parent of his generation” (25)
The
capitalization in the middle of the lines in the three quotes above emphasizes
what is important to the government and what can be known about people without
actually knowing who they are. The words
“War,” “Public Opinion,” and “Eugenist” are the words capitalized mid sentence
in the above three quotes. During the
mid 1900’s, which would be around the time this poem was being writing since
Auden was born in 1907 and died in 1973, war was a major issue. World War II had just ended and the Vietnam
War was just starting up during the mid 1900s; these were both major issues and
the government needed people to join the war effort. To the government, the ideal citizen
supported the war when the government did. The capitalization of “War”
emphasizes the importance of war in the time period and how the government can
tell that this unknown person supports the war effort. The capitalization of “Public Opinion”
emphasizes the close monitoring of the public opinion and how you can’t disagree
with public opinion without showing up on the radar of the government. Lastly, the capitalization of “Eugenist”
hints at the fact that the baby boom was going on and there were people keeping
track of breeding patterns. At the time
of the baby boom it was normal to have many children and this poem highlights
just that. The speaker takes that stance
that it is safe to assume that this “unknown” person has many children simply
based on the fact that they are unknown and thus do not deviate from the norm. The capitalization of certain words mid-line
highlights the important issues at the time this poem was written and the
issues that the government feels they can generalize for people that are unknown.
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