W. H. Auden's The Unknown Citizen

The Unknown Citizen by W. H. Auden describes a man that statistically, on paper, was a “saint” as stated in the poem. He had no criminal offenses on his record, and those who vaguely knew him could characterize his behavior as normal, citing him to be a model citizen. The overall consensus of the reports in the poem point to this man being completely normal, functional, and happy. But, these are only opinions of those who observed his behavior, and essentially the way he chose to spend his money, and time. These reports are not measuring the degree to which this man was content, or even happy with himself, or his family. There are so many factors to one’s perception of themselves, that records on paper and certain behaviors cannot dictate what emotional state this man was in.

This poem represents a cookie-cutter society, in which if you pay your dues, take out the right insurance, have the correct opinions that directly correlate to popular opinions at the time, then you too can qualify to be a model citizen. In degrees of Americanness, I would rate this poem first degree. It directly falls into that thought of the “typical American”, very popular during the 50’s and 60’s. To …show more content…
Younger generations don’t want to just fit in with this ideal, they want to change the world. But both ideas on how to properly live one’s life is where the Americanness sets in. They’re idealistic, probably unachievable, yet widely popular. And that’s exactly what makes it American. This country was founded on the whole “Be yourself!” idea. The government is there to protect you, protect your rights, and is made not to control, but guide. The people make the government, the government doesn’t make the people. Here, you are allowed to be idealistic, and even if you and everyone around you knows what you want is probably unattainable, that’s okay. Because that’s what we are encouraged to do, to dream for a better