Human Rights Education: The 4th R, Human Rights Education
and the Arts, vol. 7 No. 1, Winter 1996.

Literature and Poetry

W.H. Auden’s “The Unknown Citizen”

The following comments and sample lesson are excerpted from Teaching About Conscience Through Literature by Cynthia Stokes Brown and Herbert Kohl, which is included in its entirety in the Teaching Human Rights Through Literature section of the AIUSA Human Rights Education Resource Notebooks.

One way to approach the moral and practical problem raised by issues of conscience is through literature. Poems, songs, and themes from plays and novels can be used to focus students’ attention on specific aspects of moral choice and responsibility. They can lead to discussions of the issues involved, to suggestions for creative writing, and to a more general investigation of the historical conditions that led people to perform acts of conscience or to become passive.

Many people make a conscious effort not to know some of what is happening in the world so they will not be forced to make moral choices. These people hesitate or refuse to confront the personal consequences of social injustice or the violation of fundamental rights of various kinds, believing that it is best to remain ignorant or keep silent. Moral avoidance has been portrayed in literature in many ways. This poem provides an ironic portrait of the good citizen who has never taken action or felt the need to act on the basis of conscience.

Discussion Topics:

1. W.H. Auden uses a number of phrases to develop the idea of a passively obedient, unthinking citizen: “no official complaint,” “the Greater Community,” “normal in every way,” “the proper opinions for the time of the year,” etc. Ask the class to discuss these phrases. What might their opposite be? For example, what are improper opinions for the time of the year? What occasions official complaint? The idea of “official complaints” and “unofficial complaints” can lead to a general discussion of the difference between complaining in private and trying to do something about your complaints.
2. In conjunction with an analysis of these phrases, ask the class to generate an “anti-poem.” The “anti-poem” should be written “To the Too-Well-Known Citizen” or “To the One Who Objected too Much.”
3. A good lead into a discussion of obedience is the line “When there was peace, he was for peace; when there was war, he went.”
4. A discussion of Auden’s final statement can lead into the whole question of freedom of expression. Does the structure of our society inhibit or encourage the free expression of ideas? For a few? For anybody? Do people get punished (either psychologically, socially, or physically) for the free expression of certain ideas? What ideas are considered dangerous? Why?
5. At the end of the poem Auden says: “Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:/Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.” He is implying that under the surface the statistical Unknown Citizen might have been a complex, troubled individual lost in an uncaring world. These lines have double meanings and therefore employ the literary device of “irony,” which is an effective way to make a point indirectly. One way for students to familiarize themselves with “irony” would be to practice rewriting direct sentences, from other excerpts in this section, using this device.

The Unknown Citizen
W.H. Auden

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, 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 retired
He 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 found
That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day
And 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 declare
He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Installment Plan
And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
That 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.

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Resources

(For an extensive, annotated bibliography, see Teaching Human Rights Through Literature in the AIUSA Human Rights Education Resource Notebooks.)

Fiction

Allende, Isabel (1986). The House of the Spirits.
Anand, Mulk Raj (1990). Untouchable.
Argueta, Manlio (1990). One Day of Life.
Begley, Louis (1992). Wartime Lies.
Coetee, J.M. (1985). Life and Times of Michael K.
Dorfman, Ariel (1991). My House Is on Fire.
Emecheta, Buchi (1976). The Bride Price.
Gordimer, Nadine (1981). July’s People.
Hautzig, Esther (1992). The Endless Steppe.
Head, Bessie (1987). When Rain Clouds Gather.
Lowry, Lois (1989). Number the Stars.
Minnesota Humanities Commission (1991). Braided Lives: An Anthology of Multicultural American Writings.
Morrison, Toni (1988). Beloved.
Mukerjee, Bharati (1990). Jasmine.
Styron, William (1980). The Confessions of Nat Turner.
Taylor, Mildred D. (1984). Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.
Vonnegut, Kurt (1991). Mother Night.
Zwi, Rose (1991). The Umbrella Tree.

Nonfiction

Angelou, Maya (1983). I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.
Bendt, Ingela, & Dowling, James (1982). We Shall Return: Women of Palestine.
Friedlander, Albert (1989). Out of the Whirlwind.
Menchu, Rigoberta, with Elisabeth Burgos-Davis (1984). I, Rigoberta Menchu: An Indian Woman in Guatemala.
Partnoy, Alicia (1991). The Little School: Tales of Disappearance and Survival in Argentina.
Szymuciak, Moylda (1986). The Stones Cry Out, A Cambodian Childhood. 1975-1980.
Woods, Donald (1991). Biko.