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Selected Poems
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W. H. Auden > Auden: the Unknown Citizen

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grllopez ~ with freedom and books (with_freedom_and_books) | 140 comments The Unknown Citizen is about the perfect model citizen who lived the way he was expected to live, according to society. He served the greater good, worked satisfactorily in the factory, paid his union dues, read the paper, responding to ads as expected (and this was before Google!), paid his insurance, owned all the popular gadgets, and reserved the right opinions at the right times. He had five kids and never complained about their education.

BUT

"Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard."

There was no individuality about him. He blended with the masses. Had he been anything else, complaints would have been made, and it would have been known, and this little elegy would have never been written.


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