Friday, 29 October 2021

The Unknown Citizen by W.H. Auden

 
W.H. Auden

Annotation – 1

“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”

Context: These are the beginning lines from “The Unknown Citizen” by W.H. Auden.

Explanation:

                Bureaucratic government treats citizens as machines and monitors continuously whether they function perfectly. Machines should not have feelings, so the govt. thinks of people.  It collects data about their behavior not about their well-being. Here the data reported by Bureau of Statistics says that there is no complaint against the unknown citizen. His conduct is good. He is perfectly right like a saint in all his activities. The old sense of the word saint is a person who has renounced all desires for spiritual reason like Buddha. But the modern meaning of the word here is a person who is always disciplined and right in the purview of government. Here the saint, the unknown citizen has sacrificed his own likes and dislikes for the wellbeing of the government.

Criticism:

                 The citizen does not make a complaint, not because he has no grievances but because he knows the consequences of making a complaint. He may have mouth and tongue to speak but he should not. Then only, he will be certified that his conduct is good. Bureaucratic government is not elected by people, so it is not for the people. Rather, the citizen is for the government. He is domesticated like cats and dogs by the government. Here his conduct certificate from the government is more valuable than his freedom and happiness.

Annotation -2

“For in everything he did he served the Great Community.

Except for the War till the 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)”

Context:

                This is an extract taken from “The Unknown Citizen” by W.H. Auden.

Explanation:

                Auden describes here the exploitation of the citizens by the Bureaucratic government in the name of obedience and loyalty. The speaker of the poem is a govt. official. He reports that the recently died citizen is a model individual because he does not do what he likes but what will be good for the Great Community, the government. He is very faithful to his employer and has followed with great sincerity the rules and regulations without any question. He is faithful to the Union because he has paid the dues without fail. It is not the question whether he fought for his rights. What matters is whether he is a conformist.

Criticism:

                The term “fudge” means to cheat by not telling the exact truth. The company where the citizen of the poem worked may not have given wages fairly, so Auden rightly names the company Fudge Motors Inc. It also shows the impact of industrialization on man who almost became a machine without feelings. The duty of the Union is to fight for the employees’ rights. But here the citizen is loyal both to the employer and to the Union. Such a great selfless conformist he is!

Annotation -3

“And our Social Psychology workers found

That he was popular with his mates and likes a drink.

The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day

And that his reactions to advertisement 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 frigidaire.”

 Context:

                W.H. Auden has written these lines for his poem “The Unknown Citizen”. He is satirizing the overreaching surveillance of bureaucratic government into an individual’s privacy and the modern men’s way of living in such a society.

Explanation:

                A bureaucratic government monitors each and every activity of the individual –1) whether he is popular with his mates, 2) what he likes or does not like, 3) whether he buys newspaper everyday, 4) whether he has taken an insurance policy, 5) when he was admitted in a hospital and discharged, 6)whether he has bought like others on installment the necessary things such as a phonograph, radio, car and fridge. Through one Id Number (such as Aadhaar) the govt. watches everything and has found that the citizen is a typical example for how to be a conformist. The citizen cannot do anything without the knowledge of the government. Thus the individual’s freedom and privacy are put at stake.  

Criticism:

                How a modern man suffers by buying the so-called necessary things on installment is vividly portrayed by Auden here. He also satirises the government’s trespass into an individual’s privacy. What is the necessity to the govt to watch whether an individual likes a drink or not? Rousseau has rightly said- “Man is born free but he is everywhere in chains.”

 Annotation -4

“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.”

Context:

                This is an extract taken from “The Unknown Citizen” by W.H. Auden.

Explanation:

                The speaker of the poem says that the citizen has offered ‘proper opinions’. Opinions need not be proper.  It means that he has no opinions of his own and he has to give his opinions as expected by the govt. Whether he supports war or peace is a million dollar question. Because the  govt wants peace, then he also wants peace. When the govt decides the war, he is ready for war. The govt also decides how many children he should have and here it is five children. Whatever is taught in school, he will blindly accept and will never raise any question or doubt. The readers may doubt whether he was happy and free in his life. But there is no ground for asking such a question. He must have been happy and free. Otherwise he would have made a complaint - the report says that he hasn’t.

Comment:

                The poem begins with the note that there is no complaint from the recently died citizen. The poem ends with the note that the citizen would have complained if he had not been free and happy. This is the diplomacy of the bureaucratic government. It dictates the citizens and puts their freedom at stake. But It awards them for not making any complaint against the govt and for not receiving any complaint from the govt. It also justifies its rule that the people must be happy because there is no complaint.

Monday, 25 October 2021

Voice of the Unwanted Girl by Sujata Bhatt

Female Feticide


Annotation – 1

“Mother, I am the one

you sent away

when the doctor told you

I would be

a girl – In the end”

 

Context: This is an extract taken from “Voice of the Unwanted Girl” written by Sujata Bhatt. The same line is repeated in the middle of the poem to stress the female feticide.

Explanation:

            The speaker of the poem is a dead unwanted girl. She is introducing herself to her mother that she is the girl whom the mother doesn’t permit to live on the earth. As soon as the doctor informed the mother that she would give birth to a female child, the mother decided to kill the child in the womb itself. The voice of the dead girl is asking for justice in this beginning line of the poem. In the 20th Century, Indian society, especially rural poor families did not like a girl child because the parents had to save a lot of money to sell her in the marriage market. This is reflected here.

Comment:

            First of all, a mother is known for her love towards her children. The dead girl seems to ask - “how dare you mother to kill me, being a woman?” Secondly, the duty of a doctor is to save the life. But here he gives an injection to kill the girl child at the earliest stage in the womb. Sujata Bhatt, being herself a woman, vividly describes the helpless state of such a female child.




Annotation – 2

“I could have clutched the neon blue

                                    no one wanted –

No one wanted

To touch me – except  later in the autopsy room

when they knew my mouth would not search

for anything – and my head could be measured

and bent cut apart.

I looked like a sliced pomegranate.

The fruit you never touched.”

 

Context:

            These lines are from the poem “Voice of the Unwanted Girl” by Sujata Bhatt. The speaker of the poem expresses how she was not liked by anyone even at the time of her death.

Explanation:

            A mother kills her child by taking an injection as soon as she comes to know about the presence of a girl child in her womb. The child compares herself to neon blue colour. Construction workers would wear neon blue pants as the warning message to the viewers. A female child in those days is a warning message to the poor parents who couldn’t afford dowry. Before she grows up, the girl embryo is here wantonly killed in the womb itself. When it is taken out, the head is measured and cut just like a pomegranate. Then it is preserved in autopsy room for medical examination. The voice of the dead girl child says that no one wanted to touch me except examiners in the autopsy room.

Comment:

            Untouchability is a crime. But here the girl’s voice says, “No one wanted to touch me.” The girl is a second girl child in the family. So she is not wanted any more. Her self-respect is reduced to an object for examination in the autopsy room.  How helpless the girl child is! She is bleeding like the red colour juice of the pomegranate when it is cut. These lines also reveal the colour psychology of the poet who rightly compares the girl to neon blue colour, the unwanted colour by many people.

Annotation – 3

 

Parijatak Flowers


            Afterwards, as soon as you could

            you put on your grass-green sari –

            the orange stems of the parijatak blossoms

            glistened in your hair –

                                                            Afterwards

            everyone smiled.

Context:

            Sujata Bhatt has written these lines in her poem “ Voice of the Unwanted Girl”. This is said by the speaker of the poem, the dead unwanted girl when she finds fault with her mother’s lack of care for her.

Explanation:

            After abortion of the child, the mother gets ready for home from the hospital. She puts on her grass-green sari. She has also worn the Parijatak flower whose stems are shining in her hair. As if a big task is over, everyone smile at each other. The line is here so ironic. The mother likes grass-green sari but she roots out the new grass about to be born from her. The mother likes parijatak flower but she crushes to death her own flower, the girl child about to blossom from her. What they have done in the hospital is a murder. But all of them smile at each other as if they have won a great battle.

Comment:

            The girl child can endure if others don’t like her. How can it endure if her mother herself doesn’t care for her? The images of the grass and parijatak are efficiently used by the poet to express the helpless feelings of the affected girl child.

Annotation -4

 


            “I won’t come to you in your dreams.

             Look for me, mother, look

             because I won’t become a flower

             I won’t turn into a butterfly

             And I am not a part of anyone’s song…

             That is not ‘God’s will’

             Look for me, mother

             because I smell of formaldehyde-”

Context:

            These lines, taken from Sujata Bhatt’s “Voice of the Unwanted Girl” bring out the feelings and expectations of a killed girl child towards her mother.

Explanation:

            Any mother would usually have dreams about what her daughter would become in future. But here the dead girl child says pathetically that she would not come in her mother’s dream. Flowering here is attaining puberty. Girls become so beautiful like butterflies after they come of age. Then great poets would write songs in praise of their beauty. But the dead girl here says that she would not become a flower or butterfly. She would not appear in anybody’s song. Her death is not God’s decision but the mother’s decision. The girl would actually spread the fragrance of a flower but now her dead embryo is kept in a bottle in lab and is preserved with formaldehyde.

Comment:

            No poet can express the cruelty of female infanticide better than Sujata Bhatt as expressed here. The poet simply says that the mother doesn’t merely kill the child. She has killed the dreams of the child. Uneducated villagers would often use the terms ‘fate’ or God’s Will after such female feticide but the poet clearly says here that it is not God’s Will. God who sends a child to this world would never like to kill her. We are shocked to see how the unfavourable circumstances challenged the survival of girl children in those days.

The Poet: Sujata Bhatt

Wednesday, 20 October 2021

Experiment 13 (M Scheme)

Prepare an Outline of a Project to Obtain Loan

Click here to view the Outline Of a Project

Experiment 12 (M Scheme) - Resume Writing

Click to View the Resume 

Experiment 11: Making Sentences from the given patterns

Date:

Box 1

The workers

are

on strike.

 

There

is

a branch

in Chennai.

There

are

25 clients

here.

Sheela

works

in the first shift.

 

We

manufacture

dying machines.

 

 Framed New Sentences:

1. The bank employees are on strike.

2. There is a canteen here.

3. There are 10 products here.

4. Ravi works in the night shift.

5. We manufacture programming softwares.

Box 2

He

was

promoted

as a project manager

yesterday

Many employees

come

to office

by car.

 

The industry

is shut

for May Day.

 

 

She

had

a discussion

with his manager.

 

He

tried

at his best

to get

the order.

 Framed New Sentences:

1. Mr. Ganesh was promoted as a Union Leader Yesterday.

2. Many employees come to office by staff bus.

3. The industry is closed on Sundays.

4. She had a discussion with the committee members.

5. She tried at her best to get the order.

********* 

Experiment 10: Framing New Questions from the Given Pattern (M Scheme)

1. Box – 1

Where

is

my report?

 

 

What

do

you

know about

this problem?

Why

is

it

important?

 

How much

did

you

pay

for this work?

Who

asked

you

to send

this mail?

 

Framed Questions:

1. Where is my room?

2. How do you know about this problem?

3. Why is it expensive?

4. How much did you spend for this project?

5. Who asked you to install this software?

 

1. Box -2

How many

clients

attended

the meeting

Yesterday?

How

will

you

solve

this problem?

Who

is

the manager

of this factory?

 

When

will

you

go

to Mumbai?

Which software

would

you

like to

order?

 

Framed Questions:

1.  How many officials attended the meeting yesterday?

2.  How will you complete this project?

3. Who is the organizer of this programme?

4. When will you go to Chennai?

5. Which device would you like to buy?