Carl Sandburg Analysis

The single most powerful thing on this earth originates from one primary thing: Mankind. What’s even more powerful than that? Unified people. As ancient as time itself, people have imperialized and built the world into its reality of today. It was the repercussion of the people that demonstrated how great of an impact they can make upon the world they dwell upon. Literature, particularly poetry, has been one of the key outlets in which such a discovery can be expressed. In Carl Sandburg’s poems, “The People, Yes”, “I Am The People, The Mob”, and “And They Obey” all convey one universal theme while expressed through contrasting diction, tone, and plentiful evidence of imagery.

The mastermind behind these poems, Carl August Sandburg, was born on January 6, 1878. He was the second eldest out of the seven children of Swedish immigrants August and Clara Sandburg. Young “Charlie” (nickname he was called as a child) surprisingly quit school subsequently after his eighth grade graduation and began working at a very young age. He pursued every job he could manage to handle whether it was delivering milk, harvesting ice, laying bricks, or shoe shining. Throughout these experiences with working and traveling around the States, Sandburg became influenced by his writing as well as political views. In 1898 at the dawn of the Spanish-American War, Sandburg volunteered to join the service only to return home years later to attend Lombard College where he shaped his literary talents and political views. By the end of his senior year of college, Sandburg had mastered his writing skills and adopted socialist views of his mentor, Lombard’s Professor Philip Green Wright. As the years passed, Sandburg grew concerned for the strife of the average Ameri...

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...the two previous poems, “And They Obey” indicates a highly authoritative tone for readers, even within the title itself. Sandburg’s cacophonously literal diction conveys that commands are given through concrete and direct word choice in order to get the task done.

Personally, I realized how Sandburg’s poems still possess a decent amount of significance to the world today. I found each of his poems to be powerful because their theme remained relevant and relatable. Cities are being torn down as well as rebuilt into greater ones worldwide. We have the power to create new life and build empires just as we kill and destroy our surroundings.

So, yes, we die as individuals but as a human race we are forever evolving. Thus, literary works such as poetry, allows readers to see precisely how mankind is indeed, the most powerful force that not even death itself could stop.