If We Must Die

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1919

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Form and Meter

“If We Must Die” is a Shakespearean sonnet. The poem uses mostly iambic pentameter, and it contains 14 lines with three quatrains and a concluding couplet. The rhyme scheme is ABABCDCDEFEFGG.

The first half of the poem uses conditional statements to set up the urgency of the moment and to establish the tone and message of the poem. The second half of the poem drops the conditionals and replaces them with direct commands, signifying the speaker’s confidence and belief in the goal.

The volta, or turn, of the sonnet comes right before the concluding couplet. The speaker asks, “What though before us lies the open grave?” (Line 12). It is the only question in the poem, and the line sets up the image of the final transformation of the hogs into men who fight through death, and the monstrous dogs who have become even more animalistic in their pursuit.

McKay’s use of the Shakespearean sonnet is notable because poets have traditionally used sonnets for more romantic poetry. McKay uses the form here for political and social purposes. Working within form gives the message a tight, structured, and organized feel that a free verse poem would lack.

Assonance and Consonance

Though the sonnet relies heavily on end rhymes, McKay also uses a host of internal rhyming sounds and repetition to give the poem more weight and to align the words with the images. This is mainly done through assonance, the repeating of vowel sounds, and consonance, the repeating of consonant sounds.

McKay tends to repeat similar harsh sounds when describing the “they” group, and he tends to use more ordered, softer sounds for the “we” group. According to Robert A. Lee, this creates meaning through sound and technique, which is a common approach in poetry (219). Lee cites some specific lines, but there are a few that stand out.

First, the sounds associated with the dogs are harsh, including some consonance with k sounds like in “bark the mad and hungry dogs, / Making their mock at our accursèd lot” (Lines 3-4). Notice the harsh sounds of bark, making, mock, and accursed. These sounds stand out when compared to what Lee describes as more formal o sounds in lines like “O let us nobly die” (Line 5) and “O kinsmen! we must meet the common foe!” (Line 9). There is O, nobly, O, common, and foe. The o sound is softer and smoother than the k sound. The purpose of this technique is to match the form with the content. By doing this, McKay amplifies the contrast between oppressor and oppressed, thus strengthening the message of his poem. McKay subtly associates each side in this war with sounds of his choosing.

Allegory and Metaphor

Similar to George Orwell’s Animal Farm (1945), this poem allegorizes a social and political struggle by using metaphors about animals to represent different factions in the fight. Approaching the topic allegorically instead of literally allows the author to dramatize the situation and the characters within the situation. Allegory also helps the author make their rhetorical point in a more subtle way than writing literally.

While this poem is certainly allegorical, the message of the poem comes through clearly once the reader understands the context of the author’s history and American history.

However, despite the allegory’s success, it also has the consequence of broadening the poem’s topic and making it difficult to understand without historical and contextual knowledge. People therefore have used the poem throughout the years, which is a good thing because it means the poem is authentic and speaks to an almost universal notion of freedom and fairness. However, a negative consequence is that the broad appropriation almost devalues (or at least distracts from) the poem’s original context, which was within the beginning of the Harlem Renaissance.