Comparative Study of Reluctant Fundamentalist and Auden's Poetry within the Premise of Power and Tyranny. Hamish Gordon Young 12th Grade

The ability of a text to channel a cogent political viewpoint is exemplified within ‘The Unknown Citizen” (1939), in which Auden sympathises with those impacted by political acts of the 20th century manifested within political ideologies fronted by unjust intentions in misrepresenting people for political power. Additionally, in “September 1, 1939” (1939), Auden denounces the dilution of morality in the contemporary era emanating from the rise of autocracies surrounding WWII. Similarly, Hamid’s 2007 novel, ‘The Reluctant Fundamentalist’, both repudiates the impact of capitalism on the individual, further denouncing the effect that economic power has on the morality of individuals.

Auden deplores the impact political acts have on individual lives to a substantial extent through the ‘Citizen’. He censures the false façade of political regimes, claiming to represent the people and civil aspirations, however in reality having egotistical motives to enhance their own power. Thus, Auden condemns the impact of this selfishly-motivated hunger for power, sympathising with the victims of economic and bureaucratic political acts; the powerless individual. Influenced by his cynicism following the rise of totalitarianism in Communism in the...