If We Must Die

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summary This poem is a defiant call to protest. The speaker warns against passive acceptance of hostility and urges people to fight back. He suggests that death is inevitable but can be noble if it serves a cause. The final couplet states the speaker’s resolve to die fighting. If We Must Die Claude McKay If we must die, let it not be like hogs Hunted and penned in an inglorious1 spot, LITERARY ANALYSIS While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs, Making their mock at our accursed lot. c sonnet 5 If we must die, O let us nobly die, Possible answer: The rhyme scheme is So that our precious blood may not be shed In vain; then even the monsters we defy abab, cdcd. On the basis of this rhyme Shall be constrained2 to honor us though dead! c c SONNET scheme, the sonnet is Shakespearean. O kinsmen! we must meet the common foe! State the rhyme scheme of lines 1–8. Considering 10 Though far outnumbered let us show us brave, If students need help . Refer them to the rhyme scheme, what page 847 and the definitions of Petrarchan And for their thousand blows deal one deathblow! type of sonnet is this? and Shakespearean sonnets. What though before us lies the open grave? Like men we’ll face the murderous, cowardly pack, Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back! d d FORM AND MEANING By the end of the poem, what resolution has the READING SKILL speaker reached? d form and meaning Possible answer: The speaker decides that he will fight back even if he dies fighting. 1. inglorious: shameful; disgraceful. 2. constrained: forced. If students need help . Have them record line groupings and main ideas in the pre- 850 unit 5: the harlem renaissance and modernism reading chart introduced on page 847. Line Grouping Main Idea L11PE-u05s12-IfWeDie.indddifferentiated 850 instruction 8/31/06 4:11:51 PM First quatrain We won’t die like hogs hunted by dogs. for less–proficient readers for advanced learners/ap Second quatrain If we must die, we will Comprehension Support [paired option] Research McKay wrote “If We Must Die” do it nobly. Have student pairs work together to during the “Red Summer,” a term coined respond to these questions about “If We by James Weldon Johnson to describe the Must Die”: racially violent summer and fall of 1919 selection wrap–up • Who is the speaker? during which African Americans were the victims of violent attacks. Have students • What is the speaker’s message? SYNTHESIZE Invite students to comment on research the causes of these events, noting what Johnson’s and McKay’s works contrib- Invite pairs to share their responses. Ask in particular the significance of McKay’s uted to the Harlem Renaissance. students to explain their thinking by poem as a part of the response to them. providing examples from the poem. Find opportunities for students to present their findings to the class. 850 unit 5 LL11TE-u05s02-mycity.indd11TE-u05s02-mycity.indd 850850 11/4/07/4/07 112:56:562:56:56 PPMM.

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If We Must Die
Get hundreds more LitCharts at www.litcharts.com If We Must Die the only viable option for this oppressed group—the only way POEM TEXT they can reclaim their dignity and freedom. The people that the speaker of “If We Must Die” addresses are 1 If we must die, let it not be like hogs oppressed, so much so that they are in danger of losing not only 2 Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot, their lives, but also their humanity. The speaker describes these 3 While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs, people as surrounded by “monsters” and “mad and hungry dogs” who will inflict a “thousand blows” upon them. They are 4 Making their mock at our accursèd lot. “far outnumbered” by these monsters. These metaphors 5 If we must die, O let us nobly die, indicate that the group of people the poem addresses are a 6 So that our precious blood may not be shed minority community threatened by violence from a larger and 7 In vain; then even the monsters we defy more powerful group. 8 Shall be constrained to honor us though dead! The oppression that the group suffers threatens to turn them 9 O kinsmen! we must meet the common foe! into animals, figuratively speaking—to deprive them of their 10 Though far outnumbered let us show us brave, humanity. As the speaker notes in line 1, they are in danger of 11 And for their thousand blows deal one death-blow! dying “like hogs.” But the people who oppress them have also 12 What though before us lies the open grave? lost their humanity.
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