carl sandburg accomplishments

Carl Sandburg "What is instinct? What is thought? Where is the absolute line between the two. Nobody knows-as yet" (Allen Fire 3). Sandburg thought hard while he wrote using only his quick instinct, which made his writings come alive, free, flowing poetry on themes he developed while living in the Midwest. Sandburg loved and wrote in detail about the beauties of everyday items in the Midwest such as the workforce, that no one at the time truly paid attention too. The romantic naturalist who focused on simple splendors of life created free verse poems with passionate and naturalistic values (Crowder 1). A theme that appears in most of his poems is respect to the common man (Allen Fire 1). He created most of his themes by growing up poor and neglected by his parents in the Midwest, where the poor blue-collars and farmers worked. He decided to fight in the war after he left his home but got out of the war as soon as possible and started working low paying jobs. He got his first real job, as a Chicago Daily News writer, which allowed him to work on his poetry and allowed him the ability to gather connections that would help him succeed in the poetry scene. He eventually got his poems published in popular poetry publications and was recognized by many event organizers (Carl 1). He was soon reading his poetry to large crowds of poetry enthusiasts, children, and just the common man. In the beginning he would read a few of his poems and then he would read a barrage of Walt Whitman poems to show his admiration of the man (Crowder 1). Later in his life he wrote some award winning books, but was more notable for his poetry. Sandburg was criticized throughout his life for being more of a writer then a poet, but Carl Sandburg was really an innovator that wasn't ready for his time (Allen Fire 1). Formal of all free-verse poets, Carl Sandburg created themes that praised ordinary people and exemplified the beauty that surrounded the common man in the early 1900's effectively influencing the upper class to pay more attention to it's other classes. Carl Sandburg's free-verse prose writing style is very similar to Walt Whitman's style, but on the other hand the themes and lengths of the poems created by Sandburg are very different compared to Whitman (Allen Fire 4). Both poets write using a style called free-verse prose, which allows the poet to be free and not constrained by a specific structure. Whitman and Sandburg, being a successor and admirer of Whitman, both relished and used the idea of being able to write free poetry. You can see this style used best in "Chicago" by Sandburg in which he writes, "Fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning/ as a savage pitted against the wilderness,/ Bareheaded,/ Shoveling,/ Wrecking,/ Planning,/ Building,/ breaking, /rebuilding" (Carl 2). Just like Sandburg, Whitman created short spurts and long spurts of words in his poetry but the poetry was always free causing the reader to get a specific feeling while reading it. The feeling is different between the two poets because the two write about completely different topics and also write different length poems (Allen Carl 2). The length of the poems are longer in Sandburg's poems in contrast to Whitman's short spurted but both are still written with emotional feelings These short lines can be seen in the poem "Full of Life" in which Whitman writes, " Full of life now, compact, visible,/ I, forty years old the eighty third year of the States" (Allen Fire 2). That short poem by Whitman had the feeling still intact but was short enough to read in a few seconds. Sandburg always gets the feelings across but he usually uses a longer stretch of lines and a bigger poem. This style by Sandburg can be seen in his poem "Questionnaire" in which he wrote, "Have I told any man to be a liar for my sake?/ Have I sold ice to the poor in summer and coal to the poor in winter for the sake of daughters/ who nursed brindle bull terriers and led with a leash their dogs clothed in plaid wool jackets?/ Have I given any man an earful too much of my talk or asked any man to take a snootful of/ booze on my account?" (Exploring 3). The poem has a feel of an essay because of the long lines and lengthy body but also has the feeling of a deep emotional poem that describes a man's life in which the man is questioning what he is doing with his life. A working man thinking about his life is a big theme mentioned in a lot of Sandburg's poems as opposed to the themes represented with Whitman, who mainly focused on nature and god. The reason why these two poets have the same style of writing but have two completely different themes is because the two of them grew up during different time periods and in different locations (Allen Sandburg 2). Yet both of them were poor growing up and not well educated while working jobs for the newspaper, they found themselves as popular poets late in their primes (Williams 2). Although the poetry themes were completely together, you can know see why the two are so similar. Carl Sandburg began the trend in the early 1900's of free prose poetry but Whitman was the leading light; the only thing that separates them is the theme and trend that Sandburg created. Growing up poor, going to war, and working in the Midwest have all contributed to Sandburg's free-prose writing trend towards the common man and the need for him to collect his dues. Sandburg grew in rural Illinois where the Populists and Progressive were trying to get a grasp on the rights as farmers in America and rights that all American's should deserver. In the early 1900's many of the people bought the surrounding land to make family farms (Conlin 2). He watched closely as his family tried hard to acquire money to pay for food, housing, and other bills. This gave Sandburg the gratitude towards Cornhuskers and other farmers in the Illinois area; which showed up in poems like "Illinois Farmer". He wrote lines in his poems to described the farmer as someone that paid his dues in life with a Puritan Work Ethic, "BURY this old Illinois farmer with respect/ He slept the Illinois nights of his life after days of work in Illinois cornfields./ Now he goes on a long sleep" (Exploring 4). After he got out the devastating life of farming, he had to witness death and war in the Spanish American War. Sandburg developed a dark rich feeling for his poetry, which included many similes and metaphors to bring a more earthly surrounding to his poems (Allen Fire 4). A great poem that uses these metaphors and similes is "Gargoyle" in which he describes a creature, "I SAW a mouth jeering. A smile of melted red iron ran over it. Its laugh was full of nails rattling. It/ was a child's dream of a mouth/ A fist hit the mouth: knuckles of gun-metal driven by an electric wrist and shoulder. It was a child's/ dream of an arm" (Sandburg 10). After the war, Sandburg got a job as a reporter, which caused him to see the common working man. He saw how the common working man work all day long and then he didn't paid quite as much as a big guy in a suit telling the work what to do (Carl 1). Seeing this, Sandburg in effect wrote many poems about the situation about common working man that influenced a lot of people but the one poem that stands out in most people's eyes is "Grass" in which he says, "Two years, ten years, and passengers ask the conductor:/ What place is this?/ Where are we now?/ I am grass/ Let me work" (Exploring 3) After working successfully and gaining respect in the community as a poet, Sandburg was hit just as hard as his fellow man; when the stock market crashed in 1929. Sandburg fell to the lower class when he couldn't afford the supplies to produce his poetry (Rijord 10). When the stock market crashed, it caused a lot of problems for the common man, and Sandburg dictated this in his poetry with a poem called, "To A Contemporary Bunkshooter" which showed the impact of the problem, "You tell the poor people they don't need any more money/ on pay day and even if it's fierce to be out of a job,/ Jesus'll fix that up all right, all right all they gotta/ do is take Jesus the way you say" (Exploring 5). While Sandburg lived many social and economical junctions, he helped set themes and trends in his writing to create an overall feeling of hope towards the common man. Sandburg's free structured prose symbolized a hope driven style towards protecting and rewarding the common man's effort while focusing on the life around us. As Sandburg grew older and worked more with the public he realized that he was making an impact on some people's lives (Hoffman 2). The people of Illinois have received most of his praise, with poems like "Skyscrapers" that talk about the daily struggle and routine the people put up with, "Prairie and valley, streets of the city, pour people into/ it and they mingle among its twenty floors and are/ poured out again back into the streets, prairies and/ valleys" (Carl 14). He said the idea for "Skyscrapers", came from just watching and living with his own experiences of the daily struggles of a rigid schedule of Chicago (Allen Fire 6). He was so well received by his audience that he was awarded a day of honor in Illinois, which most government officials take off (Carl 1). Sandburg's poems still speak to people in the city, in the ghetto, and the industrial workforce. The reason why his poetry sticks around is because of his amazing skill of tying folklore, observations, and general life into his poetry (Crowder 3). His poem, "The People, Yes", does this the best, "The people learn, unlearn, learn/ a builder, a wrecker, a builder again,/ a juggler of shifting puppets" (Allen Fire 6). These observations provide a certain change of pace among his poetry and his feelings toward the common man. The use of the words and form of this poem is almost the same way the common man speaks which makes it very appealing to many (Allen Fire 7). His words provided the hope for the workers to have adversity, and strength that they will survive and endure the worse. His poems seek escape from easy analyst to a more complicated look into the depth of what Sandburg is trying to say. The poetry is Sandburg's expression to the world but it is undetermined in time and space alike (Allen Carl 2). This expression provides us with many observations into lands we have never seen, such as the poem, "From the Shore", which helps us see the ocean in a way we never really look at it, "A lone gray bird,/ Dim-dipping, far-flying,/ Alone in the shadows and grandeurs and tumults/ Of night and the sea/ And the stars and storms" (Sandburg 17). The poetry brings back memories of what America use to be, and what America looks like in the eyes of an artist. The America Sandburg wants us to remember is a simple observation of America where nature is as important as the common work. The worker is focused more in Sandburg's poetry, because he was more immersed with situations of the workforce (Hoffman 4). In the poem, "Masses", he tells us of a journey where he observers things such as, "Great men, pageants of war and labor, soldiers and workers,/ mothers lifting their children these all I touched, and felt the solemn thrill of them" (Exploring 11). These observations tie in with all his other themes: nature, man, work, and hardships. The hardships are so lovely compared in his poetry to nature, which causes you to think in a way you didn't think was possible (Allen Fire 8). Sandburg's poetry has opened many doors for the common man, because of his influenced and feelings toward America's higher powers. The influence that he has created on the upper-class and on the era of the 1930's has giving many people hope. The free-structured artist, Sandburg, populates his poetry with ideas on how to express the idea of the common man working for nothing but his pursuit to happiness. Though he grew up poor and under educated he became one of the most popular contemporary poet in the 19th century. The focus towards the common man was sincere, but more with an observational side. This observational side allowed him to see the workman and the common man in his natural setting, either in the city or in the country. Threw these observations he has won acclaim and has influenced many. He is a perfect explain of Americana, he should belong in your heart, your mind and your soul for he has created poetry at its finest. His style was obtained through another American symbol, but his free-verse style has made a lasting mark by making the theme more effective. The people that don't like Sandburg don't have a good reason why, and the people that like Sandburg don't even know why they like him. Works Consulted Allen, Gay W. "Carl Sandburg: Fire and Smoke." South Atlantic Quarterly. Spring, 1960: 315 - 31. <http://galenet.gale.com>. Allen, Gay W. "Carl Sandburg." University of Minnesota Press. Spring, 1972:Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Dedria Bryfonski. Vol. 10. Detroit: GaleResearch Inc. 1979. "Carl Sandburg." Adventures in American Literature. Ed. Gerald Bighess. New York:Prentice Hall, 1987. Conlin, Joseph. "Streessful Times Down Home." A People's History of the United States.New York: Houghten Publishing, 1981. Crowder, Richard H. "Carl Sandburg: Overview." Refrence Guide to American Literature. Spring, 1994: <http://galenet.gale.com>. Duffey, Bernard. "Carl Sandburg and the Undetermind Land." The Centennial Review. Summer, 1979: 295-303. <http://galenet.gale.com>. Hoffman, Daniel. "'Moonlight Dries No Mittens': Carl Sandburg Reconsidered." The Georgia Review. Summer, 1978: Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Sharon Gunton. Vol. 15. Detroit. Gale Reasearch Inc. 1980. Exploring Poetry. Gale Research, 1997. Sandburg, Carl. Early Moon. New York: Harcourt, 1930. Risjord, Norman K. "The Depression: Hoover to Roosevelt." America: A History of the United States. New Jersey: Prentice - Hall Inc, 1985. Williams, William C. "Carl Sandburg's Completed Poems." Selected Essays of William Carlos Williams. Fall, 1954: Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Sharon Gunton. Vol. 15. Detroit. Gale Reasearch Inc. 1980. . " ;Carl Sandburg: Fire and Smoke." South Atlantic Quarterly. Spring, 1960: 315 - 31. <http://galenet.gale.com>. Allen, Gay W. " ;Carl Sandburg. ". " ;Carl Sandburg: Overview." Refrence Guide to American Literature. Spring, 1994: <http://galenet.gale.com>. Duffey, Bernard. " ;Carl Sandburg