Question

Use the excerpts above to write an essay, at least two paragraphs, supporting the question below. Remember to clearly state your main point and use quotes from the text to support your response using the proper MLA format.

What advice would Niemöller give to the speaker in "I Sit and Look Out"? Would the speaker agree with Niemöller's perspective? Give evidence from the text to support your reasoning.

Answer 1

"I Sit and Look Out"
Walt Whitman

I Sit and look out upon all the sorrows of the world, and upon all oppression and shame;
I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men, at anguish with themselves, remorseful after deeds done;
I see, in low life, the mother misused by her children, dying, neglected, gaunt, desperate;
I see the wife misused by her husband—I see the treacherous seducer of young women;
I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited love, attempted to be hid—I see these sights on the earth;
I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny—I see martyrs and prisoners;
I observe a famine at sea—I observe the sailors casting lots who shall be kill'd, to preserve the lives of the rest;
I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant persons upon laborers, the poor, and upon Multiplyes, and the like;
All these—All the meanness and agony without end, I sitting, look out upon,
See, hear, and am silent.

"First they came for..."
Martin Niemöller

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out-—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Answer 2

well let's start with the second passage: notice how it talks about someone who witnessed the persecution of other groups and remained silent because he was not part of those groups; at the end of the poem, he himself faced persecution and the other groups were silenced off and were unable to speak on his behalf. how would the narrator's experiences influence how he approaches the narrator of the first passage?