Carl Sandburg: From Rock Bottom to Fruition in Literature - Essay Sample

Introduction

Learning from Carl's life, discovering your potential is often a stochastic venture. Carl Sandburg rising from a low life managed to flower literature during his time. You are having to quit school after eighth grade seems like hitting rock bottom hard and shutting dreams. Carl creates a voice through his literature work, including; poetry, fiction, journalism, and collecting folk songs, which has proven fruition. Through his work, he shares his vision and socialist view; logically, this earned him the secretarial position to Milwaukee's socialist mayor.

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Looking at Carl's poetry Chicago, the voice and tone seek freedom for the oppressed for any society. This poem discredits the authority's inactivity in the early nineteenth century. Being a child to foreigners gave him foreign aspects that may work against anybody, yet he managed to create a voice. In the poem Chicago (American Working-Class Literature, 311), he points out the atrocities prevalent in the city of Chicago. Luckily, writing for the Chicago Evening World was an avenue to reaching a broad audience, in turn, making his work renowned.

The poems focus on the themes of revolt, repression, and cultural formation in the early nineteenth century. The poems Muckers and Child of the Romans, which he wrote in 1916, sought to address cries of men in boots as well as their faults of inactivity. Using the right avenue has seen Carl's work hit a landmark of recognition globally. Rising from a miserable life with no better future and overturning the odds to his favor by making a life is remarkable. Cutting across all the cultures that make it impossible to voice out Carl's work creates a route through it all; he used intellect and mass media to reach the people being a socially acceptable avenue.

Negative Aspects in the Mid-Nineteenth Century

The mid-nineteenth century was characterized by the post-World War I and the onset of World War I and the Cold War. Wars are not any fun and often result in losses than gains for the majority affected. The writers in the book's chapter five focus on affluence, cold War, and America with a particular interest in; working, waitress, and steelworker (651-660). Starting with Loius Terkel's story, working (651-652), he is born to Russian Jewish parents and barred from serving overseas due to his political views. Consequently, he is banned again from airing through having his contract with a media house canceled because he refused to give evidence against these sharing similar views to his.

Looking at the story of Dolores Dante (652-654), who was a waitress, starts with a negative notion of how society perceives that all waitresses have broken homes. Form another dimension, Dolores says that she works in a hotel that earns her more than working in an office discrediting the famed corporate jobs deemed to have better pay than the informal sector. Further, in her story, she brings logic to why she works so hard after divorcing her husband, who is unconcerned of her welfare and the kids'. Her story shows a lot growing in the society then, plus the growing weaker social bonds amongst the people

Lastly, looking at Mike Lefevre's story (655-659), mike works at a steel mill and he shows high levels of psychological egoism that he derives no pleasure in something he never participated in building. Work at the steel mill was not easy; he calls himself a dying breed and laborer handling large amounts of steel daily. It was a hard time to exist, harsh working conditions, and the difficulty of tabling food for the family.

Works Cited

American Working-Class Literature, An Anthology, 2007.