Identify the title of the poem in which the following lines appear:
"He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint
For in everything he did he served the greater community."
"He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint
For in everything he did he served the greater community."
Show Hint
- "In Memory of W. B. Yeats"
- "The Unknown Citizen"
- "In Praise of Limestone"
- "On this Island"
The Correct Option is B
Solution and Explanation
Step 1: Recognize voice, theme, and diction.
The excerpt adopts a bureaucratic, report-like voice: "Bureau of Statistics," "official complaint," "reports," "served the greater community." The tone is dry and pseudo-pious ("modern sense of an old-fashioned word"), which is typical of a satirical dossier on an anonymous conformist.
Step 2: Match to Auden's poem.
W. H. Auden's "The Unknown Citizen" (first printed 1939; collected in Another Time, 1940) is a dramatic monologue in the form of a state memorandum about a model citizen, identified only by an alphanumeric code (parodying "The Unknown Soldier"). The poem ironizes modern technocratic culture that reduces a person to compliance metrics and consumer statistics—precisely the elements visible in the quoted lines.
Step 3: Eliminate other options by content and style.
\begin{itemize}
\item (A) "In Memory of W. B. Yeats" — an elegy (1939) with lyrical and reflective tones; no bureaucratic voice.
\item (C) "In Praise of Limestone" — a meditative landscape poem (c. 1948) on geology, body, and civilization; entirely different imagery.
\item (D) "On this Island" — from Auden's early collection; lyric pieces, not the satirical dossier style.
\end{itemize}
\[
\boxed{\text{Hence, (B) "The Unknown Citizen."}}
\]
Top Questions on Poetry
- Write the central idea of the poem "My Mother at Sixty-Six."
- Write the central idea of the poem "Aunt Jennifer's Tigers."
- Read the following extract carefully and answer the questions that follow:
Perhaps the Earth can teach us
As when everything seems dead
And later proves to be alive.
Now I'll count up to twelve
And you keep quiet and I will go.
What lesson does the Earth teach us? - Read the following extract carefully and answer the questions that follow:
Perhaps the Earth can teach us
As when everything seems dead
And later proves to be alive.
Now I'll count up to twelve
And you keep quiet and I will go.
What remains alive when everything seems to be dead? - Read the following extract carefully and answer the questions that follow:
Perhaps the Earth can teach us
As when everything seems dead
And later proves to be alive.
Now I'll count up to twelve
And you keep quiet and I will go.
What does the poet ask us to do?
Questions Asked in GATE XH-C2 exam
Here are two analogous groups, Group-I and Group-II, that list words in their decreasing order of intensity. Identify the missing word in Group-II.
Abuse \( \rightarrow \) Insult \( \rightarrow \) Ridicule
__________ \( \rightarrow \) Praise \( \rightarrow \) Appreciate
- A car started from city P at 9:40 AM. The time taken for the car to reach city Q is 4 hours and 50 minutes. The time of arrival of the car at city Q is:
- Consider a square field ABCD. The diagonal AC is 50 meter. The cost of laying grass in the field is Rs. 5 per square-meter. The total cost for laying grass in the field ABCD is Rs. ________ (rounded off to two decimal places).
In the following figure, four overlapping shapes (rectangle, triangle, circle, and hexagon) are given. The sum of the numbers which belong to only two overlapping shapes is ________
- Many countries are facing water shortage crises in the past few years. A report of the United Nations has named India among the worst countries for poor quality of water. The report ranks 122 countries according to the quality of their water as well as their commitment to improve the situation. Some countries in Europe are considered the worst because of the quality of its groundwater. Rain failed in some parts of India in the past. The vast areas of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Andhra Pradesh were affected by severe drought. People without water turn desperate and violent. Consequently, the food godowns were attacked in some of the states. Based on the details given in the passage, which of the following option(s) is/ are correct statement(s)?