Claude McKay

If We Must Die

Animal degradation

Hogs were considered the lowest death—unclean animals slaughtered without dignity. The contrast with 'nobly die' five lines later sets up the poem's central demand.

If we must die, let it not be like hogs
Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs,
Making their mock at our accursèd lot.
If we must die, O let us nobly die,
So that our precious blood may not be shed
In vain; then even the monsters we defy
Shall be constrained to honor us though dead!
O kinsmen! we must meet the common foe!

Shakespearean turn

This is the volta—the shift at line 9 where sonnets traditionally pivot. McKay moves from 'if we must die' to 'we must meet'—from conditional to imperative.

Though far outnumbered let us show us brave,

Military mathematics

'Their thousand blows deal one death-blow'—outnumbered fighters making each strike count. The singular 'death-blow' against 'thousand blows' emphasizes quality over quantity.

And for their thousand blows deal one death-blow!
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!

Cornered defiance

The final image: backs against the wall, no escape possible, still fighting. 'Pressed to the wall' makes the physical situation literal—this isn't metaphorical resistance.

Source Wikipedia Poetry Foundation

Reading Notes

Red Summer, 1919

CONTEXT McKay wrote this in July 1919 during Red Summer—a wave of white-on-Black race riots across American cities. In Chicago, Washington D.C., and dozens of other cities, white mobs attacked Black neighborhoods. Hundreds died. The poem first appeared in *The Liberator* (a socialist magazine) under the title 'A Poem,' then spread through Black newspapers.

The poem's power came from its studied vagueness. McKay never says who 'we' are or who the 'foe' is. During Red Summer, Black readers knew exactly what he meant. But the poem's language—'kinsmen,' 'common foe,' 'pressed to the wall'—was universal enough that other groups claimed it. Winston Churchill read it to Parliament during WWII (without crediting McKay). Activists from Jewish resistance fighters to anti-colonial movements adopted it.

Notice McKay accepts the premise of death—'if we must die' becomes 'we must die' by line 5. He's not promising victory or survival. The demand is narrower: die with dignity, die fighting, make them pay for it. This is a war poem where winning means forcing respect from your killers.

Sonnet as Weapon

McKay chose the Shakespearean sonnet—the most English of forms—to write a poem about resisting white violence. This wasn't accident. He was Jamaican-born, classically educated, and knew exactly what he was doing: using the colonizer's form to articulate resistance.

The rhyme scheme (ABABCDCDEFEFGG) is perfect, the meter almost perfectly iambic pentameter. This technical mastery mattered in 1919, when Black artistic achievement was constantly questioned. The poem proves intellectual equality while demanding physical respect.

Watch the pronouns shift: 'we' and 'us' (the besieged) versus 'they' and 'their' (the attackers). But McKay uses animal imagery for both sides—'hogs' and 'dogs' for the victims, 'monsters' and 'pack' for the attackers. The difference: humans can choose how to die. The final line's 'fighting back' transforms the hunted hogs of line 1 into armed resisters.