The poem “The Unknown Citizen” by W. H. Auden is a satire about how the official treats the anonymous individual. “The Dead-Beat” by Wilfred Owen is a war poem about a soldier's naive faith in the system and how people abuse this system.
“The Unknown Citizen” tells of an unknown person, known only by the statistics taken by the government, an example of this is that “He was found by the Bureau of Statistics...” to be normal. The unknown effect of this poem is also reinforced when this man is referred to as “JS/07/M/378”. This man is normal in every possible way , he bought a paper everyday, he had the right number of children, he worked a factory and was dedicated to his union, he held the proper opinions, and he owned the normal household conveniences. This poem tells about the how officials treat the anonymous individual, as statistics. The last line, “Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard," exemplifies the official position on the anonymous individual and the importance of statistics in modern society.
“The Dead-Beat” tells of a soldier who fakes an illness, not because he is sick of the war, but because he is homesick, and he is worried about what his wife doing behind his back while he was away. This soldier cannot leave any other way except by faking an illness, because the soldier would be shot on sight for leaving. So he fakes an illness on the front line and the stretcher bearers know that he is faking. After being taken down to the hospital, he later dies there, even though he was not sick. It is revealed the doctor killed him when the narrator writes he had a “...well-whiskied laugh.”
The similarities in these poems are that the people put their faith in official people or organizations. “The Unknown Citizen” tells about incorrectly placed faith in official statistics, this is revealed in the last line that is anything was wrong statisticians would have know about it, which is not true, you can tell nothing about the person's personality from statistics. “The Dead-Beat” tells about incorrectly placed faith in the doctor and the system, This is shown when he kills a patient while he is intoxicated. It is revealed the doctor killed him when the narrator writes “...well-whiskied laugh.” It is also revealed that the doctor was glad the Dead-Beat died as revealed by when the doctor says “Hooray.”
These poems also tell us about how much people have become dependent and trusting of officials for information and properly working systems and how people believe naively what an official tells them and how the official betrays that trust and does not perform their duties properly. These poems warn to be weary about putting too much faith in Authorities.