The Twins of Disregarded Capitalism

By Mitaya La Pierre

McKay’s “The Tired Worker” tells a story we are all familiar with; an exhaustion that complies with the typical hustle of our days. The work that stains our fingers and wears down our minds; is beautifully portrayed in this sonnet. But there’s a question to be asked here; what about the poem “Outcast”? And what does that poem have to do with Mc Kay’s other poem; “The Tired Worker”? Well more than one may think.

In the first line of “Outcast” we get a description of the speakers background.

“For the dim regions whence my father’s came

My spirit, bondaged by the body, longs.” 

The first lines of this sonnet provide a compelling point of view. Where the worker in “The Tired Worker” shows a relatable disdain for the working day; we can find a bit of under surface finding with outcast. This character hates being ‘chained’ by their job, but maybe there’s something not so funny or relatable about it when spoken of in Outcast.

“-Words felt, but never heard, my lips would frame;

My soul would sing forgotten jungle songs.

I would go back to darkness and to peace,

But the great western world holds me in fee,

And I may never hope for full release

While to its alien gods I bend my knee.”

In lines 3-8, it shows me that he isn’t just talking about not wanting to go to work, like in the other poem, but that he is also trying to go back to something else. By working, and applying himself constantly to society, this torn worker has lost sight of himself. He is no longer his own; his soul sings jungle songs, his fathers came from dim regions; he is no longer himself but of the capital world. Yeah sure, no one likes to get up for work in the morning, but outcast shows that for the tired worker its more than that! Claude McKay coming from a black background knows the effects of racism and slavery first hand. For the speaker its not just work but, the bondage of it that is so personal to him. Because of the western world, because of white nationalism, and capitalism; he is not just responsible for being a cog in the machine, he is forced into it. This poem providing a more in depth, and tragic understanding of what it actually means to work as a black man in this white dominated industry.

Trapped in the Western World

sofia garcia

McKay’s “Outcast” represents the hopelessness and despair of the working-class speaker in “The Tired Worker.” In both of the sonnets, the speaker is taking about being tired of being trapped in a life style they do not want to be in, and there is no way out of it.

In “The Tired Worker” McKay is about how the average worker is tired about their daily routine and they finally get to rest after such a long day. However, in the volta of the poem, the poet speaks about how they dread that the next day they are going to do this over again because they are aware that this life style is a trap.

In “Outcast” the speaker is tired of their current situation. They want to go back to their country and go back to the life style they once had in their native country. The speaker is longing to go back to their, “soul would sing forgotten jungle songs” (line 3). They want to get out of the trap of the western world’s daily routine, but that is merely impossible.