Claude McKay’s “If We Must Die” is an English sonnet dramatizing the theme of overcoming adversity in engaging an enemy.
First Quatrain: “If we must die--let it not be like hogs”
The speaker is exhorting his fellows not to allow themselves to be humiliated and degraded as animals are when the animals are rounded up for slaughter. The comparison to “hogs” does not work as well as it could. “Hogs” are not really hunted; they are raised with the express purpose of selling off to market.
Also a farmer keeping swine for commercial purposes would not need or encourage “mad and hungry dogs” to engage the marketable animals. Fattening up pigs for slaughter includes keeping them docile and unexcited.
Nevertheless, the point is made that men should not behave as penned up animals do when confronted with an enemy who would kill them. In a battle against an enemy, soldiers must stand bravely with their fellow soldiers to protect their own lives, their family, and their countrymen. This position is the one Winston Churchill was extolling by using this poem.
Second Quatrain: “If we must die--oh, let us nobly die”
In the second quatrain, the speaker plainly advises his fellows to “nobly die,” that is, if they must, in fact, die. They must die nobly so that they will not have spilled “[their] precious blood” for no reason.
The speaker then makes a rather naïve remark: if they die nobly, “even the monsters we defy / Shall be constrained to honor us though dead!” It is not likely that after the enemy has prevailed, he will honor the vanquished, except to hoist his own glory. Fighting against brave warriors, who have at least made a valiant effort, makes the winner appear even stronger than vanquishing a weak enemy.
On the other hand, even though the “monsters” probably will not honor them, their own side will, and that is even more important in the long run.
Third Quatrain: “Oh, Kinsmen! We must meet the common foe”
The speaker then exhorts his “Kinsmen” along with himself to “meet the common foe.” Even though they are outnumbered, they must stand and demonstrate that they have backbones, that they are men. If they can kill only one of those who are dealing them a “thousand blows,” they will have properly acquitted themselves.
After all, “before[ them] lies the open grave,” but it is better to go to that grave fighting than merely allowing themselves to led in like sheep.
Couplet: “Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack”
The speaker then rallies his comrades to “face the murderous, cowardly pack” “like men.” Of course, he means like human beings as opposed to animals. He is not implying that women are free from this fight.
Even if they are backed into “the wall,” they must continue to fight, and not allow the enemy to cow them into subservience. They must stand like men and fight.
Other McKay Article: McKay's “America”: A Testimony of Love and Hate
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