Summary Of Robinson Jeffers 'Poem Shine, Perishing Republic'

Have you ever thought your own country that you live in is corrupted? Many problems coming together can cause a civilized country to become destroyed. Robinson Jeffers’ poem, “Shine, Perishing Republic,” explains the author’s view on the decisions that were made in America that he believes are causing it to become corrupt. In the poem, Jeffers uses many examples of foreshadowing, metaphors and imagery to express his own opinions on these problems while illustrating the corruption that is going on in America during the 1920’s. In the first line of the poem, Jeffers uses a lot of foreshadowing by explaining how America is starting to become an empire. This is then shown throughout the poem with many examples describing how this can be possible. By using foreshadowing, the reader clearly knows what the poem is going to be expressing. Showing foreshadowing for America becoming an empire helps to describe the main theme of the poem

During the 1920’s the Great Depression was a good example of this. People would all line up in front of the banks and try to get their money. If they were unsuccessful, a protest would start and build up as more and more people were denied their money. Jeffers incorporates this metaphor into the poem because it was a great example of how one small problem can soon grow into a much larger one in a short period of time. Jeffers not only is referring to the protest itself, but also “tends to apostrophize his countrymen as they blunder toward a comfortable destruction” (english.illinois.edu). He feels the reason why the protest is happening is not because there is a problem. The people are overreacting and not realizing what they are causing. Finally something actually happens and then there is another problem. Jeffers tries to explain that there is just a cycle of protest building up and then falling