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Educated minds have long been puzzled by the perplexing Nazi racial ideology following the atrocities of WWII. Despite the well-known horrors suffered by Jews and other groups during this regime, the mentality that allowed such acts to occur remains a mystery to many. Maxine Kumin effectively communicates this oppressive mindset in her seemingly simple poem "Woodchucks," drawing readers into the narrator's rational yet somewhat sociopathic perspective on the woodchucks as inferior beings, while also paralleling it to the Nazi justification for mass extermination.
By the end of the poem, this allegory becomes explicit and shocking for the audience as Maxine introduces the narrator's dilemma with gassing them.
The narrator discusses how using gas to kill the woodchucks did not go as planned. This highlights the narrator's attitude towards the task, likening it to a failed batch of cookies or coffee. While gassing suggests a slow and painful death, the narrator tries to justify it by describing a knockout bomb as merciful and quick.
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In the second stanza, the narrator's belief in the inferiority of the woodchucks becomes clearer, using alliteration to emphasize their comparison between cyanide, cigarettes, and Scotch.
The narrator portrays gassing the woodchucks as a gesture of kindness, akin to offering them scotch or cigarettes. The metaphor suggests the narrator's skewed perspective on life in relation to the woodchucks, subtly hinted at in the second stanza. War imagery is introduced by Maxine in this stanza, as the narrator depicts the woodchucks seizing control of the vegetables through actions like "nipping" and "beheading" (11-12).
These actions personify the vegetables as victims and portray the woodchucks as evil aggressors in a warlike fashion. The narrator fails to acknowledge the woodchucks' basic need for sustenance, viewing their actions as an unwarranted invasion. This attitude mirrors the anti-Semitic beliefs that fueled the Holocaust, where Jews were required to prove their right to exist. The narrator denies the woodchucks access to the garden in a manner similar to how Jews were unjustly denied their rights. By the third stanza, Maxine cements the narrator's hatred and thirst for blood towards the woodchucks, using a Nazi-affiliated scapegoat justification for their extermination.
The stanza begins with the phrase "The food from our mouths" (13), indicating the narrator's belief that woodchucks are not just consuming food, but actively stealing it. This aligns with the idea of scapegoating, much like how the Jews were blamed for Germany's economic collapse (Foster 13). However, Maxine subtly suggests that the narrator's scapegoating is exaggerated. Despite the variety of vegetables in the garden, a small family of woodchucks is unlikely to pose a significant threat. Similarly, the claim that Germany was being 'Judaized' lacks substantial evidence, as Jews made up only .80 percent of the total population in 1933 (Foster 15). The third stanza delves further into Nazi ideology with the mention of being "puffed with Darwinian pieties for killing" (16).
The third stanza stands out due to its "Darwinian" aspect, linking a human social concept to the killing of woodchucks. This connection can be traced back to the Nazi ideology, which was influenced by ideas of eugenics and Social Darwinism over the previous 80 years (Erdos 6), although Maxine has not fully addressed this link. In the final two stanzas, the narrator diminishes the significance of the woodchucks' deaths by using vague language like "died down" (18), masking any horror and creating a rather cartoonish portrayal as the mother "dropped" and "flip-flopped" (19-20). Even the depiction of their deaths is tinged with an eerie sing-song tone, as seen in lines like "O one-two-three / the murderer inside me rose up hard" (22-23).
The poem draws parallels between the systematic killing of Holocaust victims and the dehumanized way in which death was described. This connection is seen in the way bodies were disposed of in Nazi concentration camps. The tone shift in the fourth stanza, with the narrator acknowledging their inner killer, signifies a shift from viewing woodchucks as aggressors to the narrator themselves becoming the aggressor. This change in tone suggests a shift from the Nazis' perspective to a modern interpretation of them as invaders.
The final stanza of this poem shocks the audience by directly mentioning the Nazis in the closing line: “If only they’d all consented to die unseen / gassed underground the quiet Nazi way” (29-30). Any subtle references to Nazi ideology throughout the poem are now emphasized by this line. Readers have been taken on a turbulent journey by the narrator's portrayal of woodchucks as inferior beings, only to be jolted by the allusion to Nazi atrocities. The entire poem, including its scattered rhyme scheme, leads to this central theme highlighted in the last line. Through the language and structure of "Woodchucks," Maxine demonstrates how terrifying ideologies akin to the Nazis are not as rare on a smaller scale as one might believe.
The Nazi Mentality in Maxine Kumin's "Woodchucks". (2016, Dec 17). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/nazis-and-woodchucks-essay
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