Sandburg’s ‘Chicago’ stands the test of time

Editor’s note: This column originally published on June 11, 1996

This is a literary note on the Bulls victory tour:

Carl Sandburg was wrong, apparently. Sports writers know better.

Sandburg was a dreamy young giant from Galesburg who came to Chicago and worked on the Daily News in 1914. He was a movie reviewer for the News as well as a reporter who covered such gritty matters as the 1919 race riot. He was also a poet.

His Chicago poems began to appear in Harriet Monroe’s new magazine called Poetry in 1914 and were collected as a book in 1916. Among the poems he wrote was the finest poem ever written about an American city: “Chicago.”

This poem sums up the images - good and bad - of the vibrant metropolis he made home. The words are strong, direct and part of the vernacular. Sandburg went on to win Pulitzer Prizes for his biographies and poetry but “Chicago” was at the beginning of the journey of letters.

Who would have thought that his words in the poem could be improved upon? Especially by newspaper hacks? Like the sports columnist for the New York Times who, writing of the Bulls in yesterday’s paper, called us this “broad-shouldered” city? Or the three writers in recent weeks in The Sun-Times who have also found the city of “broad” shoulders worthy of mention? Or the recent Tribune sports writer who saw “broad” writ large on the city’s legend? Where did they all get this word “broad”?

Illiteracy is one thing. Pseudo-literacy is worse. Mayor Jane Byrne practiced the latter when she referred, at one time or another, to the city of “wide” shoulders and “broad” shoulders. She and the scribes mentioned above are trying to do Sandburg’s poem better than justice - they want to improve on it, apparently without having read it. They can’t. Not even to describe what the Bulls are doing to the Sonics - which is just retribution for that awful coffee Seattle has flooded into the local market under the Starbucks name.

Once and for all, fellow writers and pseudo-lits: It is City of Big Shoulders. Not “broad” or “wide” or “cute” or “large.” Listen to Sandburg’s words and try to remember them. And teachers can feel free to clip this column for use in September to save another generation of would-be writers from desecration of a fine poem. The city may have a lousy song - the toddlin’ thing - but the poem needs no revisions. Clip and save:

Chicago.

By Carl Sandburg

Hog Butcher for the World, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat,

Player with Railroads and the Nation’s Freight Handler;

Stormy, husky, brawling,

City of Big Shoulders:

They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I have

seen your painted women under the gas lamps luring the

farm boys.

And they tell me you are crooked and I answer: Yes, it is true

I have seen the gunman kill and go free to kill again.

And they tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the faces

of women and children I have seen the marks of wanton

hunger.

And having answered so I turn once more to those who sneer

at this my city, and I give them back the sneer and say to

them:

Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so

proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.

Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on job,

here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft

cities;

Fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning as a

savage pitted against the wilderness,

Bareheaded,

Shovelling,

Wrecking,

Planning,

Building, breaking, rebuilding,

Under the smoke, dust all over his mouth, laughing with white

teeth,

Under the terrible burden of destiny, laughing as a young man

laughs,

Laughing even as an ignorant fighter laughs who has never lost

A battle,

Bragging and laughing that under his wrist is the pulse, and

under his ribs the heart of the people,

Laughing!

Laughing the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of Youth, half-

naked, sweating, proud to be Hog Butcher, Tool Maker,

Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and Freight Handler

to the Nation.