Saturday, February 20, 2016

Man in the Mirror by Michael Jackson: Analysis


Michael Jackson is quite popular with creating music that both appeals to one's senses and creates awareness about the current situation of the world in the minds of those listening to it.

This music of the "soul" genre is no different. Written in free verse, figurative language colloquial dialect, the song comprises of roughly six stanzas where the third stanza is a short chorus and the sixth is a lengthy one which wraps up the song, creating a vivid image of the horrible condition some people live in the world.

The song is tactfully written such that the first part of the song shows how unfortunate some of us are. For example, the verses like "a widow deeply scarred" and "somebody's broken heart" clearly depict that how tragic someone's life is even though they are living right among us; while the second part tells us how we can get rid of the situation and also invokes the sense of consciousness and subconsciously instills the energy in our minds to do so. 

The author intends to make the world a better place and shows us that the only effective way of doing so is by changing the "man in the mirror", a metaphor for oneself since the man in the mirror is none but each of us. The poet makes it clear that it is up to us to change the world by asking a couple of rhetorical questions here and there.

The lyrics of the song doesn't follow any specific rhyme scheme but throws in a few internal rhymes here and there but the song is successful in provoking an energetic and compassionate mood within us with its subtle message.

Hello guys, sorry for the late. I was very busy with college and moving. Anyways, I am back but kind of ran out of ideas for my blog. So I decided to share my college assignments just in case they might help you somehow someday. Love!


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