Vol. 3, Issue 10, Part B (2017)

Abstract
This paper aims to study the notion of Death in Claude McKay’s "If We Must Die" on the philosophical, existential and contextual levels. Indeed a thorough analysis following a sociocriticism and a psychoanalytic perspective reveals that this poem may be at the same time a philosophical poem, an existential poem and a contextual poem thanks to the notion of Death it deals with. As a result, we observe obviously that beyond the Black American people to whom this poem was intended (the circumstantial or contextual level), it concerns every human being. Because "we" as human beings are already alive and it is possible that sooner or later "we" will reflect on Death (the philosophical level), and also "we" are already alive therefore no one will escape this human finitude which is Death (the existential level). So the problem of Death concerns us all and is universal.