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The Hangman (poem)
Poem by Maurice Ogden
The Hangman (poem)
"The Hangman" is a poem written by Maurice Ogden in 1951 and first published in 1954. The poem was originally published under the title "Ballad of the Hangman" in Masses & Mainstream magazine under the pseudonym "Jack Denoya", before later being "[r]evised and retitled". Its plot concerns a hangman who arrives in a town and executes the citizens one by one. As each citizen is executed, the others are afraid to object out of fear that they will be next. Finally, there is nobody remaining in the town except the hangman and the narrator of the poem. The narrator is then executed by the hangman, as by then there is no one left who will defend him. The poem was adapted into an 11-minute animated film in 1964 which received an award at the 1964 Locarno International Film Festival. The poem is used in education material on topics about the Holocaust and the bystander effect.
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