Wordplay
Often considered a lightweight poet because he worked in comic vein, Nash belongs alongside the much more highly regarded Lewis Carroll as a master of linguistic wordplay. In fact, Nash proves himself the superior to those who relied on invented words and phrases to serve a more nonsensical purpose since his engagement with invented words and experimental meter and rhyme all serve the purse of literate content.
Satirizing American Middle Class Lifestyle
Domesticity and the everyday irritants of trying to live a comfortable middle class existence when it often seems as there is a secret but well-organized system designed for the express purpose of thwarting success is a common thread running through Nash domestic poetry. Many of his poems are directed toward the economic gap between the haves and the have-nots with the wealthier side of the equation usually the target of barbs related to hypocrisy over what money means to them or their insidious motives in handing out advice. Other poems take on the irritants of middle class existence raging from conflicts with neighbors to the befuddlement of changing fashions and tastes.
Hypochondria
Nash appears to have been a genuine textbook case of a hypochondriac judging from the sheer volume of verse he devoted to the various ailments—real or imagined—afflicting both body and mind. Poems inspired by an obsession with health range from consideration of “The Germ” to concerns about aging and losing mental acuity to processes of the health care system including doctors and insurance salesmen.
Family Life
Marriage is viewed through the lens of battlefield primed with potential land mines in many of Nash’s poems. His view toward children and their various assaults on trying to maintain a sense of comfort and peace of mind often verges into a territory where W.C. Fields might well be the speaker’s friend and confidante.
