Contrast Essay: "To an Athlete Dying Young" vs. "Ex-Basketball Player"

The poem “To an Athlete Dying Young” by A. E. Housman depicts the funeral of a young champion runner, who has died at the peak of his youth and athletic career. The poem makes note of the sorrow of a young life being cut short, but also glorifies the death of the athlete for capturing the young runner in the prime of his life. Housman’s poem was written in the form of the classical lyric poem, which could be influenced by Housman’s early tutoring in Greek and Latin lyric poetry (Holzberger 4). The poem also makes use of a four-line ballad stanza, which Housman forms into an elegy for the young runner as he reflects on the runner’s death (Holzberger 7). The use of symbols throughout the poem such as the

John Maloney’s “Good!” A short (14-line) poem incompasses the fast paced events within a Basketball game.It is limited third person from the perspective of a player that gained possession of the ball after a missed basket. The poet focuses the narrative onto the actions after the rebound occurred. The speaker of the poem, a player on the court, is focused on the game and the game alone, determined to keep the ball in his team’s possession and allow his team the chance to make a shot. Which in the end, he ends up taking the shot himself earning his team two points.

In the poem, “Ex – Basketball Player” by john Updike, (which is a narrative poem) illustrates the nature of life on how life is potentially is seen has a mirror to other people’s life, especially people who play sports. Life is the physical and mental experience of an individual. An in the poem the main character Flick, supply the poem with a good example of how life is potentially a mirror for other people. This poem is formally organized, even though it locks some qualities, it still haves the qualifications of a good poem. The “Ex Basket Player” is an interested poem because it has a good theme, tone and lots of figurative languages.

The poem tells the story of the life of the former high school basketball standout, Flick Webb and his fall from grace and fame. The speaker takes us on a journey through Flick’s life, beginning with the main street in town, developing to Flick’s fall from fame to his lowly job, and then ends by telling us of his menial daily habits. He was once the best basketball player in his area. However, he has since his fall from grace he is now just a lowly gas attendant who checks oil, and changes flat tires for a living.

No matter how big or great one is, he cannot escape death. In Randall Jarrell’s 1963 writing of “Say Good-bye to Big Daddy,” the poet describes Big Daddy Lipscomb as a football lineman superstar. His goliath size makes him impenetrable on the football field. Randall describes Big Daddy as the “Rock of Gibraltar”; however, it may also be Big Daddy’s sportsmanship and compassion for others that has made him a superstar. Although he was capable of pulling the largest of men to the ground, he was always sure to help them back up. Big Daddy is conscious of the fact that his actions are viewed by not only adults but also young impressionable children. He doesn’t want those young minds to think of him in a negative manner, and this is one reason he helps those he tackles back to their feet.

The use of imagery to depict a Golden Age is evident in John Updike’s poem “Ex-Basketball Player.” This piece of poetry tells the story of a man named Flick Webb, who works at a garage pumping gas and repairing cars. As the poem continues, we learn that Flick once was an incredible basketball player; he holds the county record for points in a season. However, after high school, he never continued with his abilities, and never studied another trade. There is one stanza of the piece—the third stanza—that focuses on Webb’s ball-playing days. Updike describes his incredible abilities with beautiful language, comparing Flick’s hands to “wild birds” in the sense that they were delicate yet impressively skilled; as the poet describes them later on,

“Time has a wonderful way of showing us what really matters.” A.E. Housman grew up in a small town in Worcestershire, London. His childhood ended at the age of twelfth because his mother passed away. Then he went to this University where he fell into a dark love and made him depressed. He worked really hard and got a job as a professor at the University College in London. Although he does all of his teaching and helping scholars he is most known for his poetry. His poems display deep feelings and are emotionless. His poems usually affected the reader like a shiver down the spine or a punch in the stomach. I am going to be talking about three messages from the poem “To an Athlete Dying Young” by A.E. Housman.

Remember that boy in high school that was the star of the basketball team? He still holds most of the records for the team. He scored more points than anyone else in the school’s history. He never studied much because he was an athlete. His basketball skills were going to take him places. But high school ended and there are no more games to be played. Where is that former all-star now? In his poem “Ex-Basketball Player,” John Updike examines the life of a former high school basketball star. Flick Webb was a local hero, and he loved basketball. He never studied much in school or learned a trade because he was a talented athlete. Now years later, the only job Flick can find is working at the local gas station. He used to be a star, but now

In “To An Athlete Dying Young,” Housman refers to “the rout / of lads that wore their honors out.” A rout is a

In his poem “To an Athlete Dying Young”, A.E. Housman makes a quite different approach on death. People have different perspectives on death, but more often than not, it is viewed as an undesirable event that people wish to avoid. The speaker in the poem, however, praises a young and famous athlete for dying before he became old and forgotten. This can be interpreted two very different ways. One can assume Housman believes that the only way for athletes to capture the glory is to die when at the peak of their careers. One might criticize him for having such a pessimistic view of life, but we must realize that we are among many people who give those athletes the feeling of disgrace as they are no

A.E. Housman was a poet born in 1859 who became very successful during his lifetime. “To an Athlete Dying Young” represents the theme of glory is fleeting by illustrating the point that if a successful athlete dies young, they will not have to worry about their glory of victory fading. They can rest in peace knowing they will be remembered at their athletic peak when they were successful and victorious. They will not have to go through the pain of watching their fame disappear or whither out with time. In this poetic masterpiece, Housman pulls together figurative language, sound devices, and structure to illustrate that glory is fleeting through a

Alfred Edward Housman best known for his beautiful and distinctive imagery and lyrical poems wrote often about the life of the young. He created a poem by the name of “To An Athlete Dying Young” and by the title one can assume what it might be about. In poetry, all poems have a mood, tone, and central meaning. In almost all of them, you can tell the narrator's attitude towards the topic that is being written about. The poem is actually about a young man who received praise and glory from his hometown because of his victory race. Even when he passed away he was still being held high. The author had felt like the athlete was lucky to have died young because he was going to be remembered for winning the race, one of the best moments of his life that he shared with others. The narrator additionally felt like the athlete wouldn’t have wanted to see his name being forgotten about so it was best to die young, saying this with his figurative language and imagery.

Throughout all of Housman’s work, the most striking features of “To an Athlete Dying Young” include the vivid and engaging metaphors which Housman introduces for the reoccurring theme of the poem, which is death. In the first stanza, Housman describes of a time when the young athlete was still alive, and how the town would hoist the athlete onto their shoulders whilst others would cheer for the victory the adolescent had not only brought for himself, but to the entire town as well. The line “Today, the road all runners come” found in the second stanza enhances the idea of the one account of life the majority of people fear the most: the end of life (Housman). Though people deny their fear of dying, the fear still resides within the deepest parts of the souls of every human being of Earth. “And early through the laurel grows” found in stanza

"To An Athlete Dying Young" is a sonnet in A.E. Housman's A Shropshire Lad . It is portrayed as a verse lyric furthermore a funeral poem. It is maybe a standout amongst the most understood lyrics relating to right on time demise; for this situation, that of a young fellow at the tallness of his physical force. Nobody recollects the triumphant minutes that he lived and the wonderfulness of his prosperity vanishes with age. The lyric difficulties the conventional thought of carrying on with a long life and objects that it is disastrous to pass on youthful. A youthful athletic champion's passing being grieved at his burial service where the writer understands that this early demise is to be sure his good

The poem commences with an athlete attaining victory and triumph. His career bloomed and blossomed like a “laurel grows,” but his life “withers [away] quicker than a rose” (Housman, lines 11-12) It transitions to a “dismal” route that “all runner[’]s/ fleet f[ee]t [come to] the sill shade¨ (Housman 5,22). Every living person will eventually encounter the face of death and reach eternal rest. The athlete was “brought shoulder-high/ [and] set at [his] threshold” (Housman 6-7). He was glorified at his deathbed since he died at the peak of his career. The olympian was a “smart lad, to slip betimes away/From fields of glory does not stay” (Housman 9-10). He was fortunate to have passed on early with the finest memory people had of him. Housman claims that death early on in life is a benefit to the deceased because one will not undergo his/her downfall. Their remembrance will purely be of bliss and prestige. Housman illuminates that the athlete was brisk to die young before his glory had been defamed and waned away. Nothing lasts forever in life, eventually, his “record [would have been] cut,” but his “eyes the shady night has shut” (Housman 13-14). The poet contradicts the popular notion of life and death. Housman clarifies that the death of the olympian was an advantage because he would “not swell the rout” (Housman 17). The athlete is “unconscious” of his surroundings, including of the “lads that wore [his] honours out”