Essay on To an Athlete Dying Young Poetry Analysis

Sydney Walcher Instructor, Lisa Ward English 1213 8 April 2013 To an Athlete Dying Young A.E. Housman was a poet born in 1859 who became very successful during his lifetime. â€Å"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†¦show more content†¦Another example is â€Å"Today, the road all runners come† because of road and runner. Rhyme is similarity of sound between words or the endings of words when used at the end of a line of poetry. The rhyme scheme of â€Å"To an Athlete Dying Young† is ABAB. This means that the last wor d of every two lines rhymes. For example, â€Å"So set, before its echoes fade,/The fleet foot on the sill of shade,/And hold to the lintel up/The still-defended challenge cup.† This is an excellent demonstration of the ABAB rhyme scheme because â€Å"fade† and â€Å"shade† rhymes, as does â€Å"up† and â€Å"cup.† In â€Å"To an Athlete Dying Young,† Housman uses iambic tetrameter, which refers to a line that is four iambic feet long, to create a lyric poem that can otherwise be known as an elegy since it praises an athlete that died young. Iambic tetrameter affects the beat of the words and how they flow together gracefully. Iambic tetrameter consists of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable. Most lines in these poems tend to have eight syllables. However, lines thirteen and fourteen, â€Å"Eyes the shady night has shut/Cannot see the record cut,† stray from iambic tetrameter to trochaic tetrameter, one stressed syl lable plus one unstressed syllable in four feet, with catalexis, which is an incomplete foot at the end of a line. The literary masterpiece, â€Å"To an Athlete Dying Young,† uses figurative language, sound devices, and structure to illustrate a poemShow MoreRelatedThe Death Of An Athlete Dying Young1640 Words   |  7 PagesHousman s To An Athlete Dying Young A. E. Housman s To an Athlete Dying Young, also known as Lyric XIX in A Shropshire Lad, holds as its main theme the premature death of a young athlete as told from the point of view of a friend serving as pall bearer. The poem reveals the concept that those dying at the peak of their glory or youth are really quite lucky. The first few readings of To an Athlete Dying Young provides the reader with an understanding of Housman s view of death. AdditionalRead More An Analysis Of British Literature Essay2728 Words   |  11 Pages An Analysis of British Literature nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;Death is inevitable and what happens after death will always be a mystery to the living. For this reason, the afterlife has always been a topic which artists have chosen to explore in their works. Throughout the chronology of British literature, artists have used societys views as a basis to examine the afterlife, and look at it in new ways. The afterlife has been a theme in British Literature from the Anglo-Saxon period of BeowulfRead MoreGp Essay Mainpoints24643 Words   |  99 Pagescan easily get broadcasted to a global audience †¢ Publishers want to ensure that their books sell *quality check* †¢ Any hack can put up his dribbling on Fictionpress.net †¢ Any angst-filled teenager can put up his or her macabre, misspelt poetry online. †¢ Anyone can masquerade a superstition for scientific truth and create a website to scare similarly weak-minded netizens Mainstream BAD: Profit motive and Government-regulated - reliability †¢ â€Å"Don’t let the facts get in the way ofRead MoreStephen P. Robbins Timothy A. Judge (2011) Organizational Behaviour 15th Edition New Jersey: Prentice Hall393164 Words   |  1573 PagesUniversity Christine Day, Eastern Michigan University Emmeline de Pillis, University of Hawaii, Hilo Kathy Lund Dean, Idaho State University Roger Dean, Washington Lee University Robert DelCampo, University of New Mexico Kristen Detienne, Brigham Young University Doug Dierking, University of Texas at Austin Cynthia Doil, Southern Illinois University Jennifer Dose, Messiah College Ceasar Douglas, Florida State University David Duby, Liberty University Ken Dunegan, Cleveland State University Michael