To An Athlete Dying Young

'To an Athlete Dying Young' was included in Housman's best-known collection, Shropshire Lad, published in 1896. This poem uses techniques such every bit apostrophe and imagery to create a iii-part discussion of themes such as life, youth, death, and fame/glory.

To an Athlete Dying Young by A. E. Housman

Explore To an Athlete Dying Immature

ane Summary
two Themes
iii Structure
4 Literary Devices
5 Detailed Assay

Summary

'To an Athlete Dying Immature' by A. East. Housman is an epitome-rich and metrically steady poem that is directed to a young man who has died in early on death.

In this poem, the speaker begins by recalling a young athlete who won a small-town race. He was celebrated by anybody around him. Now, in the nowadays, the athlete is being celebrated in a very different way. He's died and is beingness carried back habitation. He died gloriously and the speaker seems to praise him for it. The speaker follows this upwards past providing the reader with a series of night and thoughtful images that allude to the loss the town has suffered and the futurity the young man will never get to have. He too brings in images of the afterlife and the crown the beau will exist wearing there.

Themes

There are several important themes to take note of in this verse form. These include youth, glory, decease, and fright. These are all linked together through the life and death of this boyfriend and the speaker's contemplation of him. At that place is an implicit fearfulness of death in the speaker's delineation of the swain's early death. He dwells on what has been lost and will at present never be regained There is a good example in the second stanza when the poet's speaker spends time thinking near the period betwixt life and death and the threshold through which the townspeople comport the boyfriend. This liminal space is holding an important identify in the speaker'south mind. At that place is a cursory allusion in the line "Smart lad, to sideslip anon away" to the possibility that the beau killed himself. Therefor meeting death on his own terms.

There is also a focus on the man's age and how able-bodied he was throughout the poem. These things generally do not go together with death and are therefore juxtaposed to bring attention to one another. The speaker describes youth equally a flow of time that goes past much as well quickly, expiry comes whether one is ready for information technology or non. Glory comes and goes much in the same way. The image of the funeral initially appears celebratory but it is far from information technology. The speaker is disturbed by the death and only paints it in an upbeat life in guild to take hold of the reader's attention and compare information technology to the previous celebration.

Construction

'To an Athlete Dying Young' by A. East. Housman is an elegiac verse form that is made up of seven, four-line stanzas. These are known as quatrains. The quatrains follow a simple rhyme scheme of AABB CCDD and so on, changing cease sounds from stanza to stanza. These vii stanzas can be farther separated into three sections. The first contains a retentiveness of the past, the second stanza all the mode through the sixth brings the reader to the athlete's death and funeral. These stanzas besides incorporate a discussion about youth existence the right time for ane to die. The terminal stanza concludes the poem with thoughts nearly the futurity and what might be in store for the athlete in the afterlife.

In regards to the meter, Housman uses iambic tetrameter in many of the lines of this piece. Only, there are moments in which the lines contain more or less than four metrical feet. In that location are a few examples of catalexis, such as in the beginning line of the second stanza.

Literary Devices

Housman makes use of several literary devices in 'To an Athlete Dying Young'. These include but are not limited to ingemination, enjambment, and apostrophe. Apostrophe is an organisation of words addressing someone, something, or creature, that does non exist, or is not present, in the verse form'due south immediate setting. The exclamation, "Oh," is often used at the outset of the phrase. The person is spoken to as though they can hear and understand the speaker's words. In this instance, the speaker is talking to the athlete who has died. This is quite a mutual technique in elegies.

Alliteration occurs when words are used in succession, or at least appear close together, and begin with the same audio. For example, the "marketplace-place" and "Human" in lines 2 and three of the starting time stanza and "runners" and "renown" in line three of the fifth stanza. Another important technique commonly used in poesy is enjambment. It occurs when a line is cutting off earlier its natural stopping signal. Enjambment forces a reader downwards to the next line, and the next, chop-chop. 1 has to move forward in society to comfortably resolve a phrase or sentence. For case, the transition between lines one and ii of the get-go stanza and lines one and two of the third stanza.

Detailed Analysis

Stanza I

The time yous won your town the race

Nosotros chaired you through the market-place;

Homo and boy stood cheering by,

And home we brought you lot shoulder-high.

In the starting time stanza of 'To an Athlete Dying Young,' the speaker begins by addressing a memory that he has of a immature athlete. This person was a champion in his small town. When he was a runner he won a specific, important race and people carried him through the streets celebrating. "We brought you home shoulder-high," the speaker recalls. The "we" is the speaker and all the townspeople collectively, while "you" is the immature human who the poem is addressed to.

This first stanza, likewise as all those which follow, or examples of apostrophe. This is a technique where the speaker of the poem addresses someone or something that is incapable of hearing and understanding what is existence said. In this case, the fellow has died and will never read or hear these lines.

The poet describes how "Man and boy" were cheering in the streets. This is an innuendo to the fact that all the townspeople, young and old, felt the aforementioned pride at the accomplishments of this fellow. A reader should remember this celebratory atmosphere and take note of how information technology is mimicked in the following stanza.

Stanza Two

Today, the road all runners come,

Shoulder-high we bring you dwelling,

And set you lot at your threshold down,

Townsman of a stiller boondocks.

In the 2nd stanza of this verse form the speaker takes the reader out of the past and to "today". There was another procession, but this fourth dimension it was for a very different reason, the immature man has passed away. While this is not revealed until the third stanza, it's very clear that something is changed through the use of the phrase a "stiller town". This alludes to the fact that the beau's presence has made the town less than what information technology was before. A reader should besides take notation of the use of alliteration and the start line of the second stanza with the words "road" and "runners". There is another example in the final line of this stanza with "townsman" and "town".

Stanza Iii

Smart lad, to slip anon away

From fields where glory does not stay,

And early though the laurel grows

It withers quicker than the rose.

It's in the tertiary stanza of 'To an Athlete Dying Young'that the youth's death is revealed. The speaker refers to him as a "smart lad". It is not entirely clear why this is the case, but the fact that the speaker immediately refers to the boyfriend's ability to "slip betimes away" is interesting. It could suggest that the speaker feels that this boy was smart to die. This as well raises the possibility that the young homo committed suicide or that it was in someway a conscious conclusion to dice. The mortal world that the immature man has left is a place that'due south quite different from the afterlife. In heaven, or wherever i ends up after death, celebrity is non fleeting every bit it is on world. The athlete slipped away from "fields were celebrity does not stay".

Now, he's in a world where things are quite dissimilar. Nonetheless referring to the mortal world, the speaker describes the " Laurel" and the way that it " Withers" even faster than the Rose does. The laurel wreath is a traditional symbol of accomplishment, dating back to Greek and Roman times. The Rose is oft used as a symbol of love, passion, and in this instance, fragility. Its dazzler is nigh the pinnacle of temporary pleasure. Then, when information technology is put upwardly against the laurel, it becomes even more clear how temporary glory is.

Stanza Four

Optics the shady night has shut

Cannot see the record cut,

And silence sounds no worse than cheers

After world has stopped the ears.

Even so speaking about athlete'south death, in the quaternary stanza of 'To an Athlete Dying Young'the speaker says that since the athlete has died he's never going to accept to be alive to "see the record cut". This is in reference to the running record that the immature homo set while he was still alive. Now, he'll never have to experience the sorrow over its demise. There is a good case of sibilance in these lines with the words "shady" and "close" equally well equally "silence sounds" and "stopped".

In the 2nd half of the stanza, the speaker refers to "silence". At present, it does not affair to the swain whether there is cheering for his accomplishments, crying for his death, or silence. It's withal to him.

Stanza Five

Now you will not swell the rout

Of lads that wore their honours out,

Runners whom renown outran

And the proper name died before the man.

Due to the fact that the young human died early, he'due south never going to have to worry about this feature of life that seems to carp the speaker. He won't have to alive to see his glory fade. It is likely that this fact is what led the speaker to suggest that the swain was smart to die. He'll never know when his honors have been worn out. His young expiry has solidified him as glorious for the rest of the time. The next 2 lines of 'To an Athlete Dying Young' describe, using a metaphor of a runner and a race, how fame and glory commonly outpace the men to whom they and so briefly belong.

Stanza Half dozen

So set, before its echoes fade,

The fleet human foot on the sill of shade,

And hold to the low lintel up

The still-defended challenge-cup.

The 6th stanza of 'To an Athlete Dying Young,' is slightly more obscure. It is up to the reader to interpret whether these lines are addressed to the dead immature man, as the balance of the poem has been, or if the poet is changing intended listeners and is instead talking to the townspeople of whom he considers himself one. If addressing the town, he tells them to set up down the athlete's casket earlier silence takes over the scene and becomes louder than the thanks for the fellow'due south accomplishments.

Alternatively, he's request the young man who is in the afterlife, or on the way there, to pace into the "sill of shade". This is the boundary between one world and the next, the windowsill is between the inside and exterior. In the last ii lines, it is possible still that the speaker is addressing the townspeople or the athlete. Either way, he tells his intended listener to hold up the "challenge cup". They should still gloat this young man'due south accomplishments.

Stanza Seven

And circular that early-laurelled head

Volition flock to gaze the strengthless dead,

And find unwithered on its curls

The garland briefer than a girl's.

In the seventh and concluding line stanza of 'To an Athlete Dying Young,' the speaker moves away from the present and into a discussion of what kind of life the young homo is at present existing in. He imagines the afterlife, it kind of underworld, and which the young man is nonetheless wearing the laurel crown on his head. This fits well in with the speaker's idea that the young homo's glory is now never going to fade.