To an Athlete Dying Young Poetry Analysis

Sydney Walcher Instructor, Lisa Ward English 1213 8 April 2013 To an athletic supporter decease adolescent A. E. Housman was a poet born in 1859 who became very successful during his lifetime. To an Athlete end Young represents the theme of glory is go alonging by vertiginousustrating the point that if a successful athlete dies young, they leave al one not have to worry intimately their glory of victory fading. They can rest in peace sharp 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, sizable devices, and structure to gild that glory is fleeting through a exceeding poem that will be remembered for many an(prenominal) years. Figurative language consists of many distinct devices including allegorys and similes which argon often utilizationd in poetry akin To an Athlete Dying Young. Metaphors compare un worry things but does not enforce like or as, the comparison is implied.Some metaphors that stick out in To an Athlete Dying Young are the phrase stiller town which is a metaphor for a cemetery and the line Eyes the shady night has shut out which metaphorically states that someone has died. Another device often pulmonary tuberculosisd in Housmans poem is similes, which compare unlike things while using like or as to make a direct comparison. Some examples like It withers quicker than the rose use than instead of the like or as which is comm all apply for similes. Most, if not all, similes in this poem use this method.When contradictory terms are used squarely they are called an oxymoron. The only line in this poem sticks out as an oxymoron is silence sounds. Poems are usually known for rhyming, but not all do. Many poems use other sound devices such as alliteration and rhyme. To an Athlete Dying Young uses both of these devices th roughout the poem. Alliteration is the similarity of the same garner or sound at the beginning of adjacent or consecutive words. One example of alliteration is The fleet foot on the ill of shade because of both fleet and foot and sill and shade. Another example is Today, the way all runners come because of road and runner. Rhyme is similarity of sound surrounded by words or the endings of words when used at the end of a line of poetry. The rhyme scheme of To an Athlete Dying Young is ABAB. This delegacy that the last word of every two lines rhymes. For example, 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 splendiferous demonstration of the ABAB rhyme scheme because fade and shade rhymes, as does up and cup. In To an Athlete Dying Young, Housman uses iambic tetrameter, which refers to a line that is four-spot iambic feet long, to create a lyric poem that can differently be known as an elegy since it praises an athlete that died young. Iambic tetrameter affects the scramble of the words and how they flow together gracefully. Iambic tetrameter consists of a stressed syllable followed by an feminine syllable. Most lines in these poems tend to have eight syllables.However, lines thirteen and fourteen, Eyes the shady night has shut/Cannot observe the record cut, crop from iambic tetrameter to trochaic tetrameter, one stressed syllable plus one unstressed syllable in four feet, with catalexis, which is an incomplete foot at the end of a line. The literary masterpiece, To an Athlete Dying Young, uses figurative language, sound devices, and structure to illustrate a poem that demonstrates the fact that glory is fleeting. The figurative language is used to create imagery, or to provide visual descriptions to create images in ones head.Figurative language paints a picture with words to succor readers see the story. It also creates many different perspectives based on the readers and their perspectives. The sound devices help create lines and rhythms that gracefully flow off the readers tongue. mental synthesis is what incorporates the rhythms and other devices into a pattern that binds the lines of a poem into a microscopical story with a moral that can be told to many different generations. To an Athlete Dying Young is a magnificent example of a lyric or an elegy that will be told for years to come.