A. E. Housman's Ex-Basketball Player

Die with fame, not without. A.E. Housman can concur. The poems, “Ex-Basketball Player” by John Updike and “To an Athlete Dying Young” by A.E. Housman both concentrate on what occurs after an athlete’s days of glory. Most of them seek fame, but only a few will achieve it. Their goal is not to die within their days of glory, it is to live on and have their fame live for an eternity. Unfortunately, in today’s society athletes mainly want the monetary success that comes along fame. They quickly become judged by their actions and can be forgotten if they do not reach stardom or fulfill their fame set by the standards of society. Sharing similar themes of adversity and death, the two poems still differ from one another. This causes the authors to
Updike makes Flick Webb, the main protagonist, live through a miserable transition from his most glorious moments on the high school basketball team to his “metaphorical death,” working at Berth’s Garage continually recollecting on his past. To begin, “Ex-Basketball Player” starts through a strong usage of imagery. For instance, “Pearl Avenue runs past the high school lot, bends with the trolley tracks, and then stops, cut off.” (Updike) Using this as the first line of the poem, Updike was able to immediately establish the setting of the poem through the use of imagery. It also allowed him to create the mood of sorrow within the poem which will be further explained later on, contrasting “To an Athlete Dying Young.” However just like Pearl Avenue, Flick’s life was “stopped short,” he was never able to reach his full potential or fulfill the fame he wanted. Now, he is just another object at the run-down gas station on the corner. Updike draws similarities between Flick and his current occupation by mentioning “Flick stands tall among the idiot pumps—Five on a side, the old bubble-head style, and their rubber elbows hanging loose and low.”(Updike) He says this because Flick is nothing special anymore, he is not the superstar like once was. Updike mentions this about his character because he is an aged basketball player who
In “To an Athlete Dying Young” the author seems to address his sincerity and respect for the athlete in the first stanza. However, some may argue that it might be the first line of the poem. As the speaker continues on in Housman’s poem, the audiences learns that the cherished athlete who has died young was saved from the upcoming fading of his fame. Housman