Catherine+Stephens

The poem, "To an Athlete Dying Young", is a testimony to those who rise and fall in the world. Not even a world of reality, but a world in which things happen that most don't consider important but is anyways. "The time you won your town the race, we chaired you through the market-place; man and boy stood cheering by, and home we brought you shoulder-high" (Housman). This is telling a story about when a person proved and brought themselves up to higher standards telling everyone else that that's who they were and how it was going to be. But reading further- "Smart lad, to slip betimes away, from fields where glory does not stay, and early though the laurel grows, it withers quicker than the rose" (Housman). Housman is saying that that feeling does not always stay, it fades away and is all but forgotten. Its says, "Now you will not swell the rout of lads that wore their honors out, Runners whom renown outran and the name died before the man" (Housman). People who 'have a name for themselves' tend to milk the situation and continue thinking that no matter what happens, they will always be great. That's something that always knocks someone down from their 'pedestal'. Overall this poem is teaching a lesson; a moral. Yes, there was that day that that person was great and made a name for themselves. But they wore it out and to everyone but them, it has no meaning.

In H.G. Bissingers book, Friday Night Lights, there is a character, Boobie Miles. Boobie Miles is the star of the Permian Panthers football team. He never fails kick the other team on their backs. One game though, he critically injured his knee. His football career was now ruined completely. He kept trying to come back time and time again. The first time he tried to come back, it was right after he had been to the doctor. He insisted that he was healed and ready to play even though he had been told very clearly that he could not continue playing or risk even more. When Coach Gaines put him in at the end of the game, Boobie took a hit to his knee and once again had to be taken out. In //Friday Night Lights// it says, "It was clear that Boobie had become and expendable property. If he wanted to quit, let him go and good ridance" (Bissinger 17). Just like in the poem, //To an Athlete Dying Young,// Boobie Miles had ridden out his name; who he was. The poem says, "And the name died before the man" (Housman). Everyone knew him as the Permian star but now they knew him as a dud. He wasn't part of the team anymore.