Ex Basketball Player Poem Meaning
Flick shows such promise in his teenage years but he ends up in the pathetic reality of helping out at a garage and playing pinball in a luncheonette.
Ex basketball player poem meaning. The speaker leads the reader on a journey through flicks life starting with the principal road in the town progressing to flicks lowly job and then finishing with his menial habits. Poetry about great players unusual teams and flashy moves. More poems by john updike. In fact the best and second shift occurs in stanza four he just sells gas the shift shows us that his best basketball skills are now not used and just selling gases.
The poem is a narrative told from the perspective of one of the residents of the town in which flick the protagonist used to play basketball. Ex basketball player suggests that whether happy or not both flick and the town he lives in wants and needs to remember flicks basketball glory days. The only reason i can figure out why the poet refers. The poem begins with the description.
The poem the ex basketball player by john updike dramatizes the conflict between dreams and reality in the case of flick webb. The poem the ex basketball player by john update dramatists the conflict between dreams and reality in the case of flick webb. Imagery imagery paints a picture and the picture the author paints in the first stanza is the progression of flicks life. To a former mistress now dead.
In the poem the main character was a high school basketball star. In ex basketball player first shift occurs in stanza three he was good. The poem ex basketball player by john updike chronicles the life and daily routine of the former high school basketball standout flick webb. John updike s ex basketball player a poem of five stanzas each containing six lines and written in blank verse describes the life of flick webb once a high school basketball star but now his.
The theme of the poem is the idea that one must move on not simply cling to one important memory in ones life. He just played basketball and never studied. He describes the pumps in term of basketball players and calls them idiots because they are one dimension like he was. Flick shows such promise in his teenage years but he ends up in the pathetic reality of helping out at a garage and playing pinball in a luncheonette.