Question

Instructions: Select the correct answer from each drop-down menu.

Read the excerpt and then complete the sentences that follow.
To an Athlete Dying Young
by A. E. Housman (excerpt)

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.

To-day, the road all runners come,
Shoulder-high we bring you home,
And set you at your threshold down,
Townsman of a stiller town.

. . .

Now you will not swell the rout
Of lads that wore their honours out,
Runners whom renown outran
And the name died before the man.

So set, before the echoes fade,
The fleet foot on the sill of shade,
And hold to the low lintel up
The still-defended challenge-cup.

And round that early-laurelled head
Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead,
And find unwithered on its curls
The garland briefer than a girl's.

In the poem, the phrase "sill of shade" refers to__________The narrator of this poem is__________

1)
A) the Edge of time
B) The edge of a hill
C) the loss of life
D) A window still

2)
A) the athleteś father
B) a reflective onlooker
C) the athleteś lover
D) a young athlete

Answer 1

Answer: First- C

Second- B

Step-by-step explanation:

Answer 2

The answers are indeed letters C) the loss of life and B) a reflective onlooker.

Step-by-step explanation:

The speaker of the poem "To an Athlete Dying Young" is not related to the dead athlete. He is an onlooker who comes to an unusual conclusion after reflecting on the young man's passing away. The speaker thinks he was fortunate. Even though death is always sad, he thinks it was good for him to never get to see his record broken by someone else, his trophy taken away. The speaker uses the word "shade" as a metaphor for death. When he says the athlete's foot was set on the "sill of shade", he means he's at death's door. How the young man died is not revealed by the speaker. It's as if he doesn't want readers to focus on death itself, but on the perks of dying young. He does not at any moment defend the idea of killing oneself, he merely chooses to see death from a different perspective than most people.