114. Playing the game
Playing the Game is a poem from an ‘Anonymous’ author. I find it hard to believe that such a great poem has no author. Does anyone know who the real source is? Thanks to Colin for submitting it.
This comic is a continuation of the Poetic Justice saga. You can read the previous instalments featuring the same boy and his father in the following comics:
PART 1 Invictus
PART 2 If
PART 3 O Me! O Life!
PART 4 A Bird Came Down the Walk
I don’t have a name for the boy so I’ll just take a leaf from one of my favourite authors, Cormac McCarthy, and call him ‘the kid’.
Discussion (85) ¬
That was beautiful. Thanks gav 🙂
I can’t help but think it should be “the manner you think you’re due.” Shouldn’t it?
YES! It should. Good eye!
Actually, I think both work. The current version — “the manner you think your due” — in effect translates to “the manner you think ought to be yours,” i.e. “your due.”
Here’s a 1921 published copy of the poem with ‘your’ for anyone into citations. http://books.google.com/books?id=4G5VAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA12-PA26&img=1&zoom=3&hl=en&sig=ACfU3U0hPkbB84dcdTimUfIOPuDpUTsXfg&ci=504%2C772%2C463%2C673&edge=0
Well, you are lucky enough to spend time in these famous places on new year
Your/You’re? Hmm… if “due” is treated as a noun, then “your due” would be used just like “your mom” or “your bicycle.” If you include the first part “Do you wilt and whine, if you fail to win…” it simply doesn’t make much sense to our ears today, even if it’s truly archaic. I guess it could be roughly translated, “In the manner you think is owed to you,” but I’m a fan of “you’re.”
There is nothing wrong with ‘your’ in this case since ‘due’ is treated as a noun here. Try reading it as “in the manner you think [is] your due”.
The omission of some occurrences of words like ‘is’ and ‘that’ is relatively common. Come to think of it, you could also say the above statement should’ve been “in the manner [that] you think [is] your due”.
I had the same thought at first, that it should be ‘you’re’, but all the versions I saw had ‘your’ – so I left it. Still makes sense
Awesome comic, getting back up – no matter how many times one fall down.. 🙂 Thanks for making it Gav. 🙂
Looks great, but for this guy I thought he’ll suffer a little, not get every one cheering him all the way.
he’s past appearances were a little more bloody
His dad is the coach! Nice to see him recovering. Hope that you have some more uplifting stuff ahead for this little guy.
*You’re (Panel 9). Nevertheless this is a BRILLIANT illustration, Gavin!
Just what I needed today 🙂
“Your” is correct. It’s archaic language. It means “the manner you think befits you.”
What about a girl teammate? I wasn’t ever allowed to play baseball/little league with my buddies who were all boys. I HATED it. That was 25 years ago. It should be different now. If it’s not, it /should/.
*a girl who was NOT into powder puff, flag football or underhand softball. & so had to sit out of sports altogether in a darker age.*
So what? Team sports are generally played into separate teams for boys and girls…You’re feminist complaint has no place here. The boy is a recurring character of zen comics. Gavin wasn’t going to put him on a team of girls just because of those reasons you said. He’s not being sexist…
Dammit, too much internet. I meant “your”.
At least in my area many kids teams are co-ed now up to a certain age, even football and hockey, much to the chagrin of many boys who have to deal with the fact that the girls have grown and matured faster and are sometimes bigger and almost always more coordinated. On many of the local soccer teams, to “kick like a girl” is an aspiration, not an insult.
I’m turning 40 this year, and when I was a kid, the local Little League WAS (and still IS) Co-Ed. And this was in a community that is generally considered backwards, as in 5-10 years in the past from the rest of the state! I grew up in a part of California where Rednecks & Country/Western music are still the norm, if that tells you anything.
Sports are segregated by gender for a reason–like it or not, males tend to outperform females due to genetics. I personally think that’s a shame, but it’s a fact of life.
Well, were that the case, then women could simply try out with the men, and fail if they were inferior, succeed if not.
There are other reasons why sports teams are gender segregated…
Locker-room reasons, I suppose.
Injury from trying to keep up with others who are, on average, much stronger than you is another reason. This is why female firefighters, no matter how capable during the tests, tend to retire early, according to my friend who is a (male) firefighter.
You know what else I HATE about ZP? All we ever see is the Shaolin Monk. That is discriminatory against other styles martial arts! How dare Gavin use his comic as a pulpit for his backward, jingoistic, martial bigotry?! Cant he see that it is his highest duty, as an artist who makes things I like for free, to represent EVERY martial art so that I feel slightly offended?
I DEMAND WE SEE MORE MARTIAL ARTS DIVERSITY! BOYCOTT ZEN PENCILS!
So, a student of social economics among others, I also have gender studies on my plate right now. I have to weigh in a little.
I gave much thought to this, starting out from a very feminist perspective.
I considered what I found looking at society.
Then I again looked at so many great authors (of both genders), some of them featured here.
It stands out to me, that boys and young men are in much greater need of guidance, care and encouragement than girls are.
History is full of misguided male figures, who had extreme potential, but noone to guide them, no righteous male mentor. Some of them turned crazy, some of them we know became dictators. Misguided potential. But I’m thinking more of the misguided regular guy, than the historical big-shot.
And yes, maybe in the past it would’ve been hard for a women to assume a position so powerful as to become a dictator. But again, I’m looking to regular everyday life. Men are fucked up, we are NOT what we ought to be. I cannot say the same for women, quite to that extent. It’s true for them too, just glancing over to b-models and porn, they also don’t have the role-models they would deserve.
But as I said, in everyday life, I know much more broken men (some of them don’t seem to be on the outside) or at least bad men, than I know women who are so far off from what they could be.
Women are somehow more enduring, they can thrive without encouragement or much guidance, it’s good if they do have that, but they also manage without. I’m thinking about all the women who raise their kids alone, while the men took off, they couldn’t take it, they were not strong or enduring or of good character.
This discussion has been here before on ZP with how many quotes from women and men are featured. It was good this discussion was there. But you cannot bind an artist to a 50/50 rate if maybe the are overall more male authors.
And what is more important. Young men need guidance. They need a goal, to see their lifes are going somewhere. They need to feel needed and appreciated by society.
Now women do too, but they don’t go crazy and join gangs (I know very little female gangs) if they don’t get that, they can keep it together far better.
Young men should have mentors, good authors help too, but a real person would be better. (Ideally we should have fathers, but our society has looked at “ideally” in the rear-view mirror at some point between the industrialisation and WWII).
If anyone is interested, I can recommend Donald Miller’s “To own a dragon”. The first few chapters capture this nicely.
Oh, forgot the point while writing.
It’s good to sometimes have a male-role model beyond either softies and machos. A guy who doesn’t succumb to the pressure of society.
Who leaves behind the “comfort” that men usually strives for and gives his ill-gained reputation or wealth or status away, so he may build character.
I think, for the reasons above, that boys are in greater need of this kind of role-model than girls. Boys spoil easier.
Charles, you think you’re not sexist because you think men are “fucked-up” and women are “more enduring”, but that’s really just another way of classifying women as some mystical “other”. This is the same kind of logic that leads to victim blaming. Since men aren’t expected to be able to control themselves, the responsibility falls on women to make sure they aren’t tempted.
The truth is that we are all people and people fall on a spectrum on most character traits. Men tend to fall on the more athletic side of the spectrum and women tend to fall on the more nurturing side, but the ranges overlap. Some girls are much more athletic than some boys, for example, so why should they be excluded from certain athletic opportunities just because “most girls” lack the interest and aptitude?
Strong role models and community building activities benefit everyone. Even if you’re right that more boys need strong role models than girls, who cares? Why do you feel the need to make it an exclusive boys’ club for them to have the benefit?
Every time…every time you come out with one of these it’s amazing. How do you keep hitting them out of the park (no pun intended) like this?
As with every poem in the poetic justice saga, I got a chill at the end. STRONG WORK Gav!
Somebody on panel 12 forgot to put on his shoes this morning 🙂
Beautiful, as most of your work is, Gavin. Thank you for what you do.
I humbly suggest that this would be even stronger if it ended in the next-to-last panel, with “then you will be playing the game” next to the close up of the kid’s eyes. The fact that he connects with the ball is not as important as the fact that he got up after failing, and had the right attitude (“I shall do or die”) to give it his all. We, as parents and coaches, are taught to praise effort, and not result. The kid won the moment he picked up the bat and decided to go for it again, not when he connected with the ball (skill, luck).
Great quote and amazing drawings as always. I believe you should check out the amazing portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa he may not be one of the jolliest but he sure is one of the best.
There’s a typo in this one… in the box that asks “do you wilt or whine…”
Reminds me of
http://xkcd.com/391/
(better than the 4chan version of “the game” … 😛 )
Reminds me of The Decemberists “The Sporting Life”. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuDVaWtNIpM
Yay! The kid is back! 🙂
WOW…. i really needed this. Im a very optimistic person and sometimes even I get shaken up. I cannot afford to let others and myself down.
GAV…you really rock…this comic was amazing…and the kid is the awesome character ever…
Thanks for coming up with this! It’s my birthday today and it is inspiring for me, as a teacher, to read this on this day! This poem, those illustrations, come together beautifully.
You Rock…. 🙂
Simply awesome !
Beautiful. you created the kid, and now he has a life of his own.
you managed to make me empathise with a comic book character.
great work Gavin.Gave me the shivers
35 comments and half of them are about “your vs. you’re”. *sigh*
There is value in both “playing the game for fun” and “playing the game to win”. It all depends on WHY YOU’RE PLAYING.
In the context of a sports game and similar, you better play for fun. But in the context of life, so long as you aren’t hurting others, you better play to win.
I can’t seem to find who would have written this particular quote.
It may have been inspired, however, by the 20th Century writer Grantland Rice, who wrote a sports-related poem about “How to play the game”. The poem is called “Alumnus Football”. It was published in November, 1914:
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1144&dat=19141102&id=ah4bAAAAIBAJ&sjid=M0kEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6335,767311
http://www.ask.com/wiki/Grantland_Rice
Grantland’s Rice could have inspired this “anonymous” writer, but the concept of “How to play the game” goes farther than that in my opinion. The Greek writer Herodotus (in Book VIII. 26, sometime in the 5th Century BC) wrote “tis not for money they contend but for glory of achievement” (about the Olympians).
(To Combat Scholar: I disagree. Neither playing a sports game or real life should be played to win. Life’s to short to be so competitive. Life’s to short not to take it with a bucket of salt; not to enjoy it for the sake of enjoying it. My 2 cents of course. We all choose to live differently.
One could also argue though, that “to win” has a different meaning to you, than to me. So, in a way, I suppose I also completely agree with you. It is important to play both games and life “to win”- what we choose to try and win is more-so the questionable element here.)
It should have ended with “I shall do or die”
Wow. Amazing poem! I wonder who wrote this?
Gita Ashok is the poet who wrote this poem…….great work doing the comic….God bless you
no…..im sorry……Gita Ashok wrote another poem with the same title….not the same poem….my bad
Ugh. I’m not a Cormac McCarthy. His stories are interesting, but his delivery (purposeful lack of punctuation) drives me nuts. (In case you’re wondering, I’m an English professor and a yet-to-be-published author.)
Excellent comic though. The rhyming was hard to keep straight at times, but I think it’s just the structure of the poem.
The moment i read you calling him “the kid”, the whole poem retroactively became voiced by Logan Cunningham as Rucks.
“Kid’s playin’ a game of ball. He fails and falls. But that ain’t gonna keep him down. Kid gets up and plays on. He’s still got a good swing or two in him.”
hey Gav, i found this wonderful quote by Bob Marley a while ago. It’d be interesting to see what you could do with it.
“You may not be her first, her last, or her only. She loved before she may love again. But if she loves you now, what else matters? She’s not perfect – you aren’t either, and the two of you may never be perfect together but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice, and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can. She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break – her heart. So don’t hurt her, don’t change her, don’t analyze and don’t expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she’s not there.”-Bob Marley
Gav. Thanks for this. Not commented before but had to here.
Wanted you to know the the kid reminds me of my own boy and I’ll be showing him this one later after he had a tough day with his football team yesterday. I know it’ll make him smile.
Thank you man, just thank you! 🙂
It’s strange, I’ve been following you for quite some time now and never have I ever had one favourite comic… until I read this one about two weeks ago.
In that two-week period I must have come back to it at least five times.
This fifth time I realized something. I now have a favourite comic.
Thank you, Gav, thank you.
BRAZILIAN/PORTUGUESE
Awesome work, as always
Please make this available for buying as a print!
Please, please make this available as a print! It is absolutely amazing!
It sounds a little like Kiplings “If” poem. I wonder if it’s another of his works?
This is amazing. Thanks 🙂
Sounds very much like the brilliant poet, Robert W. Service.
“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”
Earliest reference I could find on Google books was from The Shoe Makers Journal in 1921, it appears in several similar US publications in the 20s to 40s, always with the author unknown. So not Rudyard Kipling then… the style reminds me of Edgar Albert Guest, but his is not a difficult style to imitate so I guess it could have been anyone
Trading cards available at Chaos Cards. Many collectable trading cards to be bought online, complete your collection of trading cards now.
Here at Gamer Heaven we are a small team of guys and girls that are passionate about Video Games, Super Heroes, TV, Film, Comics and all things Nerdy! Whilst we orignially started out just offering a small number of cool tees and hoodies, we have now grown the range to include all sorts of cool merchandise such as action figures, statues, limited edition Games sets, caps, hats, messenger bags, dog chains, wristbands, rucksacks, wallets, books and much more!
Global Scarves is one of the premier custom soccer scarf providers in the United States and Canada.
The poem does have an author, of course. We just don’t know who it was.
I don’t know who the author is, but as I was reading it, I automatically assumed it was Kipling. It reminds me an awful lot of “If”.
The learning lab is providing the best Maths and English tutor in Sydney and if you are looking for maths tutor for your child contact us now!
Great quote and amazing drawings as always. I believe you should check out the amazing portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa he may not be one of the jolliest but he sure is one of the best.
So…you know how in the movies there’s these scenes where a character has some breakthrough revelation and it’s such a shock that they gasp and sway and drop whatever they’re holding? Yeah, you just did that to me when I got to this strip. I’m not sure what exactly I just realized, but finding out should be interesting.
Are you looking for Diamond Engagement Rings, Jewellery & Loose Diamonds New Zealand? We are providing Free Shipping to all over NewZealand. Get the best Solitaires, Princess Cut, Gold & Platinum now!
Spot on with this write-up, I truly believe that this amazing site needs much more attention. I’ll probably be returning to read more, thanks for the info!
Thank you so much for this Gavin.
Truly powerful words to live by.
Don’t look for God where He is needed most; if you didn’t bring Him there, He isn’t there.
The maker of a sentence launches out into the infinite and builds a road into Chaos and old Night, and is followed by those who hear him with something of wild, creative delight.
If I’d known I was going to live so long, I’d have taken better care of myself.
Thank you Gavin for your “Playing the game” comic post
http://vuelosdelalma.blogspot.com/2013/11/kampung-inggris-pare-kediri.html
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
thank you i like your website
Its an awesome song pleased listen to it.
Thank you so much for showing up, bringing your real authentic self and being such a huge contribution to us all.
Its happen when life is not good with you :p
If there are many sad stories, share it with the people you trust. Sharing helps people get closer together and you also relieve some of that sadness.
Comments are closed.