1/31/2024 0 Comments The way fastball![]() I imagine the characters being nearing the end of their lives, and losing all of their worldly concerns. This road and the characters journey down it, symbolizes, in my opinion, growing old and a final progression towards death. This is further affirmed in lines thirteen and fourteen, claiming “they’ll never get hungry they’ll never get old and gray.” Walking down a road “paved in gold,” where “it’s always summer, they’ll never get cold,” one can assume that they are walking towards a much better place (lines eleven and twelve). The oft asked question is immediately is posed with “Where were they going without ever knowing the way” in the next line. The imagery of “an exit to eternal summer slacking,” paints the picture that they were looking to ‘get away from it all.’ A lack of concern is shown “when the car broke down (and) they started walking” in line nine. It can be deduced from the opening lines, “They made up their minds, and they started packing, they left before the sun came up that day,” that the characters in the song hastily planned a journey. Another way of describing inebriation and professions of love can be witnessed in lines six through eight with “they drank up the wine, and they got to talking, they now had more important things to say…” “Eternal summer slacking” in line four, replaces ‘taking it easy’ or other similar phrases as metaphor. Hyperbole is used in describing a road “paved in gold” in line eleven. “Shadows” are personified as “wandering off somewhere” in lines fifteen and thirty. The words chosen make for interesting figurative language. The repetition of beats in “star-ted pack-ing” in line two matches that of line four with “sum-mer slack-ing.” They roll off the tongue in some instances, showing an intricate attention to meter. ![]() Using similar consonant and rhyming words (the author’s diction) and how they are pieced together (syntax), makes for a relatively bouncy flow. The “-ay” sound is borrowed again with “day/way” in lines twenty-two and twenty-five. ![]() A short bridge reuses “’em” which rhymes with itself in lines twenty-one and twenty-four. The author pairs the words “highway/today,” which also become noticed in the vocalization. The chorus (lines eighteen and nineteen) is wrapped up using rhyme as well. The chorus brings a new series of rhyme in lines eleven and twelve, matching “gold/cold.” The similarly sounding endings of “somewhere/care” follow in lines fifteen and seventeen. Also repeated is the “-ay” sound in lines eight and ten with “say/way.” The first line of verse one curiously rhymes with the first line the subsequent verse, albeit awkward with “minds/wine.” Vocalized, the rhyming nature of the words becomes more clear, and a clever treat to a discerning ear. The prior line is matched to the fifth, pairing “day/way.” The same scheme is repeated again in the next stanza, working again with the “-ing” sound with “talking/walking” in lines seven and nine. It is exhibited very quickly in the second line “packing” resolving neatly with “slacking” in line four. Rhyme is also heavily used throughout the rest of the song. Quite cleverly, the sentence also shows an example of midsentence rhyme with “going/knowing.” It is repeated again in the tenth, and twenty-fifth lines. Starting with the fifth line, “Where were they going without ever knowing the way?” asks the question using a string of four words with “w” sounds. The element is used again in the fourth line with “summer slacking.” The most repeated (and titular) line of the song has the heaviest use of alliteration. The song breaks right into its use of alliteration with the first line “They made up their minds.” The words “they/there” and “made/minds” follow one another closely in a repetition of consonants. The hallmark of the song is the reuse of consonant sounds, and this becomes evident quite quickly. Ultimately, I will offer my opinion as to what this arrangement symbolizes, based upon my interpretation of the lyrics. The use of these elements creates a strong symbolism. All of these elements combined with a curious use of rhyme, diction and syntax make for a peculiar arrangement of words and word order. Also among the lyrics is the heavy (the ‘catch’ of the song) alliteration. I will discuss these elements, as well as examples of the figures of speech, hyperbole and personification that make up the song. Upon analysis, however, there is more to it, veiled in metaphor and other literary/poetic devices. ![]() At first listen (or read through) it would appear that the song is about two people deciding to take a vacation.
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