Student of the game

Reader question:

Please explain “game of poetry” in this sentence: I am a student of the game of poetry, and my mentors are all those poets I read about in school and still read today.

My comments:

Great question. The phrase to examine here is “student of the game”, meaning someone who has a keen interest in something (and is always eager to learn and to improve).

In the example above, see the speaker as treating poetry as a game. He calls himself a student of the game. And he is right – he still reads and studies – as does a student in school – poetry long after school, not because he has to in order to past a test or get a promotion but because he likes it.

“Student of the game” is a sporting term, referring to players and coaches who never tire of analyzing and studying each and every facet of the game. Arsene Wenger, a French football coach who has managed English Premier League club Arsenal since 1996, is, for example, a perpetual student of the beautiful game. The guy is so consumed with his sport that he spends sleepless weekend nights watching tape, including the night right after his team plays earlier in the evening.

Anyways, the biggest trait or characteristic of a student is that he keeps learning. And we should all be a “student of the game” and be a good student well after school, I mean after graduation.

This is particularly important in a country like ours, where youngsters often cease to learn after high school or college. Historically, we treat education as a sort of knocker on the door – the door to officialdom, that is. And after achieving officialdom, i.e. securing a job in the government, we abandon the knocker (the books) altogether.

Anyways, be a student of the game – whatever game it is that you play – and keep improving, both as a professional and as an individual.

Yes, be a student of life. Maintain the attitude of the young student. Keep a beginner’s mind and hold on to your child-like curiosity to, NOT just your office, but the whole wide world. And that, by the way, is what helps you stay young.

And here are media examples of “student of the game”:

1. John Gagliano is not one to draw attention to himself. Very humble, he always wants to give the credit for the success of the Howell High School wrestling team to others, most notably, his wrestlers and fellow coaches.

Gagliano, though, couldn't avoid the spotlight last Wednesday night (Jan. 24) when he became Howell High School’s all-time winningest coach.

When the Rebels beat Middletown North, 47-13, in the first round of the Shore Conference Tournament, it made the Rebels 17-0 for the season and was the 154th win of his career, surpassing the 153 wins his former coach, Doug Bauer, had piled up during his 12-year career at Howell...

Bauer couldn’t have been happier for his former star student (Gagliano was an NJSIAA District and Region champion at Howell) or prouder.

“It’s great,” said Bauer. “He was the hardest-working kid I ever had, and he’s still working just as hard. No one deserves it [the record] more.”

While Gagliano was starring at Howell (he would graduate as the school’s all-time winningest wrestler with 79 wins), Bauer knew the young wrestler was destined to be a coach.

“He was always a student of the game, always wanted to learn,” he recalled.

- Gagliano now Howell's winningest coach, GMNews.com, January 31, 2007.

2. PADDY FAGAN will be at Eastlands on Tuesday, as he is for every Manchester City home game. And as the anticipation builds before the latest derby (a Carling Cup semi-final first leg), his mind may drift back almost 55 years to a February afternoon at Old Trafford when he became a City legend.

Fagan never played in an FA Cup final with a broken neck like Bert Trautmann, was never voted European Footballer of the Year like Denis Law. He didn’t win a title like Francis Lee or Mike Summerbee. But he’s a legend.

His memory isn’t as good as it once was but some things stay with him. Like being the first City player to score a hat-trick at Old Trafford.

‘I don’t hear about the three goals too much, suppose it’s a long time ago,’ Fagan, now 78, laughs in a broad Dublin accent that bears few traces of nearly 60 years of living in the north of England.

‘It’s nice to score one goal against your biggest rivals, so imagine getting three.’ In the 1954-55 season, United and City met as equals - as many argue they will do this Tuesday. Matt Busby was in the middle of creating his second great United side (his first, in the late 1940s, was led by Johnny Carey) while City boss Les McDowall had studied the great Hungary side of Ferenc Puskas and tried to recreate their methods at Maine Road. On occasion, it worked.

‘Les was an interesting character,’ Fagan recalls. ‘He had the bit of the dour Scot about him, but he was a student of the game. When he watched Hungary destroy England, he decided we should play the same way. It was christened the Revie plan, because Don Revie was the most important player.’

- Old Trafford hat-trick ensures Fagan is forever remembered by City fans, Mail On Sunday, January 17, 2010.