Darker side of Robert Frost
Robert Frost is often referred to as a poet of nature. Words and phrases such as fire and ice, flowers in bloom, apple orchards and rolling hills, are all important elements of Frost's work. Remove them and something more than symbols are taken away. These 'benign' objects provide an alternative way to look at the world and are often used as metaphors to describe a darker view of nature and humans. In Frost's poetry, the depth is as important as the surface. The darker aspects of Frost's poetry are often portrayed through the use of symbolism, vivid imagery, and selective word choice. Frost's poems appear to be simple on the surface, yet upon further scrutiny the poems reveal themselves as elusive. Frost utilizes ordinary objects to create a deeper meaning. For example, the poem "Mending Wall", appears to be about the differences between two neighbors and their ideas on rebuilding a wall. On the other hand, the wall may be viewed, in a more general sense, as a symbol to repres!ent all the antagonistic or mistrustful barriers that divide man from man. "The gaps I mean / No one has seen them made or heard them made / But at spring mending-time we find them there" (lines 9-11), illustra
s theirs" (5), refers to the field and suggests that the field is just there. The animals are absent too - "smothered in their lairs" (6). The speaker is "too absent-spirited" (7) to matter. Thus, without the care of man and without the animals the field is deserted, desolated, and lonely. The closing line "To scare myself with my own desert places" (16), examines the manner in which people often fail to get in contact with aspects of their personalities which are undesirable or difficult to admit. For example, the constant struggle between one's inner feelings and the accepted social norms. "Desert places" also suggests that people have darkness within themselves. The absence of a meaningful self or lack of self-esteem may create feelings of isolation. "Stopping by Woods on a Snow evening", also illustrates a dark complexity to Frost's works. The poem captures images of loneliness and indecisiveness by selective word choice. For instance, "woods" are sometimes connected with ! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ the unknown, darkness and isolation. The speaker also uses phrases such as, "darkest evening" and "frozen lake" to solidify the mood of aloneness. The speaker is riding into the darkness on an unknown journey, only to find himself caught "between the woods and frozen lake" (7). The speaker is caught between old patterns and new possibilities. The "woods" represent the unfamiliar while the "frozen lake" represents the familiar. The speaker cont
Some common words found in the essay are:
Gold Stay, Woods Snow, Mending Wall, Frost's Remove, Julia Reidhead, Robert Frost, York Norton, Word Count, reidhead 5th ed, Literature Ed, American Literature, vols york norton, 2 vols york, ed 2, york norton, 5th ed, ed julia, julia reidhead, vols york, literature ed, ed 2 vols, 5th ed 2, frost robert, american literature, reidhead 5th,
Approximate Word count = 1012
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)
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