If you had a choice on how the world should end, what would you decide? Would your choice be to go painfully but fast or slow and painless? That’s what I believe Robert Frost’s poem “Fire and Ice” is meant to express. Although the poem is short, it holds a very interesting question to think about. What way would you prefer the world to end? There are two choices. In his poem “Fire and Ice”, Robert Frost compares and contrasts the two destructive forces: fire and ice. In the first two lines of the poem he presents two options for the end of the world, “Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice”. I feel that he uses the term fire, not to hold the direct meaning of a burning flame, but to represent the punishment something can …show more content…
In the first line of the poem, “Some say the world will end in fire”, this is where I compared the stanza to my assumption. In the Bible, the book of Revelations also says that the next time that God comes for his people; he is going to destroy the world with fire. This is the biblical aspect of the poem. For Robert Frost, poetry and life are one and the same. In an interview he said, “One thing I care about, and wish young people could care about, is taking poetry as the first form of understanding”. Each Robert Frost poem strikes a chord somewhere; each poem brings us closer to life with the compression of feeling and emotion in such few words.
Fire and Ice by Robert Frost | Some say the world will end in fire
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
Both “Fire and Ice” and “Nothing Gold Can Stay” are great reads. They have their differences, but they have similarity’s as well. Having the common themes, while staying unique is impressive. The shortness of good things, stressed in the first poem. As well as the argument of how the world will end. These poems by Robert Frost make you think, that is what makes them so memorable.
In the poem, Frost is the narrator and he is speaking to the readers. The issue that Frost discusses is if the world will end in a blazing fire or in freezing ice. Based on the poem, Frost believes he would perish by fire because in verses 3 and 4 he wrote: From what I've tasted of desire, I hold with those who favor fire. But in verses 5, 6, 7, and 8 Frost wrote: But if it had to perish twice, I think I know
Robert Frost and William Shakespeare have been celebrated by many people because of their ability to express themselves through the written word. Here we are years after their deaths analyzing these fascinating poems about life and death. It’s clear they had similar thoughts about this subject at the time of these writings, even though their characters could not have been more opposite. For both poets, life is too
Frost’s poem has a great sense of irony towards the end, “I shall be telling this with a sigh / somewhere ages and ages hence” (16-17). The irony is that while he’s making his choice he is already anticipating how he will tell the story in the future, almost adding a sense of drama
In Robert Frost’s poem “To the Thawing Wind,” in the literal sense, he is asking the Southwest wind to come, melt the snow and bring spring, but symbolically he is tired of the winter and wants warm weather. He wants to burst out of his cabin and have a good time, not thinking about poetry. The poet has been confined in his winter cabin and is wanting the wind and rain to melt the snow, so it will change his winter isolation. He has been longing for the “thawing wind” because that is when spring is coming. He is anticipating spring to come because it will bring him inspiration and the freedom needed to be able to do new things and enjoy everything good that comes with this season.
To analyze the poem better I took each word as if it symbolized a certain characteristic. In lines three and four, "From what I've tasted of desire I hold those who favor fire" it led me to believe that Frost was trying to use desire as a metaphor to fire. Desire, can usually be used a negative or a positive manner depending on the context it's use. In the poem I think that Frost is using it in a negative sense, because he is uses words like end, perish, and destruction in the poem. Negatively the word desire can mean the drive to win or receive something at any cost, the urge for power, which is very destructive. In lines six and nine "I think I know enough of hate to say that for destruction ice is also great and would suffice". Saying that ice is a metaphor to hate. The word hate is worldly known to have a negative condensation. Hate is also
The poem “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening”, by Robert Frost, is a short, yet intricate poem. What appears to be simple is not simple at all. What appears to be innocent is really not. The woods seem pristine and unimposing, however, they are described as being “dark and deep”, and it is the “darkest evening of the year”. He speaks of isolation, “between the woods and frozen lake” and of duty “But I have promises to keep”. And also, Frost’s usage of “sleep” easily implies death. Though this poem might come off at first to be nice and peaceful, however, that peace has an underlying menace.
January 1st, 2000. December 21st, 2012. September 23rd, 2017. Conspiracy theorists have continually tried warning the public of what they think will bring the world to its end and yet the human race lives on, despite the arguments saying the opposite. It takes the termination of an situation to finally be able to grow from the circumstances. In the poem, ‘Fire and Ice’ written by Robert Frost, the narrator discusses their own idea of how the world will end, with reference to the 1920 debate on the same topic, coming to the conclusion that it is all up to the eyes of the beholder and that death is merely inevitable. With the tone of the poem being ironic but primarily accepting, it is the total the opposite and if not juxtaposes one of Frost’s other poems, ‘Home burial’ which accents a more depressing and a grieving nature. This poem does not discuss the end of everyone’s world, but the end of a couple’s world in which they’re in a strained relationship after the loss of their child. Both poems share the same topic ‘the end of life’, much like the film ‘Me, Earl and the Dying Girl’ in which the protagonist, Greg Gaines, reconnects with a family friend who has just been diagnosed with leukaemia. The film discusses the inevitability of her end in a misleading way, promising the audience that she does to die, however, they realise that the promise was a lie as she dies in a hospital bed whilst watching a film Greg made her as a dying wish. All three texts and all three of their protagonists grasp the concept of the end through the loss of life.
The published version of this poem is not the same as the one Frost originally wrote. The original poem was much longer and Frost left out entire stanzas from the original poem. Frost wrote this because he afraid of what the world was turning into because of political reasons. Frost didn't publish the original poem in fear that because he was such a popular poet that many people would think there was something wrong with the world.
Firstly, the poem “Fire and Ice”, written by Robert Frost, uses tone and poetic language in order for the reader to understand that the poem is about two opposite things being able to equally destroy us. In the poem, the lines that read, “From what I’ve tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire” the poet is using fire as a symbol for desire. This explains that the things that we desire most have the ability to destroy us. Additionally, the lines that read, “I think I
Frost is hiding, or at least never published the part about, the end of the world. This may lead one to believe he did not want to cause panic among people, because they listened to him. Though he still wanted to get some point across, as evident of him publishing the entire poem.
Although this poem also is connected with nature, the theme is more universal in that it could be related to Armageddon, or the end of the world. Even though this theme may seem simple, it is really complex because we do not know how Frost could possibly
“Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words,” Robert Frost once said. As is made fairly obvious by this quote, Frost was an adroit thinker. It seems like he spent much of his life thinking about the little things. He often pondered the meaning and symbolism of things he found in nature. Many readers find Robert Frost’s poems to be straightforward, yet his work contains deeper layers of complexity beneath the surface. These deeper layers of complexity can be clearly seen in his poems “ The Road Not Taken”, “Fire and Ice”, and “Birches”.
Robert Frost is perhaps one of America's best poets of his generation. His vivid images of nature capture the minds of readers. His poems appear to be simple, but if you look into them there is a lot of insight. Robert Frost spoke at John F. Kennedy's inauguration. He is the only poet to have had the opportunity to speak at a presidential inauguration. Through his poetry people learn that Robert Frost is a complicated and intellectual man who has a place in many American hearts. (Richards P.10)
The great debate of whether the world will end in a fiery ball of destruction or a frozen wasteland has baffled the minds of many people. A man named Robert Frost has written a poem called "Fire and Ice" that describes his thoughts on how he would prefer to leave this world. Upon reading this poem, the reader can derive two distinct meanings of fire and ice; one being of actual fire and ice destroying the world, and the other having symbols for the fire and ice, such as fire being desire or passion and ice being hatred and deceit. Although this poem is one of his shortest poems with only nine lines, it is also one of the most famous works that he has ever created.