What is so important about mending a wall? Robert frost a down to earth, phenomenon has used his supernatural skills to write a poem which may seem to be a simple, ordinary poem, yet what lays hidden behind the veils may be unraveled. That is the spiritual world that you and me may learn to understand the philosophical basis of human nature that provokes the human revolution. Believe it or not this poem was ingeniously devised by Robert Frost to articulately open up a world of ideas that acumen imagination and its complexities. That is what I will be elaborating on in terms of textual evidence.
Like many of Frost’s poems, ‘mending wall’ involves a journey. We are introduced to two farmers in an annual meeting at the wall that separates
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Like tree felling, sheep shearing and crop-harvesting. It is a ritual which has it’s own paradox, it causes two neighbors to cooperate so that the wall which separate them to be sustained. It divides even their energies at this moment as they keep the wall between them as they walk its line. The definition of the ritual in strong symbolic terms is a statement of humankind’s determination to hang on to all that divides it. Furthermore in this stanza they fix the wall in springtime, after wintertime, when the ‘frozen-ground-swell’ has done its work of destruction.
Frost feels a sense of mischief, an urge to question deep rooted and unreasoned attitudes. So he questions his neighbour’s motto: why do good fences make good neighbours? He uses the most elementary of examples: if you had cows you would of course want to wall them in and stop them from roaming into others’ properties. But he points out the obvious, simple truth, in the most simple of language: ‘But here there are no cows.’ Surely, such a persuasive argument must make his neighbour rethink his preoccupation that you need walls between you to make good neighbours.
Frost questions the reasons for the wall being built in the first place. He sees a couple of reasons for building a wall: if there is something you need to keep in or out, build a wall; if some trouble can result from open spaces, build a wall. Otherwise why have one? He climaxes his argument by
In life, many people have parts that they let people see of them, and other parts that they keep hidden. Many times, we build these walls to shut people out so people can never really see what is going on inside. These “walls” keep many of one’s deepest secrets hidden. In the poem, The Mending Wall, by Robert Frost, shows a mindset of two neighbors who continue to adjust and mend their wall between each other. This idea of confinement is seen throughout the poem to show that the neighbor is trying to protect themselves. This creates speculation upon the speaker of what exactly are they trying to hide. One might see this poem as meaning a physical barrier, but this is more of an emotional “wall” or barrier that this poem creates. In the poem,
Frost’s various speaking tones can be shown in his well-known poem “Mending Wall.” Throughout the poem the speaker’s voice is open and relaxed, yet, inward and musing. It helps welcome the reader and at the time entices the reader into a riddle which becomes essential to the poem’s meaning. The speaker’s eventual speculation about what might not “love a wall” becomes a description of the struggle of wall-mending and begins to wonder why he and his neighbor have met to carry out the task in the first place. The speaker’s range of tone throughout the poem varies from seriousness to fantasy to glee.
In his poem 'Mending Wall', Robert Frost presents to us the thoughts of barriers linking people, communication, friendship and the sense of security people gain from barriers. His messages are conveyed using poetic techniques such as imagery, structure and humor, revealing a complex side of the poem as well as achieving an overall light-hearted effect. Robert Frost has cleverly intertwined both a literal and metaphoric meaning into the poem, using the mending of a tangible wall as a symbolic representation of the barriers that separate the neighbors in their friendship.
“Mending Wall” by Robert Frost, the fifty-six line lyric poem gives off a sarcastic tone that expresses impatience with his neighbor and the “wall.” The poem focuses on a theme of separation, the necessity of boundaries and the illusory arguments used to annihilate them.
In “Mending Wall”, two neighbors are ironically united by the traditional rebuilding of the wall between them. A wall symbolizes boundaries, orders, and separation. Or does it? One of the two neighbors doesn’t seem to think so. “Good fences make good neighbors” is his motto. (Line 26) The neighbor doesn’t see how ironic it is that the wall is a meeting spot. He uses the wall as an excuse to talk with his neighbor, because he is not very open or conversational. The situational irony ostended by Robert Frost is that the wall between the two clashing neighbors is supposed to separate them. However, each year, when they meet to “walk the line”, the wall serves as a meeting spot for the two to catch up. (Line 12) Dividing, but unifying, Frost uses the wall to symbolize unity amongst clashing people. Without the situational irony of repairing the wall, the two incompatible neighbors would unlikely be able to unite.
Robert Frost is describing a process in "Mending Wall", which is repairing a wall that separates his territory and his neighbor's. The wall was deteriorated during the winter, when the cold frost created cracks and gaps in the wall. He uses a nearly infantile imagination to unravel the mystery of the damage that appeared suddenly in spring. While they are tediously laboring to reconstruct the fence, Frost is imploring his neighbor about the use of the wall; his apple trees can be clearly distinguished from his neighbor's pine trees. Yet underneath this quotidian routine, Frost goes beyond the surface to reveal its figurative meaning.
Building physical and emotional walls has a negative impact on the people, countries, and civilizations they divide. In the case of Frost's poem, the wall took away the narrator's voice. The narrator disliked the wall, but was too timid to speak up for what he believes in. His neighbor says "good walls make good neighbors," but the narrator felt as if the wall should be torn down, and they should unite
In “Mending Wall” (A Blank verse) the plot is how two neighbours have to repair their stone wall that separates their two properties every year. “The Wall” had been destroyed by winter freezing because the Ice filled that gaps and then when
Robert Frost's "The Mending Wall" is a comment on the nature of our society. In this poem, Frost examines the way in which we interact with one another and how we function as a whole. For Frost, the world is often one of isolation. Man has difficulty communicating and relating to one another. As a result, we have a tendency to shut ourselves off from others. In the absence of effective communication, we play the foolish game of avoiding any meaningful contact with others in order to gain privacy.
In both paragraphs you will find the theme of separation. The text that frost told about neighbors that kept a wall in between them. They rebuilt the wall every year.In ronald ragens text talks about the berlin wall. The berlin wall separates families, countries, and cities. The wall in both text symbolizes the separation of the people.
Poetry is a literary medium which often resonates with the responder on a personal level, through the subject matter of the poem, and the techniques used to portray this. Robert Frost utilises many techniques to convey his respect for nature, which consequently makes much of his poetry relevant to the everyday person. The poems “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’ and “The mending wall” strongly illuminate Frost’s reverence to nature and deal with such matter that allows Frost to speak to ordinary people.
“The parallel plots of a novel… would act in the reader's mind and perhaps the author's as a kind of splitting” (Holland). Frost meant the wall to embody the physical and psychological boundaries people set up to maintain their privacy. The narrator tone for most of the poem is ironic, because he expresses his desire to rid himself of the wall “There where it is we do not need the wall” (Frost 245), but he repairs it nonetheless, “I have come after them and made repair” (Frost 245). Frost introduces the reader with different causes for the recurring destruction of the wall. The narrator’s first possible cause is nature, but does Frost means a force of nature? His choice of words where “Frozen-ground-swell” (Frost 245), which is another way of saying Frost. The poet might be indicating that in actuality he is the one that want the wall destroyed. The second possible reason for the wall’s destruction is the hunters. The narrator constantly expresses his dislike of the wall, but is quick to reprimand anyone who destroys it; in this case the hunters. The narrator’s act of patching the wall when damaged, is a clear sign that he yearns for a psychological to distance him from the neighbor. This ironic tone continues throughout the poem, but it is never completely clear it the speaker wants the wall removed for good, or keep it as it is. The neighbor on the other hand,
In the poem, “The Mending Wall” Frost creates a lot of ambiguity in order to leave the poem open for interpretation. Frost’s description of every detail in this poem is very interesting, it leaves the reader to decide for themselves what deductions they are to be making of the poem. To begin with, Frost makes literal implications about what the two men are doing. For instance, they are physically putting the stones back, one by one. Their commitment and constant drive shows how persistent these men seem about keeping the wall intact. On the other hand, there are inferences that something deeper is occurring.
In Roberts, Mending Wall, he expresses the alienation within our society. This story was and is very controversial throughout history. Written in 1914, it became widely known for its connection with racism and segregation. In 1960, Frost was asked to read it for President John F. Kennedy’s inauguration. In JFK’s inauguration speech, he declared, “We observe today not a victory of party, but a celebration of freedom”(Kennedy), which shows how he felt about segregation. This created a skirmish throughout the U.S., because this poem was so controversial. The poem, which was a memory when Frost was a young boy, consists of him walking the line. Walking the line means picking up rocks that had falling from the ice melting, recreating the fence between you and your neighbor. Frost suggests alienation in this story by using symbolism of the lines between African Americans and white folk. In the poem he asks the question, “Why do they make good neighbors”(line 30)? An interpretation of this line is that he is asking the question, ‘why do we have these lines between our people? There is no reasons to have these lines separating us?’. The poem suggests that we get into routines and then never break them because we have done them for generations. Frost challenges this, asking questions that are very hard to answer.