James Giltenan
LTCM
Erik Gray
TA: Michael West
26 October 2016
Robert Frost’s “Design” as Seen Through the Lens of His Earlier Poem “Range-Finding” In Robert Frost’s “Design,” written in 1922, the narrator laments the juxtaposition of life and death that he bears witness to when he sees a spider on a heal-all flower carrying the dead moth it has killed. He uses a modified Italian or Petrarchan sonnet, punctuation, repetition of rhyme and diction, repetition of anomaly, and repetition of the same rhyme in both the octave and the sestet, to convey that death is a question that cannot be answered and that the only solution, the only answer, is to continue to ponder over it. While it is a question that cannot be answered, it must be questioned anyway. He uses symbols he has drawn from in earlier works, as well as his experience playing with the form of the Petrarchan sonnet in the past, to help shed light on the importance of this. Using a modified Petrarchan sonnet, Frost is able to use the formal rhyme scheme in the first eight lines, called the octave, of abb/aab/ba. While the rhyme scheme of the second six lines of the poem, called the sestet, follows less stringent guidelines, Frost uses that of ac/aa/cc, which is extraordinary in that it carries over the “a” of the octave’s rhyme scheme and introduces it into the rhyme scheme of the sestet. Usually the sestet introduces new rhymes of “c” and “d” but Frost chooses to only introduce one new rhyme to its scheme, that of
12. A Petrarchan Sonnet has two parts, one stanza that contains 8 lines and another containing 6. It “uses a rhyme scheme that ties the first eight lines (the octave) together, followed by a rhyme scheme that unifies the last six (the sestet)” (Foster
Robert Frost's Design Robert Frost outlines an ironic and disturbing situation involving a flower, a spider, and a moth in his poem "Design". The poem's text suggests the possibility of an absence of a god, but does no more than simply beg the question, for Frost's speaker does not offer the answer. By examining the events of the poem in the first stanza and the speaker's annotative second stanza, we
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
What are the rhythm patterns that Frost uses in the poem (include the scansion and technical methods: alliteration, assonance, and consonance)? Frost uses both masculine rhyme and end rhyme. The masculine rhyme is the rhyming sounds that contain only one syllable such as wood, stood, and should. The end rhyme pattern that Frost uses is, A, B, A, A, B C, D, C, C, D E, F, E, E, F and G, H, G, G, H. (Arp & Johnson, 2009). There are lines of this poem that show the alliteration method, two examples are found in line 6-“then took the”, and line 8- “wanted wear” Assonance also
The poet uses a number of poetic devices to enrich his poem. The most obvious device used is the rhyme scheme. The poem uses the aa, bb, cc, dd… rhyme format. Frost uses personification to draw a correlation between ant life and human life. For example, the line “he showed not the least surprise,” gives the ant a human quality of emotion such as surprise. The author also uses several forms of allusion. Janizary is an allusion to an elite guard in the 14th century Turkish army, a sepal is an allusion to the outer-protective covering of a flower, and ichor is an allusion to a mythological word meaning the blood of the gods. This poem uses a few instances of alliteration as well. One example is the line “… and heaving him high in the air,” with the repetition of the consonant sound “h.”
Robert Frost takes our imagination to a journey through wintertime with 
his two poems "Desert Places" and "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening". These two poems reflect the beautiful scenery that is present in the snow covered woods and awakens us to new feelings. Even though these poems both have winter settings they contain very different tones. One has a feeling of depressing loneliness and the other a feeling of welcome solitude. They show how the same setting can have totally different impacts on a person depending on 
their mindset at the time. These poems are both made up of simple stanzas and diction but they are not straightforward poems.
Conclusively, Frost uses multiple literary devices to create a more easily understood piece. Frost clearly depicts a real life situation in this poem by creating a problem involving decision making. Frost begins the poem by showing two roads, both covered in leaves. Both paths appear to be worn at about the same condition, but Frost cannot decide whether or not one road is better than another. He expresses his decision making process by elaborating on how he still would like to keep the first path for another day. However, he changes ideas and states how his decision that he took with the less traveled path was life-changing. The extended metaphor allows the reader to understand the figurative meaning of the roads, and apply them to real-life
Discoveries often require individuals to reconsider their perspective and develop a new understanding of the world around them. Examine this statement in relation to your prescribed text and ONE related text.
Despite being considered a sonnet, “Design” does not express the true nature of a sonnet’s meaning. In contrast of pleasing or inspiring, it is unexpectedly doubtful. Frost made changes to the typical sonnet form. He made his own design. Primarily, the usual pattern of a question in the octave followed by an answer in the sestet, is reversed in this situation. The octave in the poem is an observation, and the successive sestet is a question. Additionally, Frost made changes to the usual rhyme scheme of a sonnet; the "cdecde" pattern in the sestet has been changed to "acaacc.” The reader could possibly be caught off guard by the unexpected differences.
Robert Frost’s poetic techniques serve as his own “momentary stay against confusion,” or as a buffer against mortality and meaninglessness in several different ways; in the next few examples, I intend to prove this. Firstly, however, a little information about Robert Frost and his works must be provided in order to understand some references and information given.
make a decision and at the end of the day, the nature of the decision
“The Road Not Taken” and “Nothing Gold Can Stay” are just two of many very famous poems, written by none other than Robert Frost. Robert Frost is a poet that is well known for his poetic contributions to nature, as well as his award winning poems. His poetic ability and knowledge make him an extraordinary author. His past; including schooling, family, and the era in which he wrote influenced nearly all of his poems in some way. This very famous poet contributed to the modernism era, had a family and an interesting life story, and a unique poetic style as well.
The poem "Design" explores whether the events in nature are simply random occurrences or part of a larger plan by God, and if there's a force that dominates and controls our very existence. On that point both Jere K Huzzard and Everett Carter aggress on. They differ in their interpretations of the poem's ending and what they think Frost wanted to convey with his vague ending. Both agree that the last line of the poem was written in an undefined way with purpose on Frost's side. But each critic poses his own ideas regarding what is the meaning of that line. While Carter examines the whole poem in order to answer this question, Huzzard chose to focus only on the last two lines.
In conclusion, Robert Frost uses the form of a sonnet to express his unique visuals of a lady who just lives life for what it has to offer day by day to her best advantages. Using visual and aural imagery to make us understand just how great life can
“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”.