The Road Not Taken By Robert Frost

The analysis of “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost has been up for debate since the poem release in 1916. It is known to be one of the most frequently misinterpreted poems of all time, and even Robert Frost himself has said the poem is “tricky” to comprehend (The). When analyzing this poem many readers tend to focus only on the last lines of the poem and get caught in a trap of selective-interpretation. Quite a few people after reading Robert Frost’s poem firmly conclude that this poem is about non-conformity and individualism, however, that is not the case. Robert Frost’s poem is meant to be analyzed line by line for a complete interpretation. Readers can conclude that the poem represents making choices in life, but that is not the

While it is widely rumored that many of Bob Dylan’s songs were written while he was under the influence of various drugs, I’m not so sure that those rumors are accurate. Following a 1991 interview conducted by Paul Zollo with Bob Dylan, Zollo stated that “There’s an unmistakable elegance in Dylan’s words, an almost biblical beauty” and that “Dylan’s answers give you a lot to think about while not necessarily revealing much about the man”. (Zollo 2) The same can be said with regard to many of the lyrics of Dylan’s songs. The lyrics to “Mr. Tambourine Man”, for example, are wildly descriptive and sometimes confusing and can leave a listener (or a reader) open to many different interpretations, some more complex than others, with no real meaning ever being clearly stated.

So I decided to write an explication essay on the poem “The Road Not Taken”. The poem is by Robert Frost and it tells the story about a man who is thinking about something he had done before. Even though what he did wasn’t looked as being good or bad, it was indicated the decision he made had an outcome that caused a shift in his life.

How can an author effectively convey a universal message to the broadest audience possible? Simple. The author must simply create a completely impartial narrator, devoid of sex, status, or age. The Road Not Taken is a poem told by an impartial narrator who has come to a crossroads in his/her life. The crossroads is represented by a forked path that leads through a forest. The setting is also impartial; the forest is anytime and anywhere the reader desires it to be. The narrator is forced to make a life-decision, thus changing the course of his/her life forever. Symbolism and imagery are used effectively to reinforce the main theme of the poem.

Robert Frost was born March 26, 1874 at San Francisco, California and died January 29, 1963 at Boston, Massachusetts. Frost was an educator and poet. He is widely known for his poetry; some of Frost’s famous work includes The Road Not Taken, Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening, Mending Wall, and Out, Out─. Out, Out─ tells a story of a young boy cutting wood to help provide for his family. He then acquires an injury on his hand by the saw. The boy ends up dying due to the severity of his wound. His family returns to their duties. This poem uses many elements to emphasize death. Robert Frost uses the poetic elements of imagery, figures of speech, and symbolism to illustrate the theme of death in the poem Out, Out─.

The existence of poetry as an artform predates literacy itself. Over the course of history, poetry grew from a verbal form of art, existing mainly in religious hymns, to becoming the universal “language of the heart”. The work of William Shakespeare and Edgar Allen Poe, some of the most notable poets of history, has resonated with generations of Americans. Although they lived in a Pre-industrial world, their work remains powerful because the themes expressed in their artwork can still be applied to modern society. On the contrary, protruding among this group of ancient poets is Robert Frost, whose modern work remains just as powerful, shaping generations through his questions of existence, and depiction of loneliness in an indifferent universe. One of Frost's most celebrated poems: The Road Not Taken, is influential not only in the literary world, but also within American culture. The poems subsequent ripple through American life is analyzed by David Orr In his essay The Most Misread Poem in America. Here, Orr argues that the misread of The Road Not Taken magnifies the underlying issues in society’s understanding of both Frost and poetry as a whole.

In the ending of the poem, regret is displayed after realizing the wrong choices were made.

Sometimes in our lives, we have to make important decisions. We either accept or regret our decisions. Decisions come easily to some; while others, they are caught having to choose between something that could lead them to an unknown future. Robert Frost was a four-time Pulitzer Prize. He wrote the poem, “The Road Not Taken” which was first published in Frost’s collection Mountain Interval in 1916.

“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I- I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.” From the poem The Road Not Taken, Robert Frost described that his life started to change when he decided to seize the day and express himself as an individual by choosing the road that was “less traveled by”. As a result, Frost’s life was fundamentally unique and challenging that it would have been had chosen the most well-traveled path. Similarly, in the journey of life, I have made many decisions and chosen many paths for myself. Each decision I made could be good or bad, but there is no right and wrong because different pathways have different views.

The title of the “The Road Not Taken” tells the reader immediately about the subject of the book. A man, Robert Frost, is walking down a road and the road splits into two. The man is sorry that he cannot walk down both roads and promises that he will walk down the other road another day. The setting of this poem takes place in a forest around the time of a forest. The road is most likely to be more of a path because this poem was written when cars were only first becoming popular.

In the poems by Robert frost, “Mending Wall”, “The Road Not Taken”, and “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening”. As we take a broad view, we see a correlation of the theme from all three poems. Consisting of either an outdoor setting or nature setting

The powerful metaphors employed in this work compare the “good night” with the crushing blow of death and the“wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight” to heroism and achievement. Dylan uses oxymorons and similes to emphasize the desperation he felt to highlight the conflicts of man. The “blinding sight”, the “fierce tears” and the “blind eyes [that] could blaze like meteors and be gay,” serve

Edgar Allan Poe and Robert Frost influenced my thorough love of different styles of literature, particularly poetry. To the masses, Edgar Allan Poe and Robert Frost only share job titles, but the two poets share many similarities within their writing. Personally, I read pieces from both authors over the course of my schooling experience. I admired Robert Frost’s poem, “The Road Not Taken” from a young age, and that particular stole my heart since the first read. “The Raven,” became one of my favorite poems further down my schooling career, with its clear ominous tone that symbolizes much of Poe’s writing. Frost’s and Poe’s works may not seem similar, aside from the section in which their books reside within a library, but their work resembles each other’s quite well. Frost’s writing serves as a better introduction to poetry due to his easily relatable themes, his background connects to everyday audiences, and his use of modern language.

Robert Frost's poem “The Road Not Taken” describes a traveler facing a choice, he can either choose the road not taken, or he can choose the road most traveled by. He does not know where either road might lead, but in order to continue with his journey, he can pick only one road. He analyses both roads for the possibilities of where each may take him in his journey. Frost's traveler realizes that regret is inevitable. Regardless of his choice, he knows that he will miss the experiences he might have encountered on the road not taken. Frost, uses literary elements, such as Denotation and Connotation, Symbolism, alliteration, consonance, and assonance in order to convey massage.

“The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost and “Death, be not proud” by John Donne are two poems with different meanings but share one of many of the same themes. Although the poems share different meanings as a whole, the reader can conclude the same common theme from both of these poems. Even though the reader may think the poems lack a same common theme, the theme is revealed by the end of both these poems. These two poems share the same theme of hopes and dreams. As the reader explores the same common theme of these two poems, the literary devices of personification, imagery, alliteration, metaphor, and irony can be seen throughout these poems as well.