The Road Not Taken Literary Devices

Robert Frost went from an unstable farmer aspiring to be a poet to a celebrated American poet and four-time Pulitzer Prize winner. In his poem “The Road Not Taken”, he writes about the hard choices that people have to make in their lives. Robert uses extended metaphors and symbolism to show the uncertainty and psychological chaos people feel while making hard choices.

interesting?” In Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken,” the speaker does just this: he looks

In the final stanza, lines 16-20 the tone of the poem changes completely. This is the only stanza that begins with a new sentence, indicating that it is a stronger break from the previous ideas. The speaker puts himself in a future situation discussing his life. What he states here seems to contradict what he has said earlier. From his future prospective he says that the paths where different and that he did not choose the one most traveled by. Perhaps he will in the future actually believe this and he only wishes that he could choose in the present "the one less traveled by."(20)

“The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost is a very well-known poem. Most people hear about this poem throughout their school years. Robert Frost is a well-known poet and uses many literary devices throughout his writings. “The Road Not Taken” has more literary devices used in it than other writings one may see. Frost used multiple devices, such as metaphors, form, rhythm, rhyme scheme, and many others. The most important ones are denotation and connotation, theme, and use of figurative language.

Though he may want to try it out, he comes to terms with the fact that there is no turning back and that: “Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back” (Lines 14,15). With these lines, Frost uses the tone of regret and shows that it is the speaker’s original choice that led him to his own new road. To carry on that tone of regret, in the sixteenth line the speaker states that he: “Shall be telling this with a sigh” (Line 16). By saying this, the speaker unintentionally shows that he is nostalgic on the decision of his path. If he were to be told which path to take, he may not have been in the position of regret. While the speaker was unsure of his road in the beginning, he also ended up being unsure of if he could take the other path later on. Yet again, Frost shows that the speaker had to be self reliant in his decisions, showing that he is alone in the world.

Thoreau believes deeply that one person can make a big difference in one’s own life and, in extension, the world: “I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.” Frost seems to believe that one person cannot even make a big difference in his own life. In “The Road Not Taken” the speaker is almost able to convince himself, at a later date, that he truly does take the road less traveled. His own self-disillusionment and self importance leads the speaker to feel more in control of his life. While Thoreau is actually able to make a significant difference in his life and the way he perceives the world, Frost’s character cannot.

In “The Road Not Taken”, Frost draws a picture of life-long journey of one’s life. He writes “And both that morning equally lay/ In leaves no step had trodden black…” and “I shall be telling this with a sigh/Somewhere ages and ages hence…” When Frost looking back in life, he realised he has already make

In Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken”, Frost shows the everyday human struggle to make a choice that could change the course of one’s life. In his poem, a person has the choice to take one road or the other. One road is worn out from many people taking it, and the other is barely touched, for fewer have taken that road. Throughout the poem, the speaker learns that just because so many other people have done one thing, or walked one way, does not mean everyone has to. Sometimes you just have to go your own way.

When it comes to make a decision many times we take our time to think of the pros and cons for each point of that decision. Frost stood while looking at both roads and was trying to envision what may be of each road. When he finally decides to make his personal decision on which road to take he describes it as follows, “And having perhaps the better claim, because it was grassy and wanted wear” (Frost 7-8). The road he took appealed to him the most after observing and deliberating it. He also says “And be one traveler…”

Firstly, in the first stanza, Frost describes standing at an open road that splits into two separate paths: “two roads diverged in a yellow wood”. He goes on to say how he wishes we could try going down both paths to see where each ones leads. The two paths represent two different ways he could go about living his life. When he says: “And I looked down one as far as I could” he’s referring to how he tried his best to find all the pros and cons of one of the two possible options. In the second stanza, Frost decides now to look on at the other path, or to consider the second option he has: “Then took the other, as just as fair”. The words “perhaps having the better claim, because it was grassy and wanted wear could mean a choice that wasn’t exactly normal, or made much sense but he wanted to pursue it anyways. These stanzas present the readers with the situation and bring out the idea of having a tough decision to make, which links to the first half of the theme.

In Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken,” the narrator of the poem analyzes his situation thoroughly prior to choosing his path. His process can be seen in several lines of the poem. For example, his decision begins, “And be one traveler, long I stood.” Similar to making any life altering decision, the narrator takes time rather than rushing in to his path. He weighs the options of each path (decision) as he “looked down one as far as [he] could…Then took the other, as just as fair.”

Frost presents the traveler's choice of paths as a metaphor for the difficult decisions a person must make in life. The divergent paths are the choices to be made at various points along the way. Regardless of how he tries, the traveler cannot see beyond where the path is "bent in the undergrowth" (5). Likewise, nobody can predict what effect one choice will have on his life. The traveler sees the two paths as very similar or "just as fair" (6). As much as the traveler would like to return to the diverging roads, he realizes that he will not get another chance to travel the other path. With maturity comes a resignation that a choice has affected a person's life and there is no going back. He also tries to make the best of his decision by saying that it has "made all the difference." (20).

In the first line, Frost introduces the elements of his primary metaphor: the diverging roads. The speaker expresses his regret that "[he] could not travel both" (line 2). The choice is not easily made since "long I stood" (line 3) before coming to a decision. In an attempt to make a choice, the traveler examines the path "as far as [he] could" (line 4), but his vision is limited because the path bends and is covered "in the undergrowth" (line 5). Thus, indicating that although he would have liked to acquire more information, he is prevented from doing so because of the nature of his environment. In lines 6-8, the speaker is still unable to decide between the two paths since "the other, [is] just as fair" (line 6). He indicates that the second path is a more attractive choice since "it was grassy and wanted wear" (line 8). Nevertheless, by the end of the stanza, he remains ambivalent, even after comparing the two paths, for each was "really about the same" (line 10). Neither path has been traveled lately. In the third stanza, the speaker makes his decision, trying to persuade himself that he will eventually "come back" (line 15) to satisfy his desire and curiosity to travel both paths. However, deep down, he admits to himself that

Not only are metaphors utilized throughout the poem, but a literary device known as Imagery is as well. Imagery is alternative as important a device for it allows for the reader to have a clear picture of what the character in the poem is visualizing. Furthermore, it also helps covey the theme the author is aiming to represent to the reader. Imagery is made known in stanza two line three, which states, “Because it was grassy and wanted wear” (Myer, 1091). Here the author is using imagery to inform the readers the traveler is coming up with a reason for why one path could be more favorable over the other. The reader analyzes this line of imagery to obtain a clearer representation of the traveler’s decision-making process. Another line where the author uses imagery is in stanza two line five, which states, “Had worn them really about the same” (Myer, 1091). Here the author is using imagery to inform the reader that the paths are “worn” down, which informs the reader that both of his choices have been equally chosen by people before him. These examples help the reader begin to form the theme of self-justification in decision-making. After analyzing the metaphors and the imagery Frost uses in this poem, the reader can conclude so far that the theme the poet is conveying

In the poem Frost makes it evident that he feels that making a decision is not an easy thing to do. This is very true when we make a decision that is significant. In the poem Frost states “two roads diverged in a yellow wood/and sorry I could not travel both”. When Frost states this he is saying that