Theme Of Alienation In Robert Frost Poems

Robert Frost’s approach to human isolation is always an interesting exploration. His poem of desertion and neglect paired with eternal hopefulness ignite the reader in his poem “The Census-Taker.” All of the elements of a Frost poem are in this particular poem. “The Census-Taker” must be from an earlier time in Frost’s career because the poem is written in an open, free verse similar to the style of his earlier 20th century poetry like “Mending Wall” and “After Apple-Picking.” Also, the language lacks the sophisticated word selection a reader of poetry might find in Wallace Stevens and instead uses simplicity to

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.

Frost uses the phrase “Mending Wall” to show that the relationship between the narrator and the neighbor is not being repaired. The poem focuses on two men who meet amongst a wall to stroll and make repairs. The narrator feels that the wall shouldn’t be there. He states that, “...We do not need the wall: He is all pine and I am apple orchard, my apples will never get across.(Frost) On the other hand, the neighbor feels that the wall is needed and simply states that, “

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.

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.

Frost has a compelling way of writing the poem, in the beginnings of the poem there is a lot of metaphors and descriptions of the setting and the saw and the boy. Once the boy is injured

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.

Similar to “Acquainted with the Night,” isolation is a major theme in “Mending Wall.” In “Mending Wall,” there are two characters: the speaker and the neighbor. The two characters have two different opinions on what make a “good neighbor.” The neighbor views walls as a crucial object in

Overall, Frost’s poem “Out, Out-” uses a variety of literary devices to distinguish the setting and the most thorough meaning of the poem such as imagery, diction, and several figurative language

of this literary work. Frost uses the depiction of innocence through a young boy who suffers a

Frost describes the little boy's work in the first two lines by saying the 'stove-length sticks of wood,' inferring the practical nature of his work. The mountains described in the next lines further add to the captive nature of the poem. Vermont provides a

Robert Frost is an iconic poet in American literature today, and is seen as one of the most well known, popular, or respected twentieth century American poets. In his lifetime, Frost received four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry, and the Congressional Gold Medal. However, Robert Frost’s life was not always full of fame and wealth; he had a very difficult life from the very beginning. At age 11, his father died of tuberculosis; fifteen years later, his mother died of cancer. Frost committed his younger sister to a mental hospital, and many years later, committed his own daughter to a mental hospital as well. Both Robert and his wife Elinor suffered from depression throughout their lives, but considering the premature deaths of three of their children and the suicide of another, both maintained sanity very well. (1)

In his poem “Acquainted with the Night,” Robert Frost describes a character who spends his nights wandering the city streets. The reader can infer from both Frost’s tone, and the time of day in which the speaker chooses to walk, that the character is in a world of isolation. This is especially evident in the lines, “When far away an interrupted cry/ Came over houses from another street,/ But not to call me back or say good-by” (Frost 898). From this line, the reader understands that the poem’s speaker feels as if he is completely isolated in the world. In a similar way, E. E. Cummings poem “anyone lived in a pretty how town” expresses the loneliness felt by people of this era. Cummings creative use of pronouns gives the poem a double entendre. The characters, anyone and noone, can represent their literal meanings, or a single man and woman. Therefore, when Cummings writes that “noone loves him more by more,” he could mean that anyone is being loved greatly, or not at all. This loneliness is expressed yet again when Cummings informs the reader, “Women and men (both little and small)/ cared for anyone not at all” (Cummings 922). The works of both Frost and Cummings both portray the hardship that accompanied the feeling of loneliness during the modern

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.

Frost used a distinct way of writing throughout his poem that not only hooked the reader into the story, but also made them question their own views of walls, both physical and psychological. In the poem it is displayed that walls can be both good and bad. The wall that the narrator sees as the embodiment of what separates them, it is actually the one thing that brings them together every spring. Near the end, the narrator brings back the original question, what is the something? With this poem, maybe Frost wanted the reader to examine themselves and their surroundings and try to answer the question of tradition, and how they unite us and separates us at the same time. The narrator’s neighbor is the personification of the old ways and custom in the poem, it is evident as he is constantly repeating “good fences make good neighbors” (Frost 245) and the fact that “he will not go behind his father’s saying” (Frost 246). Even though, good fences make good neighbors is a well-known proverb, people will eventually ask themselves: Why is it necessary to have fences to build good