Bloom's How to Write About Robert Frost (Bloom's How to Write About Literature)

B L O O M’ S

HOW TO WRITE ABOUT

Robert Frost M iCH a el r . little introduction by Harold blooM

Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost Copyright © 2010 by Infobase Publishing Introduction © 2010 by Harold Bloom All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher. For information contact: Bloom’s Literary Criticism An imprint of Infobase Publishing 132 West 31st Street New York NY 10001 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Little, Michael R. (Michael Robert), 1969– Bloom’s how to write about Robert Frost / by Michael R. Little ; introduction by Harold Bloom. p. cm. — (Bloom’s how to write about literature) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-60413-347-9 (hardcover : acid-free paper) ISBN 978-1-43812-933-4 (e-book) 1. Frost, Robert, 1874–1963—Criticism and interpretation. 2. Criticism—Authorship. I. Bloom, Harold. II. Title. III. Title: How to write about Robert Frost. IV. Series. PS3511.R94Z7645 2009 811'.52—dc22

2009022860

Bloom’s Literary Criticism books are available at special discounts when purchased in bulk quantities for businesses, associations, institutions, or sales promotions. Please call our Special Sales Department in New York at (212) 967-8800 or (800) 322-8755. You can find Bloom’s Literary Criticism on the World Wide Web at http://www.chelseahouse.com Text design by Annie O’Donnell Cover design by Alicia Post Printed in the United States of America MP MSRF 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Contents

Series Introduction

v

Volume Introduction

vi

How to Write a Good Essay

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How to Write about Robert Frost

47

“Directive”

70

“Mending Wall”

80

“The Death of the Hired Man”

89

“Home Burial”

102

“After Apple-Picking”

114

“The Wood-Pile”

124

“The Road Not Taken”

132

“The Oven Bird”

143

“Birches”

151

“ ‘Out, Out—’ ”

161

“Fire and Ice”

175

“Nothing Gold Can Stay”

180

“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”

188

“Acquainted with the Night”

203

“Departmental”

211

“Desert Places”

219

“Design”

229

Index

240

Series Introduction

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loom’s How to Write about Literature series is designed to inspire students to write fine essays on great writers and their works. Each volume in the series begins with an introduction by Harold Bloom, meditating on the challenges and rewards of writing about the volume’s subject author. The first chapter then provides detailed instructions on how to write a good essay, including how to find a thesis; how to develop an outline; how to write a good introduction, body text, and conclusion; how to cite sources; and more. The second chapter provides a brief overview of the issues involved in writing about the subject author and then a number of suggestions for paper topics, with accompanying strategies for addressing each topic. Succeeding chapters cover the author’s major works. The paper topics suggested within this book are open-ended, and the brief strategies provided are designed to give students a push forward in the writing process rather than a road map to success. The aim of the book is to pose questions, not answer them. Many different kinds of papers could result from each topic. As always, the success of each paper will depend completely on the writer’s skill and imagination.

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How to Write about Robert Frost: Introduction by Harold Bloom

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obert Frost is the only eminent American poet of the twentieth century who won a large general public, as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow did in the nineteenth century. Longfellow: an admirable poet, not of Frost’s stature, nor did he employ the younger poet’s sly strategy of writing on two levels. One aspect of Frost’s work is open and straightforward, but he also composed with a smaller, elite readership in mind. Reading, teaching, and writing about Frost necessarily must manifest awareness of this poet’s double nature. Probably thinking of Hart Crane’s “logic of metaphor,” Frost was prompted to say of poetry: “Why not let it imply everything?” Crane and Frost have nothing in common except their mutual descent from Emerson and Emily Dickinson. A classical rhetorician, Frost pitches his poems at the middle voice, while the Pindaric Crane aimed at the Shelleyan, high sublime. The antithetical strains of Walt Whitman and of T. S. Eliot fuse in Hart Crane, while Frost is closest to the gnomic poems of Emerson himself. With Frost at his greatest, you must learn to read between the lines in which he depicts his quite nihilistic vision:

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Introduction

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The bird would cease and be as other birds But that he knows in singing not to sing. The question that he frames in all but words Is what to make of a diminished thing. —“The Oven Bird” You can trace this ironic swerve into skepticism throughout Frost’s strongest poems. I myself am haunted by the highly original cognitive music of his eloquent evasions. I am overtired Of the great harvest I myself desired. —“After Apple-Picking” A light he was to no one but himself Where now he sat, concerned with he knew what, A quiet light, and then not even that. —“An Old Man’s Winter Night”

If I can with confidence say That still for another day, Or even another year, I will be there for you, my dear,

It will be because, though small As measured against the All, I have been so instinctively thorough About my crevice and burrow. —“A Drumlin Woodchuck” Wind goes from farm to farm in wave on wave, But carries no cry of what is hoped to be. There may be little or much beyond the grave, But the strong are saying nothing until they see. —“The Strong Are Saying Nothing”

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These four passages, in their contexts, are fascinatingly difficult. Enigma and paradox compel the reader to resist simplistic interpretative conclusions. Frost, like his master Emerson, desires to teach you “the Conduct of Life,” while knowing Emerson’s iron New England law of compensation: “Nothing is got for nothing.”

How to Write a Good Essay By Laurie A. Sterling and Michael R. Little

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hile there are many ways to write about literature, most assignments for high school and college English classes call for analytical papers. In these assignments, you are presenting your interpretation of a text to your reader. Your objective is to interpret the text’s meaning in order to enhance your reader’s understanding and enjoyment of the work. Without exception, strong papers about the meaning of a literary work are built upon a careful, close reading of the text or texts. Careful, analytical reading should always be the first step in your writing process. This volume provides models of such close, analytical reading, and these should help you develop your own skills as a reader and as a writer. As the examples throughout this book demonstrate, attentive reading entails thinking about and evaluating the formal (textual) aspects of the author’s works: theme, character, form, and language. In addition, when writing about a work, many readers choose to move beyond the text itself to consider the work’s cultural context. In these instances, writers might explore the historical circumstances of the time period in which the work was written. Alternatively, they might examine the philosophies and ideas that a work addresses. Even in cases where writers explore a work’s cultural context, though, papers must still address the more formal aspects of the work itself. A good interpretative essay that evaluates Charles Dickens’s use of the philosophy of utilitarianism in his novel Hard Times, for example, cannot adequately address the author’s treatment of the philosophy without firmly grounding this discussion in the book itself. In other words, any ana-

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lytical paper about a text, even one that seeks to evaluate the work’s cultural context, must also have a firm handle on the work’s themes, characters, and language. You must look for and evaluate these aspects of a work, then, as you read a text and as you prepare to write about it.

Writing about Themes Literary themes are more than just topics or subjects treated in a work; they are attitudes or points about these topics that often structure other elements in a work. Writing about themes therefore requires that you not just identify a topic that a literary work addresses but also discuss what that work says about that topic. For example, if you were writing about the culture of the American South in William Faulkner’s famous story “A Rose for Emily,” you would need to discuss what Faulkner says, argues, or implies about that culture and its passing. When you prepare to write about thematic concerns in a work of literature, you will probably discover that, like most works of literature, your text touches upon other themes in addition to its central theme. These secondary themes also provide rich ground for paper topics. A thematic paper on “A Rose for Emily” might consider gender or race in the story. While neither of these could be said to be the central theme of the story, they are clearly related to the passing of the “old South” and could provide plenty of good material for papers. As you prepare to write about themes in literature, you might find a number of strategies helpful. After you identify a theme or themes in the story, you should begin by evaluating how other elements of the story—such as character, point of view, imagery, and symbolism—help develop the theme. You might ask yourself what your own responses are to the author’s treatment of the subject matter. Do not neglect the obvious, either: What expectations does the title set up? How does the title help develop thematic concerns? Clearly, the title “A Rose for Emily” says something about the narrator’s attitude toward the title character, Emily Grierson, and all she represents.

Writing about Character Generally, characters are essential components of fiction and drama. (This is not always the case, though; Ray Bradbury’s “August 2026: There

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Will Come Soft Rains” is technically a story without characters, at least any human characters.) Often, you can discuss character in poetry, as in T. S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” or Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess.” Many writers find that analyzing character is one of the most interesting and engaging ways to work with a piece of literature and to shape a paper. After all, characters generally are human, and we all know something about being human and living in the world. While it is always important to remember that these figures are not real people but creations of the writer’s imagination, it can be fruitful to begin evaluating them as you might evaluate a real person. Often you can start with your own response to a character. Did you like or dislike the character? Did you sympathize with the character? Why or why not? Keep in mind, though, that emotional responses like these are just starting places. To truly explore and evaluate literary characters, you need to return to the formal aspects of the text and evaluate how the author has drawn these characters. The 20th-century writer E. M. Forster coined the terms flat characters and round characters. Flat characters are static, one-dimensional characters who frequently represent a particular concept or idea. In contrast, round characters are fully drawn and much more realistic characters who frequently change and develop over the course of a work. Are the characters you are studying flat or round? What elements of the characters lead you to this conclusion? Why might the author have drawn characters like this? How does their development affect the meaning of the work? Similarly, you should explore the techniques the author uses to develop characters. Do we hear a character’s own words, or do we hear only other characters’ assessments of him or her? Or, does the author use an omniscient or limited omniscient narrator to allow us access to the workings of the characters’ minds? If so, how does that help develop the characterization? Often you can even evaluate the narrator as a character. How trustworthy are the opinions and assessments of the narrator? You should also think about characters’ names. Do they mean anything? If you encounter a hero named Sophia or Sophie, you should probably think about her wisdom (or lack thereof), since Sophia means “wisdom” in Greek. Similarly, since the name Sylvia is derived from the word sylvan, meaning “of the wood,” you might want to evaluate that character’s relationship with nature. Once again, you might look to the title of the work. Does Herman Melville’s “Bartleby, the Scrivener” signal anything about Bartleby himself? Is Bartleby

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adequately defined by his job as scrivener? Is this part of Melville’s point? Pursuing questions like these can help you develop thorough papers about characters from psychological, sociological, or more formalistic perspectives.

Writing about Form and Genre Genre, a word derived from French, means “type” or “class.” Literary genres are distinctive classes or categories of literary composition. On the most general level, literary works can be divided into the genres of drama, poetry, fiction, and essays, yet within those genres there are classifications that are also referred to as genres. Tragedy and comedy, for example, are genres of drama. Epic, lyric, and pastoral are genres of poetry. Form, on the other hand, generally refers to the shape or structure of a work. There are many clearly defined forms of poetry that follow specific patterns of meter, rhyme, and stanza. Sonnets, for example, are poems that follow a fixed form of 14 lines. Sonnets generally follow one of two basic sonnet forms, each with its own distinct rhyme scheme. Haiku is another example of poetic form, traditionally consisting of three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables. While you might think that writing about form or genre might leave little room for argument, many of these forms and genres are very fluid. Remember that literature is evolving and ever changing, and so are its forms. As you study poetry, you may find that poets, especially more modern poets, play with traditional poetic forms, bringing about new effects. Similarly, dramatic tragedy was once quite narrowly defined, but over the centuries playwrights have broadened and challenged traditional definitions, changing the shape of tragedy. When Arthur Miller wrote Death of a Salesman, many critics challenged the idea that tragic drama could encompass a common man like Willy Loman. Evaluating how a work of literature fits into or challenges the boundaries of its form or genre can provide you with fruitful avenues of investigation. You might find it helpful to ask why the work does or does not fit into traditional categories. Why might Miller have thought it fitting to write a tragedy of the common man? Similarly, you might compare the content or theme of a work with its form. How well do they work

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together? Many of Emily Dickinson’s poems, for instance, follow the meter of traditional hymns. While some of her poems seem to express traditional religious doctrines, many seem to challenge or strain against traditional conceptions of God and theology. What is the effect, then, of her use of traditional hymn meter?

Writing about Language, Symbols, and Imagery No matter what the genre, writers use words as their most basic tool. Language is the most fundamental building block of literature. It is essential that you pay careful attention to the author’s language and word choice as you read, reread, and analyze a text. Imagery is language that appeals to the senses. Most commonly, imagery appeals to our sense of vision, creating a mental picture, but authors also use language that appeals to our other senses. Images can be literal or figurative. Literal images use sensory language to describe an actual thing. In the broadest terms, figurative language uses one thing to speak about something else. For example, if I call my boss a snake, I am not saying that he is literally a reptile. Instead, I am using figurative language to communicate my opinions about him. Since we think of snakes as sneaky, slimy, and sinister, I am using the concrete image of a snake to communicate these abstract opinions and impressions. The two most common figures of speech are similes and metaphors. Both are comparisons between two apparently dissimilar things. Similes are explicit comparisons using the words like or as; metaphors are implicit comparisons. To return to the previous example, if I say, “My boss, Bob, was waiting for me when I showed up to work five minutes late today—the snake!” I have constructed a metaphor. Writing about his experiences fighting in World War I, Wilfred Owen begins his poem “Dulce et decorum est,” with a string of similes: “Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, / Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge.” Owen’s goal was to undercut clichéd notions that war and dying in battle were glorious. Certainly, comparing soldiers to coughing hags and to beggars underscores his point. “Fog,” a short poem by Carl Sandburg provides a clear example of a metaphor. Sandburg’s poem reads:

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost The fog comes on little cat feet. It sits looking over harbor and city on silent haunches and then moves on.

Notice how effectively Sandburg conveys surprising impressions of the fog by comparing two seemingly disparate things—the fog and a cat. Symbols, by contrast, are things that stand for, or represent, other things. Often they represent something intangible, such as concepts or ideas. In everyday life we use and understand symbols easily. Babies at christenings and brides at weddings wear white to represent purity. Think, too, of a dollar bill. The paper itself has no value in and of itself. Instead, that paper bill is a symbol of something else, the precious metal in a nation’s coffers. Symbols in literature work similarly. Authors use symbols to evoke more than a simple, straightforward, literal meaning. Characters, objects, and places can all function as symbols. Famous literary examples of symbols include Moby Dick, the white whale of Herman Melville’s novel, and the scarlet A of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. As both of these symbols suggest, a literary symbol cannot be adequately defined or explained by any one meaning. Hester Prynne’s Puritan community clearly intends her scarlet A as a symbol of her adultery, but as the novel progresses, even her own community reads the letter as representing not just adultery, but able, angel, and a host of other meanings. Writing about imagery and symbols requires close attention to the author’s language. To prepare a paper on symbolism or imagery in a work, identify and trace the images and symbols and then try to draw some conclusions about how they function. Ask yourself how any symbols or images help contribute to the themes or meanings of the work. What connotations do they carry? How do they affect your reception of the work? Do they shed light on characters or settings? A strong paper on imagery or symbolism will thoroughly consider the use of figures in the text and will try to reach some conclusions about how or why the author uses them.

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Writing about History and Context As noted above, it is possible to write an analytical paper that also considers the work’s context. After all, the text was not created in a vacuum. The author lived and wrote in a specific time period and in a specific cultural context and, like all of us, was shaped by that environment. Learning more about the historical and cultural circumstances that surround the author and the work can help illuminate a text and provide you with productive material for a paper. Remember, though, that when you write analytical papers, you should use the context to illuminate the text. Do not lose sight of your goal—to interpret the meaning of the literary work. Use historical or philosophical research as a tool to develop your textual evaluation. Thoughtful readers often consider how history and culture affected the author’s choice and treatment of his or her subject matter. Investigations into the history and context of a work could examine the work’s relation to specific historical events, such as the Salem witch trials in 17th-century Massachusetts or the restoration of Charles to the British throne in 1660. Bear in mind that historical context is not limited to politics and world events. While knowing about the Vietnam War is certainly helpful in interpreting much of Tim O’Brien’s fiction, and some knowledge of the French Revolution clearly illuminates the dynamics of Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities, historical context also entails the fabric of daily life. Examining a text in light of gender roles, race relations, class boundaries, or working conditions can give rise to thoughtful and compelling papers. Exploring the conditions of the working class in 19th-century England, for example, can provide a particularly effective avenue for writing about Dickens’s Hard Times. You can begin thinking about these issues by asking broad questions at first. What do you know about the time period and about the author? What does the editorial apparatus in your text tell you? These might be starting places. Similarly, when specific historical events or dynamics are particularly important to understanding a work but might be somewhat obscure to modern readers, textbooks usually provide notes to explain historical background. These are a good place to start. With this information, ask yourself how these historical facts and circumstances might have affected the author, the presentation of theme, and the presentation of character. How does knowing more about the work’s specific histori-

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cal context illuminate the work? To take a well-known example, understanding the complex attitudes toward slavery during the time Mark Twain wrote Adventures of Huckleberry Finn should help you begin to examine issues of race in the text. Additionally, you might compare these attitudes to those of the time in which the novel was set. How might this comparison affect your interpretation of a work written after the abolition of slavery but set before the Civil War?

Writing about Philosophy and Ideas Philosophical concerns are closely related to both historical context and thematic issues. Like historical investigation, philosophical research can provide a useful tool as you analyze a text. For example, an investigation into the working class in Dickens’s England might lead you to a topic on the philosophical doctrine of utilitarianism in Hard Times. Many other works explore philosophies and ideas quite explicitly. Mary Shelley’s famous novel Frankenstein, for example, explores John Locke’s tabula rasa theory of human knowledge as she portrays the intellectual and emotional development of Victor Frankenstein’s creature. As this example indicates, philosophical issues are somewhat more abstract than investigations of theme or historical context. Some other examples of philosophical issues include human free will, the formation of human identity, the nature of sin, or questions of ethics. Writing about philosophy and ideas might require some outside research, but usually the notes or other material in your text will provide you with basic information, and often footnotes and bibliographies suggest places you can go to read further about the subject. If you have identified a philosophical theme that runs through a text, you might ask yourself how the author develops this theme. Look at character development and the interactions of characters, for example. Similarly, you might examine whether the narrative voice in a work of fiction addresses the philosophical concerns of the text.

Writing Comparison and Contrast Essays Finally, you might find that comparing and contrasting the works or techniques of an author provides a useful tool for literary analysis. A comparison and contrast essay might compare two characters or themes

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in a single work, or it might compare the author’s treatment of a theme in two works. It might also contrast methods of character development or analyze an author’s differing treatment of a philosophical concern in two works. Writing comparison and contrast essays, though, requires some special consideration. While they generally provide you with plenty of material to use, they also come with a built-in trap: the laundry list. These papers often become mere lists of connections between the works. As this chapter will discuss, a strong thesis must make an assertion that you want to prove or validate. A strong comparison/contrast thesis, then, needs to comment on the significance of the similarities and differences you observe. It is not enough merely to assert that the works contain similarities and differences. You might, for example, assert why the similarities and differences are important and explain how they illuminate the works’ treatment of theme. Remember, too, that a thesis should not be a statement of the obvious. A comparison/contrast paper that focuses only on very obvious similarities or differences does little to illuminate the connections between the works. Often, an effective method of shaping a strong thesis and argument is to begin your paper by noting the similarities between the works but then to develop a thesis that asserts how these apparently similar elements are different. If, for example, you observe that Emily Dickinson wrote a number of poems about spiders, you might analyze how she uses spider imagery differently in two poems. Similarly, many scholars have noted that Hawthorne created many “mad scientist” characters, men who are so devoted to their science or their art that they lose perspective on all else. A good thesis comparing two of these characters—Aylmer of “The Birth-mark” and Dr. Rappaccini of “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” for example—might initially identify both characters as examples of Hawthorne’s mad scientist type but then argue that their motivations for scientific experimentation differ. If you strive to analyze the similarities or differences, discuss significances, and move beyond the obvious, your paper should move beyond the laundry list trap.

Preparing to Write Armed with a clear sense of your task—illuminating the text—and with an understanding of theme, character, language, history, and philosophy, you are ready to approach the writing process. Remember that good writing is grounded in good reading and that close reading takes time,

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attention, and more than one reading of your text. Read for comprehension first. As you go back and review the work, mark the text to chart the details of the work as well as your reactions. Highlight important passages, repeated words, and image patterns. “Converse” with the text through marginal notes. Mark turns in the plot, ask questions, and make observations about characters, themes, and language. If you are reading from a book that does not belong to you, keep a record of your reactions in a journal or notebook. If you have read a work of literature carefully, paying attention to both the text and the context of the work, you have a leg up on the writing process. Admittedly, at this point, your ideas are probably very broad and undefined, but you have taken an important first step toward writing a strong paper. Your next step is to focus, to take a broad, perhaps fuzzy, topic and define it more clearly. Even a topic provided by your instructor will need to be focused appropriately. Remember that good writers make the topic their own. There are a number of strategies—often called “invention”— that you can use to develop your own focus. In one such strategy, called freewriting, you spend 10 minutes or so just writing about your topic without referring back to the text or your notes. Write whatever comes to mind; the important thing is that you just keep writing. Often this process allows you to develop fresh ideas or approaches to your subject matter. You could also try brainstorming: Write down your topic and then list all the related points or ideas you can think of. Include questions, comments, words, important passages or events, and anything else that comes to mind. Let one idea lead to another. In the related technique of clustering, or mapping, write your topic on a sheet of paper and write related ideas around it. Then list related subpoints under each of these main ideas. Many people then draw arrows to show connections between points. This technique helps you narrow your topic and can also help you organize your ideas. Similarly, asking journalistic questions— Who? What? Where? When? Why? and How?—can develop ideas for topic development.

Thesis Statements Once you have developed a focused topic, you can begin to think about your thesis statement, the main point or purpose of your paper. It is imperative that you craft a strong thesis, otherwise, your paper will likely be little more than random, disorganized observations about the text.

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Think of your thesis statement as a kind of road map for your paper. It tells your reader where you are going and how you are going to get there. To craft a good thesis, you must keep a number of things in mind. First, as the title of this subsection indicates, your paper’s thesis should be a statement, an assertion about the text that you want to prove or validate. Beginning writers often formulate a question that they attempt to use as a thesis. For example, a writer exploring the ways we might compare “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers” might ask, Why does

Frost use the metaphor of mowing and making hay in two different poems? While a question like this is a good strategy to use in the invention process to help narrow your topic and find your thesis, it cannot serve as the thesis statement because it does not tell your reader what you want to assert about that metaphor. You might shape this question into a thesis by instead proposing an answer to that question: In “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers,” the acts of mowing and making hay are understood to be metaphors for writing and reading poetry. Reading the two poems together, though, helps us to see that “Mowing” is more concerned with writing. “The Tuft of Flowers” is more concerned with reading, and taken together the two poems argue for an ethics of collaboration between writer and reader. Notice that this thesis provides an initial plan or structure for the rest of the paper, and notice, too, that the thesis statement does not necessarily have to fit into one sentence. Second, remember that a good thesis makes an assertion that you need to support. In other words, a good thesis does not state the obvious. If you tried to formulate a thesis about Frost’s use of metaphor by simply saying, Frost’s poems “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers” use mowing and making hay as metaphors for writing and reading poetry, you have done nothing but rephrase the obvious. Even though this thesis explains the metaphors, it emphasizes the obvious point that the two poems are similar, so there would be no point in spending three to five pages supporting that assertion. You might try to develop a thesis from that point by asking yourself some further questions: How does mowing serve as a metaphor for writing poetry? How does making hay serve as a metaphor for reading poetry? How does Frost develop these ideas in multiple poems? How can comparing poems that

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explore a similar theme help us to understand each poem more clearly? How might one of those poems expand or elaborate on the theme of another poem? How might “Mowing” and “Tuft of Flowers” be read as two complementary halves of a whole poem? Such a line of questioning might lead you to a more viable thesis, like the one in the preceding paragraph. As the comparison with the road map also suggests, your thesis should appear near the beginning of the paper. In relatively short papers (three to six pages) the thesis almost always appears in the first paragraph. Some writers fall into the trap of saving their thesis for the end, trying to provide a surprise or a big moment of revelation, as if to say, “TA-DA! I’ve just proved that nature is a coldly indifferent force in Frost’s poem ‘Dust of Snow.’ ” Placing a thesis at the end of an essay can seriously mar the essay’s effectiveness. If you fail to define your essay’s point and purpose clearly at the beginning, your reader will find it difficult to assess the clarity of your argument and understand the points you are making. When your argument comes as a surprise at the end, you force your reader to reread your essay in order to assess its logic and effectiveness. Finally, you should avoid using the first person (“I”) as you present your thesis. Though it is not strictly wrong to write in the first person, it is difficult to do so gracefully. While writing in the first person, beginning writers often fall into the trap of writing self-reflexive prose (writing about their paper in their paper). Often this leads to the most dreaded of opening lines: “In this paper I am going to discuss. . . .” Not only does this self-reflexive voice make for very awkward prose, but it frequently allows writers to boldly announce a topic while completely avoiding a thesis statement. An example might be a paper that begins as follows: “Dust

of Snow,” a short and humorous poem by Frost, tells us a quick story about someone who is already having a bad day who has snow dumped on him when he walks underneath a crow who shakes a snow-covered tree limb. In this paper, I am going to discuss how the speaker of the poem reacts to the crow. The author of this paper has done little more than announce a general topic for the paper (the reaction of the speaker to the crow). While the last sentence might be a thesis, the writer fails to present an opinion about the significance of the reaction.

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To improve this “thesis,” the writer would need to back up a couple of steps. First, the announced topic of the paper is too broad; it largely summarizes the events in the poem, without saying anything about the ideas in the poem. The writer should highlight what she considers the meaning of the poem: What is the poem about? The writer might conclude that the crow’s actions give the speaker an opportunity to think about how he is feeling self-indulgently sorry for himself. From here, the author could think about the relationship of people to nature that Frost is hinting at and then begin to craft a specific thesis. A writer who chooses to explore the darkness that Frost often associates with nature might, for example, craft a thesis that reads, “Dust of Snow” is a poem

that uses humor and the way we tend to give human qualities to animals to remind us that, in fact, nature is indifferent to our cares. The symbols in the poem and the speaker’s interpretation of the crow’s intent show us that we mistakenly project fellow-feeling onto natural objects.

Outlines While developing a strong, thoughtful thesis early in your writing process should help focus your paper, outlining provides an essential tool for logically shaping that paper. A good outline helps you see— and develop—the relationships among the points in your argument and assures you that your paper flows logically and coherently. Outlining not only helps place your points in a logical order but also helps you subordinate supporting points, weed out any irrelevant points, and decide if there are any necessary points that are missing from your argument. Most of us are familiar with formal outlines that use numerical and letter designations for each point. However, there are different types of outlines; you may find that an informal outline is a more useful tool for you. What is important, though, is that you spend the time to develop some sort of outline—formal or informal. Remember that an outline is a tool to help you shape and write a strong paper. If you do not spend sufficient time planning your supporting points and shaping the arrangement of those points, you will most likely construct a vague, unfocused outline that provides little, if any, help with the writing of the paper. Consider the following example.

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost Thesis: “Dust of Snow” is a poem that uses humor and the way we tend to give human qualities to animals to remind us that, in fact, nature is indifferent to our cares. The symbols in the poem and the speaker’s interpretation of the crow’s intent show us that we mistakenly project fellow-feeling onto natural objects. I.  Introduction and thesis II.  The speaker’s psychology A.  Bad day B.  Perspective C.  Snow III.  Nature A.  The crow B.  The hemlock tree IV.  Rhyme A.  Pattern: abab cdcd V.  Meter VII.  Conclusion The speaker takes one lesson from a coincidence in nature by attributing human characteristics onto nature

This outline has a number of flaws. First, the major topics labeled with the Roman numerals are not arranged in a logical order. If the essay’s aim is to show how we like to attribute human characteristics to animals and nature, particularly a personal concern for our well-being, the writer should move straight through the poem, discussing the images and the speaker’s response in contrast to the clues provided by the poet that the speaker is taking a simplistic view. Similarly, the thesis makes no reference to the poem’s use of rhyme or meter, but the writer includes each of these elements as major sections of this outline. The simple rhyme may establish a lighthearted tone that contributes to our understanding of

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the speaker’s thinking and so may have a place in the essay, but the writer fails to provide details about the rhyme’s place in the argument. Similarly, the meter gives the poem a bouncy nursery-rhyme quality that may deserve consideration, but this is not mentioned in the thesis and does not logically merit a major section. The writer could, however, discuss the meter and rhyme together, so long as the thesis identified these elements as something the essay will investigate. Third, the writer includes a reference to snow as one of the lettered items in section II. Letters A and B both refer to the speaker’s psychological makeup; snow does not belong in this list. The writer could argue that being covered in snow is essential to his shift in psychological outlook from narrow self-pity to a more expansive view of himself, but in and of itself, the snow is not an example of the speaker’s psychology. A fourth problem is the inclusion of a section A in section IV. An outline should not include an A without a B, a 1 without a 2, and so forth. The final problem with this outline is the overall lack of detail. None of the sections provides much information about the content of the argument, and it seems likely that the writer has not given sufficient thought to the content of the essay. A better start to this outline might be the following: Thesis: “Dust of Snow” is a poem that uses humor and the way we tend to give human qualities to animals to remind us that, in fact, nature is indifferent to our cares. The symbols in the poem and the speaker’s interpretation of the crow’s intent show us that we mistakenly project fellow-feeling onto natural objects. I.  Introduction and thesis II.  Stanza 1: Nature A.  Crow B.  Hemlock tree C.  Snow III.  Stanza 2: The speaker’s psychology A.  Bad day B.  Perspective C.  The consequences of self-absorption

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost IV.  Understanding A. Nature’s agency B.  Nature’s relationship to people VII.  Conclusion

This new outline would prove much more helpful when it came time to write the paper. An outline like this could be shaped into an even more useful tool if the writer fleshed out the argument by providing specific examples from the text to support each point. Once you have listed your main point and your supporting ideas, develop this raw material by listing related supporting ideas and material under each of those main headings. From there, arrange the material in subsections and order the material logically. For example, you might begin with one of the theses cited above:

In “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers,” the acts of mowing and making hay are understood to be metaphors for writing and reading poetry. Reading the two poems together, though, helps us to see that “Mowing” is more concerned with writing, “The Tuft of Flowers” is more concerned with reading, and, taken together, the two poems argue for an ethics of collaboration between writer and reader. As noted above, this thesis already gives you the beginning of an organization: Start supporting the thesis by showing how we can interpret mowing and hay making as metaphors for writing and reading poetry. You might begin your outline, then, with four topic headings: (1) “Mowing” is regularly interpreted as a comment on poetry, (2) The Writer: “Mowing” is a positive meditation on writing poetry (in contrast to “After Apple-Picking”), (3) The Reader: “The Tuft of Flowers” shows the reader following behind the writer, (4) Frost’s philosophy of poetry: a collaborative effort between writer and reader. Under each of those headings you could list ideas that support the particular point. Be sure to include references to parts of the text that help build your case. An informal outline might look like this: Thesis: In “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers,” the acts of mowing and making hay are understood to be metaphors

How to Write a Good Essay for writing and reading poetry. Reading the two poems together, though, helps us to see that “Mowing” is more concerned with writing, “The Tuft of Flowers” is more concerned with reading, and, taken together, the two poems argue for an ethics of collaboration between writer and reader. 1.  “Mowing” is regularly interpreted as a comment on poetry ●  Critical history: Judith Oster and Jeffrey Meyers as examples ●  Frost’s own statement about the definition of poetry in the poem ●  The craft of poetry, a common theme in Frost’s poems: “After Apple-Picking,” for example ❍ Care and gentleness in craft ❍ Tiring work ❍ Never-ending work 2.  The Writer: “Mowing” is a positive meditation on writing poetry (in contrast to “After ApplePicking”) ●  Working to understand the scythe’s whisperings ●  Honor the scythe by being truthful and not trying to go beyond the truth ●  Frost’s own method mirrored in this poem: observe, then offer insight ❍ Observe the scythe, then find and articulate the meaning ❍ Frost shifts, though: Instead of finding meaning, he thinks instead about the process of finding meaning 3.  The Reader: “The Tuft of Flowers” shows the reader following behind the writer

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost ● 

orkers labor alone but are dependent on W one another for their efforts to reach their full potential ●  Each must recognize the value of the other’s contribution to the whole ❍ The mower leaves flowers standing in recognition of their beauty ❍ The hay maker recognizes the beauty of the flowers also, which makes him think of the mower as a kindred spirit ●  Workers contributing to the same task, even if separated by time or distance, work alongside one another and can even communicate 4.  Frost’s philosophy of poetry: a collaborative effort between writer and reader ●  The poet is the observer and commentator ❍ The poet must be true to the essence he observes ❍ Frost stayed true by using natural language; quote from Hoffman Conclusion: ●  Reader makes hay from grass left by poet ●  Beauty encourages reader to recognize the person behind the poem, instead of focusing solely on the poem ●  The relationship between poet and reader is reciprocal ❍ “The Wood-Pile” shows us a reader finding the poet’s work abandoned, surrendered to the reader ❍ Poetry invites us to think of the people responsible for writing it and for reading it

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● 

ltimately, reading and writing poetry are U ethical endeavors

You would set about writing a formal outline with a similar process, though in the final stages you would label the headings differently. A formal outline for a paper that argues the thesis about “Dust of Snow” cited above—that we misattribute personal care to the indifferent actions of nature—might look like this: Thesis: “Dust of Snow” is a poem that uses humor and the way we tend to give human qualities to animals to remind us that, in fact, nature is indifferent to our cares. The symbols in the poem and the speaker’s interpretation of the crow’s intent show us that we mistakenly project fellow-feeling onto natural objects. I.  Introduction and thesis II.  Stanza 1: Nature’s interactions with us A.  Crow 1.  Represents whimsical nature 2.  Represents something ominous: Refer to Wallace Stevens’s “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” B.  Hemlock tree 1.  An evergreen, still living during the otherwise dead winter 2.  Reminds us of poisonous hemlock herb C.  Snow 1.  White, provides visual contrast to black crow and green tree 2.  Blanketing, forgetful, deathlike: compare to “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” III.  Stanza 2: The speaker’s psychology A.  Bad day

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost 1.  The speaker is having a bad day and is fixated on his own grumpiness—“a day I had rued” 2.  We are often willing to surrender our happiness to perceived slights or other grievances B.  Perspective 1.  The speaker is so focused on his own internal dissatisfaction that he cannot appreciate anything around him 2.  Maintaining perspective helps us to recognize just how much, or how little, we should dedicate our thoughts and emotional energy to any one thing C.  The consequences of self-absorption 1.  The speaker’s internal dissatisfaction is magnified because it has no contrast with other events and emotions, which the speaker has blocked from his mind 2.  The speaker’s self-absorption puts him at odds with everything around him, including the natural world IV.  Understanding A.  Nature’s agency 1.  The speaker describes the crow’s actions almost as if they were deliberate 2.  Even if the speaker recognizes that the crow was not trying to be funny or mean, it amuses the speaker to think the crow acted on purpose B.  Nature’s relationship to people 1.  Frost’s poems, time and again, depict nature as something neutrally apart

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from us, barely aware of our needs or existence 2.  Examples: “The Wood-Pile” (the bird), “  ‘Out, Out’—” (brutal indifference of mountains) V.  Conclusion A.  The speaker’s perspective expands to include things outside him, which is positive B.  The speaker seems to think that nature was looking out for his best interests, which is misguided C.  The ironic juxtaposition reinforces Frost’s common theme of nature’s indifference

As in the previous example outline, the thesis provided the seeds of a structure, and the writer was careful to arrange the supporting points in a logical manner, showing the relationships among the ideas in the paper.

Body Paragraphs Once your outline is complete, you can begin drafting your paper. Paragraphs, units of related sentences, are the building blocks of a good paper, and as you draft, you should keep in mind both the function and the qualities of good paragraphs. Paragraphs help you chart and control the shape and content of your essay, and they help the reader see your organization and your logic. You should begin a new paragraph whenever you move from one major point to another. In longer, more complex essays, you might use a group of related paragraphs to support major points. Remember that in addition to being adequately developed, a good paragraph is both unified and coherent.

Unified Paragraphs Each paragraph must be centered around one idea or point, and a unified paragraph carefully focuses on and develops this central idea without including extraneous ideas or tangents. For beginning writers, the best way to ensure that you are constructing unified paragraphs is to include a topic

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sentence in each paragraph. This topic sentence should convey the main point of the paragraph, and every sentence in the paragraph should relate to that topic sentence. Any sentence that strays from the central topic does not belong in the paragraph and needs to be revised or deleted. Consider the following paragraph about the way poets and readers work together even though they do not know each other and work at different times and in different places. Notice how the paragraph veers away from the main point that the poet and reader should recognize their interdependence: “Mowing” ends with the speaker leaving the cut grass for someone else to bundle as hay. In “The Tuft of Flowers” the speaker comes along a day after the grass has been cut to turn it and speed its drying. The speaker looks for the mower but recognizes that they both must work alone. The speaker recognizes that the mower and he are working together, even if not at the same time, because the mower’s work is pointless if the haymaker does not come behind, and the haymaker cannot make hay if the mower has not previously completed the cutting. While he is working, the mower is distracted by a butterfly flitting awkwardly in a landscape it no longer recognizes. Sensing that he and the mower have a common purpose, the haymaker continues his work as if the mower were with him to keep him company. He imagines that he “held brotherly speech / With one whose thought I had not hoped to reach” (lines 37–38). The two men are able to communicate with each other even though they are nowhere near (in fact, the haymaker most likely has no idea where the mower might actually be), and the speaker ends by noting that he and the mower are working together, “Whether they work together or apart” (line 40).

Although the paragraph begins solidly, and the second sentence points us toward the idea that the speakers in each poem have a bond, the writer of this essay soon becomes sidetracked. If the purpose of the paragraph is to demonstrate that poet and reader (in the form of mower

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and haymaker) work together even when they do not know each other, the intrusion of the butterfly is tangential here. The image may find a place later in the essay, but it should be deleted from this paragraph.

Coherent Paragraphs In addition to shaping unified paragraphs, you must also craft coherent paragraphs, paragraphs that develop their points logically with sentences that flow smoothly into one another. Coherence depends on the order of your sentences, but it is not strictly the order of the sentences that is important to paragraph coherence. You also need to craft your prose to help the reader see the relationship among the sentences. Consider the following paragraph about the collaboration between two workers who have no knowledge of the other. Notice how the writer uses the same ideas as the paragraph above yet fails to help the reader see the relationships among the points. “Mowing” ends with the speaker leaving the cut grass for someone else to bundle as hay. In “The Tuft of Flowers,” the speaker comes along a day after grass has been cut to turn it and speed its drying. The speaker looks for the mower but recognizes that they both must work alone. The speaker recognizes that the mower and he are working together, even if not at the same time, because the mower’s work is pointless if the haymaker does not come behind, and the haymaker cannot make hay if the mower has not previously completed the cutting. The mower has left something behind: a group of flowers he easily could have cut down but did not, taking the trouble to leave them standing for his own pleasure but also for the enjoyment of anyone, like the haymaker, who comes along afterward. Sensing that he and the mower have a common purpose, the haymaker continues his work as if the mower were with him to keep him company. He imagines that he “held brotherly speech / With one whose thought I had not hoped to reach” (37–38). The two men are able to communicate with each other even though they are nowhere near (in fact, the haymaker most likely has no idea where the mower might

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost actually be), and the speaker ends by noting that he and the mower are working together, “Whether they work together or apart” (40).

This paragraph demonstrates that unity alone does not guarantee paragraph effectiveness. The argument is hard to follow because the author fails both to show connections between the sentences and to indicate how they work to support the overall point. A number of techniques are available to aid paragraph coherence. Careful use of transitional words and phrases is essential. You can use transitional flags to introduce an example or an illustration ( for example, for instance), to amplify a point or add another phase of the same idea (additionally, furthermore, next, similarly, finally, then), to indicate a conclusion or result (therefore, as a result, thus, in other words), to signal a contrast or a qualification (on the other hand, nevertheless, despite this, on the contrary, still, however, conversely), to signal a comparison (likewise, in comparison, similarly), and to indicate a movement in time (afterward, earlier, eventually, finally, later, subsequently, until). In addition to transitional flags, careful use of pronouns aids coherence and flow. If you were writing about The Wizard of Oz, you would not want to keep repeating the phrase the witch or the name Dorothy. Careful substitution of the pronoun she in these instances can aid coherence. A word of warning, though: When you substitute pronouns for proper names, always be sure that your pronoun reference is clear. In a paragraph that discusses both Dorothy and the witch, substituting she could lead to confusion. Make sure that it is clear to whom the pronoun refers. Generally, the pronoun refers to the last proper noun you have used. While repeating the same name over and over again can lead to awkward, boring prose, it is possible to use repetition to help your paragraph’s coherence. Careful repetition of important words or phrases can lend coherence to your paragraph by reminding readers of your key points. Admittedly, it takes some practice to use this technique effectively. You may find that reading your prose aloud can help you develop an ear for effective use of repetition. To see how helpful transitional aids are, compare the paragraph below to the preceding paragraph about the way poet and reader work together even though they are not physically together and do not even know each other. Notice how the author works with the same ideas and quotations

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but shapes them into a much more coherent paragraph whose point is clearer and easier to follow. What does the reader do, then? “Mowing” ends with the speaker leaving the cut grass for someone else to bundle as hay, while in “The Tuft of Flowers” the speaker comes along a day after grass has been cut to turn it and speed its drying. It is almost as if the speaker in “The Tuft of Flowers” is following behind the speaker in “Mowing.” The speaker looks for the mower but recognizes that they both must work alone. Yet the speaker recognizes that the mower and he are working together, even if not at the same time, because the mower’s work is pointless if the haymaker does not come behind, and the haymaker cannot make hay if the mower has not previously completed the cutting. Still, the haymaker might feel forgotten or taken for granted since he has to follow the mower and recognize the mower’s work without being recognized in turn. That recognition occurs, though, as the mower has left something behind: a group of flowers he easily could have cut down but did not, taking the trouble to leave them standing for his own pleasure but also for the enjoyment of anyone, like the haymaker, who comes along afterward. Recognizing this and sensing that he and the mower have a common sensibility, the haymaker continues his work as if the mower were with him to keep him company. Most significantly, he imagines that he “held brotherly speech / With one whose thought I had not hoped to reach” (37–38). The two men are able to communicate with each other even though they are nowhere near (in fact, the haymaker most likely has no idea where the mower might actually be), and the speaker ends by noting that he and the mower are working together, “Whether they work together or apart” (40).

Similarly, the following paragraph from a paper on the way we tend to think of animals and nature as having human characteristics and human

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empathy demonstrates both unity and coherence. In it, the author argues that Frost’s point in “Dust of Snow” is that we are quick to assume that we are the central, key figure in the action around us. Pay careful attention to the speaker’s description of the crow’s action: “The way a crow / Shook down on me” (1–2). The crow shook the snow in a particular way that makes the speaker rethink his bad mood. The speaker hints that there may have been other ways for the crow to act, ways that would not have been amusing at all. This in turn suggests that the speaker is attributing emotion and intent to the crow—the crow meant to be lighthearted, because if the crow had meant to irritate the speaker, the crow would have shaken the snow in a different, more mean-spirited way. But the way the crow shook the branch in order to dust the speaker with snow, rather than bombard him with it, strikes the speaker as amusing even if he recognizes that the crow did not have any particular concern for him at all. And this is often the insight Frost’s poetry works toward: Nature is indifferent to us, no matter how much we might like to think otherwise. We see this perhaps most starkly in a poem such as “  ‘Out, Out’—,” in which a boy loses his hand and dies cutting firewood and the surrounding woods and mountains seem almost cruelly impassive. We see it parodied in a poem such as “The Wood-Pile,” in which a bird flits away from the speaker as if worried the speaker might catch it. The speaker dismisses the bird for being so self-absorbed, but that is precisely the point Frost wants to make about us. Namely, we think everything, including nature, is responding to our agenda or is concerned for our emotional or physical well-being.

Introductions Introductions present particular challenges for writers. Generally, your introduction should do two things: capture your reader’s attention and explain the main point of your essay. In other words, while your intro-

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duction should contain your thesis, it needs to do a bit more work than that. You are likely to find that starting that first paragraph is one of the most difficult parts of the paper. It is hard to face that blank page or screen, and as a result, many beginning writers, in desperation to start somewhere, start with overly broad, general statements. While it is often a good strategy to start with more general subject matter and narrow your focus, do not begin with broad, sweeping statements such as “Everyone likes to be creative and feel understood.” Such sentences are nothing but empty filler. They begin to fill the blank page, but they do nothing to advance your argument. Instead, you should try to gain your readers’ interest. Some writers like to begin with a pertinent quotation or with a relevant question. Or, you might begin with an introduction of the topic you will discuss. If you are writing about Frost’s presentation of nature’s indifference to human affairs, for instance, you might begin by talking about how people like to attribute human characteristics to animals. Another common trap to avoid is depending on your title to introduce the author and the text you are writing about. Always include the work’s author and title in your opening paragraph. Compare the effectiveness of the following introductions. Throughout history, people have liked to think that animals have human thoughts and emotions. Do you ever think that your pet cares about the same things you do? In this poem, Frost makes a little bit of fun of our tendency to think that animals are acting with human motivations, when in fact they are not worried about our cares at all. Philosophers, psychologists, and even theologians recognize that people want their lives to be meaningful. We want to know that there is a purpose and that our existence has some greater significance. Religion offers a great deal of comfort in this area, but we have other ways of coping with the fear that the universe does not care about us. One way is our tendency to project our feelings onto animals and to the natural world around us. We like to imagine our pets’ emotions, and we like to imagine that they care about us as much as we care about

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost them. A recent study indicates that this is particularly true if we are lonely or isolated (Epley et al. 148). In “Dust of Snow,” Robert Frost makes fun of this idea while reinforcing the fact that our fears may be firmly grounded by showing us one person’s determination to find meaning in a crow’s unintentional act.

The first introduction begins with a vague, overly broad sentence; cites unclear, undeveloped examples; and then moves abruptly to the thesis. Notice, too, how a reader deprived of the paper’s title does not know the title of the poem that the essay will analyze. The second introduction works with the same material and thesis but provides more detail and is consequently much more interesting. It begins by discussing the intellectual effort that goes into explaining our purpose for existing, gives specific examples, and then points briefly to a psychological study that supports the paragraph’s general claims. The paragraph ends with the thesis, which includes both the author and the title of the work to be discussed. The paragraph below provides another example of an opening strategy. It begins by introducing the author and justifying the interpretive approach before introducing the texts it will analyze, and then it moves on by briefly introducing relevant details of the story in order to set up its thesis. Robert Frost’s poems explore a handful of recurring themes, so it is not unusual to find more than one Frost poem that meditates on death, or God, or individual isolation, or nature. These meditations often emerge from similar settings and activities as well, so it is not unusual to find more than one Frost poem set in the woods, or near the woods, or in a pasture, while characters in the poems tend animals, or repair rock walls, or simply study birds. Comparing Frost’s various efforts to explore a theme or a setting is often like putting pieces of a puzzle together, as poem by poem we are able to see the larger philosophical picture in Frost’s mind. Choosing the poems to compare may not always be obvious, though. Several of Frost’s poems refer to cutting grass and making hay, for example: “The

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Code,” “The Exposed Nest,” “The Death of the Hired Man,” “The Last Mowing,” “Mowing,” and “The Tuft of Flowers.” Fortunately, Frost has given us a clue that we might want to consider two of those poems side by side. While it may not be unusual for Frost to revisit a theme or a setting, it is far less common for him to repeat an exact line as he does in “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers,” both of which personify a “long scythe whispering to the ground” (“Mowing” 2; “The Tuft of Flowers” 32). This exact repetition suggests that Frost was working with the same idea in each poem, and when we study them together we see that is, in fact, the case. In “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers,” the acts of mowing and making hay are understood to be metaphors for writing and reading poetry. Reading the two poems together, though, helps us to see that “Mowing” is more concerned with writing, “The Tuft of Flowers” is more concerned with reading, and, taken together, the two poems argue for an ethics of collaboration between writer and reader.

Conclusions Conclusions present another series of challenges for writers. No doubt you have heard the old adage about writing essays: “Tell us what you are going to say, say it, and then tell us what you’ve said.” While this formula does not necessarily lead to bad essays, it does not often result in good ones, either. It will almost certainly result in boring results (especially boring conclusions). If you have done a good job establishing your points in the body of the paper, the reader already knows and understands your argument. There is no need to merely reiterate. Do not just summarize your main points in your conclusion. Such a boring and mechanical conclusion does nothing to advance your argument or interest your reader. Consider the following conclusion to the paper about nature’s indifference to human concerns in “Dust of Snow.” In conclusion, Frost reminds us that nature is not interested in our problems. The speaker of the poem amuses himself to think a crow has deliberately tried to lighten his mood by knocking snow onto him in a harmless

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost prank. In reality, though, as much as we might like to think that animals take interest in our affairs, the poem reminds us indirectly that they do not.

Besides starting with a mechanical transitional device, this conclusion does little more than summarize the main points of the outline (and it does not even touch on all of them). It is incomplete and uninteresting (and a little too pointless). Instead, your conclusion should add something to your paper. A good tactic is to build on the points you have been arguing. Asking “why?” often helps you draw further conclusions. For example, in the paper on “Dust of Snow,” you might speculate or explain how the speaker already knew that his self-pitying unhappiness was undesirable for his own emotional and mental health. Scholars often discuss this poem in terms of its meter and structure, and your conclusion could discuss the way the line breaks and word choices contribute to our understanding of the poem’s message. Another method for successfully concluding an essay is to speculate on other directions in which to take your topic by tying it into larger issues. You might do this by envisioning your paper as just one section of a longer essay. Having established your points in this essay, how would you build upon this argument? Where would you go next? In the following conclusion to the essay on “Dust of Snow,” the author reiterates some of the main points but does so in order to amplify the discussion of the story’s central message and to connect it to other texts by Robert Frost: In the end, Frost has ironically contrasted the poem’s surface meaning with a deeper, contradictory undertone. The speaker is walking through the woods unhappily grumbling to himself about a bad day. He is perhaps feeling sorry for himself, or perhaps he is feeling righteously indignant about the way someone has mistreated him. Whatever the source of his displeasure, he has focused all of his attention on himself and seems to have lost sight of anything beyond his immediate concerns. When the crow shakes the tree branch and knocks some snow onto the speaker, though, the speaker’s outlook suddenly changes. He seems to interpret the crow’s

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actions almost as a friendly joke, as if the crow is trying to tell the speaker that he is taking himself too seriously. The positive message of the poem is that we should remember that we do not help ourselves by elevating our personal frustrations to the point that they obscure the things that are good in our lives. Moreover, there is something uplifting about the notion that a crow might have the wisdom to help us broaden our perspectives, and that the crow would even care to help us is even more reassuring. At the same time, though, we are reminded of the many times in Frost’s poems that nature is shown to be wholly detached from us. Nature is not cruel, necessarily, but neutral—a theme that Frost explores time and again in his poems. “Dust of Snow” is much like “The Oven Bird” in the way that it shows us how to take a lesson from nature, all the while reminding us that nature is not actively trying to teach us anything at all.

Similarly, in the following conclusion to a paper on the interaction of poet and reader in “The Tuft of Flowers” and “Mowing,” the author draws a conclusion about the ethics of recognizing how much we need other people. Once the poet has been as truthful as he can, his poetry is like the cut grass left to be made into hay, and that work is the reader’s. As depicted in “The Tuft of Flowers,” the reader makes hay from the raw materials left by the poet. And as a reminder that the poet appreciates the work of the reader, the poet mingles beauty within the truth much like a group of flowers left to grow among the cut grass. In this way the interaction between poet and reader is shown to be reciprocal, and this claim may be the most startling that emerges from reading these two poems as companion pieces. Even as the poet and reader work individually on their respective tasks, they work together. Frost presents a similar idea in “The Wood-Pile,” a poem in

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost which a wanderer who is lost and far from home finds a pile of wood that someone cut, stacked, and forgot about years ago. The woodpile no longer belongs to the woodsman/poet but now to the wanderer/reader who thinks not just of the wood but of the person who stacked it. This, then, is the ethics of collaboration that “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers” indicate to be the heart of writing and reading poetry. The poet writes his poem not just for himself but for the reader, while the reader reads not just for himself but for the poet. Perhaps the greatest thing we can take from the study of poetry—perhaps the greatest idea we can take from these two poems by Frost—is an increased fellowfeeling for others who also work with poetry. Writing poetry and reading poetry are activities that require isolation for the poet and isolation for the reader, yet paradoxically the poet and reader work in concert whether they work together or apart.

Citations and Formatting

Using Primary Sources

As the examples included in this chapter indicate, strong papers on literary texts incorporate quotations from the text in order to support their points. It is not enough for you to assert your interpretation without providing support or evidence from the text. Without well-chosen quotations to support your argument, you are, in effect, saying to the reader, “Take my word for it.” It is important to use quotations thoughtfully and selectively. Remember that the paper presents your argument, so choose quotations that support your assertions. Do not let the author’s voice overwhelm your own. With that caution in mind, there are some guidelines you should follow to ensure that you use quotations clearly and effectively. Integrate Quotations: Quotations should always be integrated into your own prose. Do not just drop them into your paper without introduction or comment. Otherwise, it is unlikely that your reader will see their function. You can

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integrate textual support easily and clearly with identifying tags, short phrases that identify the speaker. For example: Robert Frost famously wrote that a poem “begins in delight and ends in wisdom.”

While this tag appears before the quotation, you can also use tags after or in the middle of the quoted text, as the following examples demonstrate: “God, if I do not believe I’m cursed,” Amy says. “Good fences,” the neighbor proudly declares, “make good neighbors.”

You can also use a colon to formally introduce a quotation: The husband’s frustration and pain in “Home Burial” is evident: “Can’t a man speak of his own child he’s lost?”

When you quote brief sections of poems (three lines or fewer), use slash marks to indicate the line breaks in the poem: In “The Death of the Hired Man,” Mary defines home as “the place where, when you have to go there, / They have to take you in.”

Longer quotations (more than four lines of prose or three lines of poetry) should be set off from the rest of your paper in a block quotation. Double-space before you begin the passage, indent it 10 spaces from your left-hand margin, and double-space the passage itself. Because the indentation signals the inclusion of a quotation, do not use quotation marks around the cited passage. Use a colon to introduce the passage: Frost explains that metaphor is the heart of poetry, but not just of poetry alone:

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost There are many other things I have found myself saying about poetry, but the chiefest of these is that it is metaphor, saying one thing and meaning another, saying one thing in terms of another, the pleasure of ulteriority. Poetry is simply made of metaphor. So also is philosophy—and science, too, for that matter. . . . Metaphor may be the special province of poetry, but all of the ways we try to understand the world, from philosophy to science, rely on metaphor. The final six lines comment on the scene that has been described: What had that flower to do with being white, The wayside blue and innocent heal-all? What brought the kindred spider to that height, Then steered the white moth thither in the night? What but design of darkness to appall?— If design govern in a thing so small. The comment here is a shaken fear that any order in the universe is cruel and capricious.

It is also important to interpret quotations after you introduce them and explain how they help advance your point. You cannot assume that your reader will interpret the quotations the same way that you do. Quote Accurately: Always quote accurately. Anything within quotations marks must be the author’s exact words. There are, however, some rules to follow if you need to modify the quotation to fit into your prose.

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1. Use brackets to indicate any material that might have been added to the author’s exact wording. For example, if you need to add any words to the quotation or alter it grammatically to allow it to fit into your prose, indicate your changes in brackets: The speaker imagines what the horse is thinking since they have “stop[ped] without a farmhouse near.”

2. Conversely, if you choose to omit any words from the quotation, use ellipses (three spaced periods) to indicate missing words or phrases: The speaker thinks that his horse must be surprised that they “stop without a farmhouse near . . . [on the] darkest evening of the year.”

3. If you delete a sentence or more, use the ellipses after a period: Frost explains, “For me the initial delight is in the surprise of remembering something I didn’t know I knew. . . . There is a glad recognition of the long lost and the rest follows.”

4. If you omit a line or more of poetry, or more than one paragraph of prose, use a single line of spaced periods to indicate the omission: What had that flower to do with being white, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . What brought the kindred spider to that height, Then steered the white moth thither in the   night?

Punctuate Properly: Punctuation of quotations often causes more trouble than it should. Once again, you just need to keep these simple rules in mind.

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost 1. Periods and commas should be placed inside quotation marks, even if they are not part of the original quotation: The speaker explains why he must keep moving: “I have promises to keep.”

The only exception to this rule is when the quotation is followed by a parenthetical reference. In this case, the period or comma goes after the citation (more on these later in this chapter): The speaker explains why he must keep moving: “I have promises to keep” (14).

2. Other marks of punctuation—colons, semicolons, question marks, and exclamation points—go outside the quotation marks unless they are part of the original quotation: Why does the speaker repeat the line, “And miles to go before I sleep”? Warren responds to Mary’s instruction to be kind by asking, “When was I ever anything but kind to him?”

Documenting Primary Sources Unless you are instructed otherwise, you should provide sufficient information for your reader to locate material you quote. Generally, literature papers follow the rules set forth by the Modern Language Association (MLA). These can be found in the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (sixth edition). You should be able to find this book in the reference section of your library. Additionally, its rules for citing both primary and secondary sources are widely available from reputable online sources. One of these is the Online Writing Lab (OWL) at Purdue University. OWL’s guide to MLA style is available at http://owl.english.purdue. edu/owl/resource/557/01/. The Modern Language Association also offers answers to frequently asked questions about MLA style on this helpful Web page: http://www.mla.org/style_faq. Generally, when you are citing from literary works in papers, you should keep a few guidelines in mind.

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Parenthetical Citations: MLA asks for parenthetical references in your text after quotations. When you are working with prose (short stories, novels, or essays) include page numbers in the parentheses: Frost says that the figure of a poem “is the same as for love” (126).

When you are quoting poetry, include line numbers: The speaker explains why he must keep moving: “I have promises to keep, / And miles to go before I sleep / And miles to go before I sleep.” (14–16).

Works Cited Page: These parenthetical citations are linked to a separate works cited page at the end of the paper. The works cited page lists works alphabetically by the authors’ last name. An entry for the above reference to Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” would read: Frost, Robert. “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” The Poetry of Robert Frost. Ed. Edward Connery Lathem. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1969. 224–225.

The MLA Handbook includes a full listing of sample entries, as do many of the online explanations of MLA style.

Documenting Secondary Sources To ensure that your paper is built entirely upon your own ideas and analysis, instructors often ask that you write interpretative papers without any outside research. If, on the other hand, your paper requires research, you must document any secondary sources you use. You need to document direct quotations, summaries or paraphrases of others’ ideas, and factual information that is not common knowledge. Follow the guidelines above for quoting primary sources when you use direct quotations from secondary sources. Keep in mind that MLA style also includes specific guidelines for citing electronic sources. OWL’s Web site provides a good summary: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/557/09/.

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Parenthetical Citations: As with the documentation of primary sources, described above, MLA guidelines require in-text parenthetical references to your secondary sources. Unlike the research papers you might write for a history class, literary research papers following MLA style do not use footnotes as a means of documenting sources. Instead, after a quotation, you should cite the author’s last name and the page number: “Frost’s poetry of work is quite directly about the correlative work of writing a poem and of reading it” (Poirier 278).

If you include the name of the author in your prose, then you would include only the page number in your citation. For example: According to Richard Poirier, “Frost’s poetry of work is quite directly about the correlative work of writing a poem and of reading it” (278).

If you are including more than one work by the same author, the parenthetical citation should include a shortened yet identifiable version of the title in order to indicate which of the author’s works you cite. For example: According to George Monteiro, “Frost must derive more from mowing than just hay” (Renaissance 116), Frost’s later poetry demonstrates a “turn away from the more purely subjective lyrics and narrative poems of his first five volumes” (“Politics” 225).

Similarly, and just as important, if you summarize or paraphrase the particular ideas of your source, you must provide documentation: Robert Frost’s early career consisted primarily of lyric poetry; later, sensing that he needed to make a more direct contribution to public life, Frost began writing more overtly political poems (Monteiro, “Politics” 225).

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Works Cited Page: Like the primary sources discussed above, the parenthetical references to secondary sources are keyed to a separate works cited page at the end of your paper. Here is an example of a works cited page that uses the examples cited above. Note that when two or more works by the same author are listed, you should use three hyphens followed by a period in the subsequent entries. You can find a complete list of sample entries in the MLA Handbook or from a reputable online summary of MLA style. Works Cited Monteiro, George. “Frost’s Politics and the Cold War.” The Cambridge Companion to Robert Frost. Ed. Robert Faggen. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. 221–239. ———. Robert Frost & the New England Renaissance. Lexington, Ky.: The University Press of Kentucky, 1988. Poirier, Richard. Robert Frost: The Work of Knowing. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977.

Plagiarism Failure to document carefully and thoroughly can leave you open to charges of stealing the ideas of others, which is known as plagiarism, and this is a very serious matter. Remember that it is important to include quotation marks when you use language from your source, even if you use just one or two words. For example, if you wrote, Frost’s labor-themed poetry

is quite directly about the correlative work of writing a poem and of reading it, you would be guilty of plagiarism, since you used Poirier’s distinct language without acknowledging him as the source. Instead, you should write: When Frost writes about work, whether that work is picking apples or stacking wood or cutting grass, he is writing about “the correlative work of writing a poem and of reading it” (Poirier 278). In this case, you have properly credited Poirier. Similarly, neither summarizing the ideas of an author nor changing or omitting just a few words means that you can omit a citation. Jay Parini’s biography of Robert Frost contains the following passage about the poem “Mowing”:

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost More to the point, he was writing about physical labor, one of the few poets in the language to make good poems out of real work. But this work is endlessly compromised by the poet’s inner voice, which keeps wanting to create meaning out of what is inherently meaningless: the rhythmical sway of the scythe as it mows down the high grass. The poem is, as much as anything, about the impulse to impose meaning, this peculiar urge to talk about “fay or elf,” when there is really nothing so fantastic at hand.

Below are two examples of plagiarized passages: Frost is one of only a handful of poets writing in English who can write good poems about work. Even so, the physical labor is overshadowed by Frost’s effort to find or even to force a deeper meaning on events that mean nothing by themselves. “Mowing” is one of the poems by Frost that depicts physical labor. The poem is not content simply to depict that labor, though, as we can hear the poet’s inner voice constantly trying to create meaning out of things like the scythe’s motion that are inherently meaningless. Finally, this poem is about the impulse the poet feels, and perhaps that all of us feel, to impose meaning (Parini 78).

While the first passage does not use Parini’s exact language, it does re-create the same ideas that he proposes as the critical theme behind Frost’s poem without citing his work. Since this interpretation is Parini’s distinct idea, this constitutes plagiarism. The second passage has changed some wording and included a citation, but some of the phrasing is Parini’s. The first passage could be fixed with a parenthetical citation. Because some of the wording in the second remains the same, though, it would require the use of quotation marks, in addition to a parenthetical citation. The passage below represents an honestly and adequately documented use of the original passage:

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According to Jay Parini, Frost’s poetry about work shows us how we all try to understand a deeper meaning in situations. In “Mowing,” for example, the depiction of labor is “endlessly compromised by the poet’s inner voice” (78). The outer voice describes the scene and the work being performed, but the inner voice comments on the scene being described and seeks to interpret it. Even when we see events or situations that are “inherently meaningless” (78), we will try to construct an explanation or narrative that gives it meaning. Ultimately, Parini argues that the poem is about our shared “impulse to impose meaning” (78).

This passage acknowledges that the interpretation is derived from Parini, while appropriately using quotations to indicate his precise language. While it is not necessary to document well-known facts, often referred to as common knowledge, any ideas or language that you take from someone else must be properly documented. Common knowledge generally includes the birth and death dates of authors or other well-documented facts of their lives. An often-cited guideline is that if you can find the information in three sources, it is common knowledge. Despite this guideline, it is, admittedly, often difficult to know if the facts you uncover are common knowledge or not. When in doubt, document your source.

Sample Essay Karen Ang Ms. Elinor English 160 March 28, 2010 ROBERT FROST AND THE COLLABORATION BETWEEN WRITER AND READER Robert Frost’s poems explore a handful of recurring themes, so it is not unusual to find more than one Frost poem that meditates on death, God, individual isolation, or nature. These meditations often emerge

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost from similar settings and activities as well, so it is not unusual to find more than one Frost poem set in the woods, or near the woods, or in a pasture, while characters in the poems tend animals, repair rock walls, or simply study birds. Comparing Frost’s various efforts to explore a theme or a setting is often like putting pieces of a puzzle together, as poem by poem we are able to see the larger philosophical picture in Frost’s mind. Choosing the poems to compare may not always be obvious, though. Several of Frost’s poems refer to cutting grass and making hay, for example: “The Code,” “The Exposed Nest,” “The Death of the Hired Man,” “The Last Mowing,” “Mowing,” and “The Tuft of Flowers.” Fortunately, Frost has given us a clue that we might want to consider two of those poems side by side. While it may not be unusual for Frost to revisit a theme or a setting, it is far less common for him to repeat an exact line as he does in “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers,” both of which personify a “long scythe whispering to the ground” (“Mowing” 2; “The Tuft of Flowers” 32). This exact repetition suggests that Frost was working with the same idea in each poem, and when we study them together we see that is the case. In “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers,” the acts of mowing and making hay are understood to be metaphors for writing and reading poetry. Reading the two poems together, though, helps us to see that “Mowing” is more concerned with writing, “The Tuft of Flowers” is more concerned with reading, and, taken together, the two poems argue for an ethics of collaboration between writer and reader. “Mowing” is not self-evidently about writing poetry, but many critics read the poem as a meditation on writing. Judith Oster says the poem shows us “hay in the making and poem in the making at the same time” (63–64), while Frost’s biographer Jeffrey Meyers refers to the speaker of the poem as the “mower-poet” (101). Frost himself said that the poem’s line, “The fact is

How to Write a Good Essay the sweetest dream that labor knows” was a “definition of poetry” (qtd. in Hoffman 36). And poetry as labor is one of the themes Frost returns to in multiple poems. One of his best-known examples is the poem “After ApplePicking,” in which the literal action is that of a man who has exhausted himself picking apples. He finally quits, physically wearied, knowing that he is certainly leaving good apples high in the trees but unable to bring himself to climb and pick any more. The care he must take to pick each apple and treat it gingerly to protect it from bruising reflects the careful work of the poet as he seeks each perfect poem and tries to hand it off to the public without damaging it. The work is tiring, and in some ways unappreciated as each poem/ apple is lost in the mass of other poems/apples, the “load on load of apples coming in” (26). In contrast, “Mowing” is a more positive meditation on the work of creating poetry. We follow the speaker as he sweeps his scythe back and forth, cutting the grass and listening to the whispering sound it makes. Once he begins to imagine the scythe to be whispering to the ground, he starts to wonder what it might be saying, but he feels responsible for getting it right. There is an honesty and a love in the scythe’s work that the speaker feels he must honor, and he honors it by being truthful: “Anything more than the truth would have seemed too weak / To the earnest love that laid the swale in rows” (9–10). Frost is offering a description of his own method for finding meaning and couching it in his poetry. A great many of Frost’s poems begin with an observation as the speaker sees a bird or a spider, for example, and then moves on to some kind of philosophical insight as the speaker thinks about what he has seen. Here, the speaker begins with an observation (noticing the work and sound of the scythe) and, rather than find some meaning in what he sees, he thinks about how he should find meaning. The poet’s job is to report the truth as he sees it and not to offer “anything more,” which could

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost be in the form of language that obscures its meaning in overwrought style or insights and conclusions that are not fair or earned. What does the reader do, then? “Mowing” ends with the speaker leaving the cut grass for someone else to bundle as hay, while in “The Tuft of Flowers,” the speaker comes along a day after grass has been cut to turn it and speed its drying. It is almost as if the speaker in “The Tuft of Flowers” is following behind the speaker in “Mowing.” The speaker looks for the mower but recognizes that they both must work alone. Yet the speaker recognizes that he and the mower are working together, even if not at the same time, because the mower’s work is pointless if the haymaker does not come behind, and the haymaker cannot make hay if the mower has not previously completed the cutting. Still, the haymaker might feel forgotten or taken for granted since he has to follow the mower and recognize the mower’s work without being recognized in turn. That recognition occurs, though, as the mower has left something behind: a group of flowers he easily could have cut down but did not, taking the trouble to leave them standing for his own pleasure but also for the enjoyment of anyone, like the haymaker, who comes along afterward. Recognizing this and sensing that he and the mower have a common sensibility, the haymaker continues his work as if the mower were with him to keep him company. Most significantly, he imagines that he “held brotherly speech / With one whose thought I had not hoped to reach” (37–38). The two men are able to communicate with each other even though they are nowhere near (in fact, the haymaker most likely has no idea where the mower might actually be), and the speaker ends by noting that he and the mower are working together, “Whether they work together or apart” (40). Reading these two poems as companion pieces gives us a fairly clear idea of Frost’s philosophy of poetry as the collaborative effort between a poet who writes

How to Write a Good Essay and a reader who interprets. The poet is the observer and commentator, doing the initial work of writing the poetry. The poet observes and must be honest when he reports his observations, staying as true to the reality and fundamental essence of the situation as he can. Frost himself worked to practice this principle in part through his use of language. One way to understand the line, “Anything more than the truth would have seemed too weak,” is to recognize that the poet’s goal is to represent the truth as he sees and understands it and to limit his efforts to conveying that truth. Poets risk succumbing to the temptation to elevate their diction and contort their syntax to fit a meter or a rhyme instead of trying to fit their language to the truth. Frost worked to maintain a natural-sounding language that was true to the way language is spoken, striving “never [to] use a word or combination of words that I hadn’t heard used in running speech” (qtd. in Hoffman 74). For Frost, natural language was the truth, and his effort to re-create natural language in his poetry was born of a desire not to burden the poem with something more than the truth. Once the poet has been as truthful as he can, his poetry is like the cut grass left to be made into hay, and that work is the reader’s. As depicted in “The Tuft of Flowers,” the reader makes hay from the raw materials left by the poet. As a reminder that the poet appreciates the work of the reader, the poet mingles beauty within the truth much like a group of flowers left to grow among the cut grass. In this way, the interaction between poet and reader is shown to be reciprocal, and this claim may be the most startling that emerges from reading these two poems as companion pieces. Even as the poet and reader work individually on their respective tasks, they work together. Frost presents a similar idea in “The Wood-Pile,” a poem in which a wanderer who is lost and far from home finds a pile of wood that someone cut, stacked, and forgot

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost about years ago. The woodpile no longer belongs to the woodsman/poet but now to the wanderer/reader who thinks not just of the wood but of the person who stacked it. This, then, is the ethics of collaboration that “Mowing” and “The Tuft of Flowers” indicate to be the heart of writing and reading poetry. The poet writes his poem not just for himself but for the reader, while the reader reads not just for himself but for the poet. Perhaps the greatest thing we can take from the study of poetry—perhaps the greatest idea we can take from these two poems by Frost—is an increased fellow-feeling for others who also engage and work with poetry. Writing poetry and reading poetry are activities that require isolation for the poet and isolation for the reader, yet paradoxically the poet and reader work in concert, whether together or apart. Works Cited Frost, Robert. The Poetry of Robert Frost. Ed. Edward Connery Lathem. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1969. Hoffman, Tyler. Robert Frost and the Politics of Poetry. Hanover, N.H.: University Press of New England, 2001. Meyers, Jeffrey. Robert Frost: A Biography. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996. Oster, Judith. Toward Robert Frost: The Reader and the Poet. Athens, Ga.: The University of Georgia Press, 1991.

How to Write About Robert Frost

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Reading to Write

n the relatively short history of American letters, few writers have attained Robert Frost’s iconic status. This is not a statement of literary merit—there are endless arguments to be made about the quality of Frost’s writing in comparison to other poets who may have been more innovative, distinctive, or insightful. But none of those writers captured the popular imagination and consciousness the way that Frost did. Frost was the embodiment of America’s kindly, wise, genial grandfather. He taught us to be calm, to take care of our business, to walk in the woods, to delight in childhood play and reflect on it as we grew up, to live simply and without airs. He taught us to listen to birds, to work with our hands, to study the natural world around us, and to think of our place in it. He did not try to overturn any reader's worldview, unsettling them and putting them on the defensive. He had a healthy perspective, an outlook that accepted the world as it was and found peace in that world. His was a simple wisdom that waited for readers to find themselves ready to receive it. Frost’s contributions to literature were recognized in official ways. He was awarded 44 honorary degrees and four Pulitzer Prizes; he was the U.S. poet laureate and, at 86 years old, he became the first poet asked to read at a president’s inauguration—and for no less an iconic figure in his own right, John F. Kennedy. But Frost’s place in the hearts of many Americans is what separates him from all other American writers. It is hard to imagine now, perhaps, that the public would ever care

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what literary critics might say about a writer, but that was the case with Frost. When one critic ventured the notion that “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” might demonstrate a death wish on the part of the speaker, the “response from readers was phenomenal” (Armstrong 440), as they lambasted the wrongheadedness of anyone who could think that Robert Frost of all people could countenance any kind of longing for death. A few years later, English professor Lionel Trilling spoke at an event honoring Frost’s 85th birthday and declared that everyone was getting Frost wrong because his work “is not carried out by reassurance, or by the affirmation of old virtues and pieties. It is carried out by the representation of the terrible actualities of life in a new way. I think of Robert Frost as a terrifying poet” (Trilling 155). These comments “were attacked in the New York Times Book Review, provoked a flow of letters and stirred up considerable controversy” (Meyers 319). Why? Because this reading, which was in fact complimentary of Frost, declared that Frost was not our comforting grandfather but was instead terrifying. Frost had himself worked hard to construct a public persona that would not unsettle the public, and he was so overwhelmingly successful that, even after decades of critics finding hints of suicide or some kind of welcome or longing for death in “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening,” we still think of Frost as the white-haired fireside talker. “He refused, for example, to read his darker, more skeptical poems in public, preferring instead to reveal his more congenial, folksy side” (DiYanni 871). For all of Frost’s public affability, he was a diligent student of poetry and a relentless, even biting, poetic competitor. He wanted to be recognized as a dominant force in American poetry. Recognition came relatively late in life for Frost. When he was thirtyeight, he realized that his life of teaching, halfhearted farming, and writing poetry was not earning him a living or the acclaim as a writer that he sought. He moved his family to England in 1912 for no specific purpose other than to change scenery and write in a different atmosphere and with a new audience. This move turned out to be exactly the thing he needed, for in London he found receptive publishers and was able to talk to other poets more skilled than those Frost knew in the United States. Pre-eminent among these poets was Ezra Pound, an American writer of fiercely original talent and a keen editorial sense—ten years later, Pound would help T. S. Eliot trim The Waste Land to the fractured modernist masterpiece that it is. Pound admired Frost but tried to domineer him;

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Frost’s age and sure sense of what he wanted to accomplish as a poet helped him resist Pound’s efforts to edit. For a time they got along, but Pound’s forceful and, at least to Frost’s mind, affected personality grew tiresome. Still, Pound’s support for Frost in the form of positive reviews and willingness to introduce him to other formidable talents such as W. B. Yeats helped Frost finally begin to make a name for himself as a poet. After three years, he returned to the United States with two successful published collections: A Boy’s Will (1913) and North of Boston (1914). One aspect of Frost’s poetry that was so compelling to his London admirers, and that continues to stand as one of Frost’s distinctive contributions to poetry, is his effort to craft a natural-sounding poetic language. That is, Frost worked to create language that sounds like natural speech, that uses the diction and vocabulary of spoken language along with all its natural cadences. Those cadences especially were troubling to early readers of Frost who thought they were reading free verse— poetry that does not rhyme and does not follow a strict rhythm—when actually Frost was experimenting with blank verse, poetry that does not rhyme but does adhere to metric patterns. These patterns were difficult for readers to discern, but once you recognize that a poem like “Home Burial” is written in blank verse, you begin to see how carefully Frost worked to experiment with the ten-beat line of that traditional form. If you are interested in the formal aspects of poetry and of understanding how Frost’s meter and rhyme were a departure from previous writers, you will want to read Donald J. Grenier’s article, “The Difference Made for Prosody” and Timothy Steele’s “ ‘Across Spaces of the Footed Line’: The Meter and Versification of Robert Frost.” Frost’s attention to natural language made his incredible popularity possible, if indirectly. Among the effects of his use of day-to-day speech are uncomplicated syntax, simple vocabulary, and readily accessible content. Frost’s poetry is readily understood after a single reading, and while there are nuances and difficulties to return to, it is possible to read any of Frost’s poems once and come away with some grasp of its point or mood. Take “Birches,” for example. On closer inspection, the poem reveals weighty concerns: how cruel fate can be, or our individual quests for spiritual understanding. On the surface, though, the poem evokes nostalgia as the speaker thinks back to childhood play. The simple message of the poem is that we do ourselves a favor when we remember our freedom from care as children, and this message is readily available to

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even a quick reading of the poem. One of Frost’s signature achievements may be that the simple message of his poems does not disappear when we plumb the poems’ other depths. The darkness of those depths may seem at odds with the surface, but it all adds up to a satisfying whole. The strength is that the poems can feel whole without the reader understanding all of the parts. It is possible to read Frost, overlook some aspect of his purpose, and still feel like you understood what he is attempting to convey. This makes for satisfying reading on many levels and makes his poetry work for readers at all levels of interpretive skill. You may find it productive to study the various levels of interpretation that Frost’s poetry rewards. This surface simplicity hurt Frost’s critical reception and to some degree still does. One approach for writing about Frost is to compare him to his contemporaries, some of whom are held in much higher critical esteem. Frost knew W. B. Yeats, and Yeats privately admired Frost’s poetry but kept this estimation from the public. If you are not familiar with Yeats’s poem “The Second Coming,” you may want to read it in contrast to Frost’s poetry. Yeats presents a terrifying picture of history and the future with epic, mythic imagery, a vast historical sweep, and an ominous, looming sense of chaos—the poem is powerful, frightening, and held in high critical esteem. It is also written in blank verse; you might find it rewarding to compare the stresses and the uneven length of the lines to a Frost poem like “Home Burial.” Alternately, you could compare the dark cosmological view of Yeats’s poem to a Frost poem such as “Design.” Ultimately, you may want to compare their critical receptions, as even thoughtful literary critics are at times inclined to overlook Frost’s affinity with other poets, simply because the veneer of Frost’s poetry is so simple and uncomplicated. That simplicity puts him in poor critical standing compared to more difficult poets like T. S. Eliot and Wallace Stevens, highly acclaimed modernist poets who mastered the convoluted, fractured, dense aesthetic of modernism, but again if you were to investigate you might find that at their deepest levels these poets all share certain outlooks and concerns. Your efforts to place Frost in the modernist context could lead to engaging study, and you could work to establish Frost as either a hidden modernist or as someone who refused to participate in the modernist aesthetic. If you want to look elsewhere for comparisons, you might consider looking to Frost’s precursors. William Wordsworth, in particular, is a

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useful companion poet for studying Frost, because Wordsworth and Frost are both pastoral poets. Much of Wordsworth’s poetry, but not all, looked to nature for instruction and as a corrective to the confusions of life. His poem “The world is too much with us, late and soon” laments how far we have separated ourselves from nature, while “I wandered lonely as a cloud” takes comfort in simple scenes of nature when the poet finds life grinding him down. Frost’s attention to natural settings and his remarkable skill in describing them characterize him as a nature poet; his poetic persona often is that of the wanderer, seemingly at home in the woods and alone in the wilds—after all, why would he spend so much time writing about nature if he was not comfortable there and perhaps even using it as a means of escape? Yet nature in Frost’s poetry is at best indifferent to human concerns and at times pitiless (to invoke Yeats), and “reading through [Frost’s] works, one finds that a major tone involves feelings of profound uneasiness, even of fear, toward nature. Frost may present himself in a natural landscape, but he is far from comfortable there” (French 155). Thoreau’s Walden and Emerson’s poetry and his essay “Nature,” are also useful starting points for considering the development of Frost’s ideas. Reginald Cook’s essay “Emerson and Frost: A Parallel of Seers” is a useful comparative introduction to the two authors. Frost’s themes are not far ranging. Time and again his poems return to circle around a few core ideas, investigating their implications and working to establish a cohesive philosophical description of the world. Nature is, of course, one of those themes, and Frost will generally place a generic “nature” in the background of his poems so that he can concentrate on specific representatives—a bird, a flower, a spider, a domesticated horse. Trees seem to have a unique place in Frost’s view of nature. At times Frost will identify specific trees, such as the birch explicitly (in “Birches”) or the apple tree implicitly (in “After Apple-Picking”), but often trees are referred to as an indiscriminate, looming presence, simply as “trees” or “woods.” Seasonal imagery plays a prominent role in Frost’s poetry, suggesting themes of the passage of time or the stages of life. Each of the seasons has its turn in Frost’s poetry—spring (“Mending Wall”), summer (“The Oven Bird”), fall (“After Apple-Picking”), and winter (“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”)—but Frost is often thought of as a winter poet. You might want to spend time studying his various uses of the seasons in his poetry. A number of potential essays exist in the exploration

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of Frost’s uses of the seasons and how those seasons provide a backdrop to some philosophical consideration. Finally, you might simply wish to return to Trilling’s depiction of Frost as a “terrifying” poet. Other critics have made the same point about Frost. Randall Jarrell was already describing Frost’s poetry as “awful” (meaning full of frightened awe) and “terrible” (meaning full of terror) years before Trilling’s inflammatory speech, but after Trilling, more and more has been written that identifies a fundamentally noncomforting, nonconsoling worldview in Frost’s poetry. “Frost’s Poetry of Fear” (Eben Bass) and “The Hidden Terror of Robert Frost” (Charles B. Hands) are good sources to consult in exploring these notions. You will find other hints in the chapters to follow of how to tease these implications out of Frost’s poetry, if they are even present in the first place.

Topics and Strategies The topics in the following pages are meant to offer you broad ideas to consider when discussing and writing about Frost’s poetry. More specific discussions of these topics and others can be found in the chapters about individual poems. The topics below serve as instigating questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes The following chapters will identify themes specific to individual poems. This chapter concentrates on some of the more common themes that recur in Frost’s poetry; in almost all cases here, the idea is to consider how themes unfold in multiple poems, to examine the larger picture that emerges as we study the ways an individual poem, then another, presents and develops one aspect of a theme. Nature is one of the most obvious themes associated with Frost. Many of his poems focus on farmers working the land, a solitary self-reflexive wanderer, or wildlife in its element. Whatever the form nature takes in any given poem, it is either a setting or the object of study. As a setting, nature provides a tonal backdrop for the action; as an object of study, it usually leads the speaker to comment first on what he sees, then what

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that makes him think about. Critic George Bagby describes such a recurrent pattern this way: “[A]gain and again, the poems move naturally from description of an object or scene or event to a commentary or meditation on its significance” (379). In all of Frost’s nature poems, a relationship between people and nature is implied if not explored outright. Frost’s speakers are often conspicuously alone, sometimes even commenting and meditating directly on that solitary state. At other times, the speaker is with another person, or a poem may depict a scene playing out among individuals. Frost also depicts people in need of solitude, in need of companionship, as well as those who work well together or work at cross-purposes. The complex interrelations between the individual and society inform much of Frost’s poetry. In a similar vein, you might consider the role of home in Frost’s poetry. Is there any common ground between the individual’s and society’s concerns and being either in the domestic sphere or away from home? Death is a common theme in Frost’s poetry, at times the explicit subject (“ ‘Out, Out—’ ”), at other times a veiled, implied presence (“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”), and sometimes the subject of indirect concern (“Design”). There is an implacable inevitability to death in Frost’s poems; the question is, what do we make of it?

Sample Topics: 1. Nature: What is our relationship to nature? What can we learn about ourselves by studying nature? How do small truths about nature illustrate larger principles? Since so much of Frost’s poetry uses nature as a backdrop or as a case study, you will have no trouble finding poems to analyze. Some of your options will be to explain how the nature imagery is used to set a mood or provide a touchstone in any given poem, to explain how poems rely on similar or different imagery to make similar or different points, or to argue for or against the conclusions or the perspective that the poem offers. When nature exists as a setting, examine the relationship between the people in the poem and the natural world around them. How do they treat nature? How does nature treat them?

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost 2. Individual and society: What are our responsibilities to ourselves? To one another? Frost’s speakers sometimes seem to be alone because they choose to be, while at other times they seem burdened by their loneliness. One possible approach to this topic is to study a collection of poems and to examine the way they represent being alone versus being with others. To what extent do the poems suggest we need to be alone? Frost is an introspective poet, and introspection is seemingly impossible without quiet and solitude. Yet Frost’s speakers will at times despair over how separated they are from other people, either physically (when a speaker wants to get home) or spiritually. 3. Home: What do Frost’s poems have to tell us about home? At times, Frost’s speakers are longing for home (“The WoodPile”), while, at the other extreme, Frost presents characters who find no comfort at home and are longing to break out of the domestic sphere (“Home Burial”). How do the poems seem to define the idea of home? How does a home stop offering comfort or emotional shelter? Frost’s speakers are often outside; how can they be “at home” in the wilderness or on domesticated land? 4. Death: What perspective does Frost’s poetry offer on death? For all of the ways Frost’s poems confront and examine death, is there a cohesive picture of death and how it impacts us that we can assemble from Frost’s poetry? Do the poems ever seem to fear death? Do they rail against it? Do they accept its certainty? Do they offer any perspective, any way of coping with the fact that death awaits us all?

Character There are few characters in Frost’s poems, but those that contain or center on a human presence offer rich ground for exploring any of the following topics. You can study the characters in the dramatic narratives,

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for instance. Frost is masterful at revealing character through dialogue, very much like an accomplished fiction writer, and you can see his skill at work in poems such as “Home Burial,” “The Death of the Hired Man,” and several others also from North of Boston. As the characters speak, in response to one another or to begin a new thought, Frost shows us a little more of who they are and what motivates and concerns them. Another character worth considering is that of Frost himself or the speakers of individual poems. Some of those speakers are more available to us as characters than others. The speaker of “Mending Wall” gives us some hints about his psychology and perspective, for example, and typically the speakers who reveal the most about themselves are the narrators of the first-person poems. Frost himself emerges as a character as well, famous for having constructed a public persona designed to evoke a certain image of rustic Americana that would be nonthreatening and charming.

Sample Topics: 1. Frost’s characters: How does Frost reveal his characters through dialogue and confession? You could write about individual poems, discussing the way the characters take shape as they speak and act, even studying the care with which Frost reveals certain aspects of character. You can compare Frost’s dramatic narratives to short stories that rely heavily on dialogue—works by Ernest Hemingway or Raymond Carver are particularly useful counterpoints. Do not overlook the first-person speakers of many of the poems. These individuals reveal aspects of themselves as well. 2. Frost’s persona: How did Frost construct his public persona? There is quite a bit that you can do to examine Frost’s public persona. You can compare that persona to what we know of the real day-to-day Frost. You can compare that persona to the speakers of some poems. Part of Frost’s appeal is the degree to which his persona seems to embody the speaker of some of the poems. This connection between the voice of a poem and the voice of the person who wrote the poem is a powerful attractor for readers. You might discuss how the persona helped to

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost obscure certain interpretations, especially those poems in which critics have detected muted references to death.

History and Context Frost seems to exist largely separate from the history of the 20th century. Frost did not comment in his poetry on the world wars, nor does his poetry offer a response, like Eliot’s, to the state of human affairs in the 20th century. Still, historical references are present in the work, and just because Frost did not address the events and movements of his time explicitly does not mean his poetry cannot be read within a historical context. The world wars, modernist aesthetics, literary criticism about Frost and others, the biographical facts of the poet’s life, and Frost’s regionalism help to frame and contextualize his poems.

Sample Topics: 1. World wars: What did Frost write during the wars, and can it be said to address those conflicts? If Frost did not write explicit war poetry, what did he write during and after the wars? World War I, in particular, was a brutal event that influenced many modernist writers; is there anything in Frost’s poetry that seems to respond to the human capacity for brutality that World War I demonstrated? If not, why not? How could a poet justify turning his or her attention away from the defining events of world history? 2. Modernism: In what ways is Frost a modernist poet? Frost came to prominence at the same time as early modernism and became a dominant poetic figure during the height of modernism. Yet his poetry seems not at all like that of writers such as T. S. Eliot. You might want to look into the aesthetics and concerns of modernist writers and discuss how much—or how little—Frost seemed interested in working with those aesthetics and ideas. A helpful starting point might be Frank Lentricchia’s book Modernist Quartet, in which he labels Frost the “ordinary man’s Modernist” (51).

How to Write About Robert Frost 3. Criticism: How is Frost analyzed by literary critics? A useful starting point for any essay is any disagreement you might have with existing literary criticism. You will find this, in fact, as the impetus for much of the literary criticism that you read about Frost—critics taking issue with another critic’s analysis or interpretation and writing an explanation of how the other critics got it wrong. The Reader’s Guide to Literature in English provides a secondary bibliography of Frost and his poetry. You might also want to read Yvor Winters’s article “The Poet as Spiritual Drifter.” Winters is a fiercely intelligent critic, but he seems to have badly misunderstood Frost. It is always instructive to read smart critics who have missed the mark; if nothing else, it should help you feel more confident about your own interpretive efforts. 4. Biography: How does Frost’s biography help us to understand his poetry? Several good biographies can help you to understand the interconnections between Frost’s life and poetry. Jeffrey Meyers and Jay Parini have written good biographies; Lawrance Thompson’s biography has largely been discredited because of Thompson’s demonstrated bias against Frost. When you are writing biographical criticism, you have to be particularly careful not to confuse the speaker of a poem with the actual poet. Just as we are able to recognize that a first-person narrator in fiction is a character and not necessarily the author’s proxy, we must recognize that a poem’s speaker is a character as well. Biographical criticism is useful for helping us understand how a poet’s life events shaped and informed his or her poetry. 5. Frost as a New England poet: How does Frost’s regional environment influence his poetry? Frost lived in New Hampshire and wrote about rural scenes and country life in New England. Many critics have noted the

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost influence of New England’s regional characteristics on Frost’s poetry, including the seasonal changes, the flora and fauna of the area, and even the political positions of locals. John C. Kemp’s Robert Frost and New England: The Poet as Regionalist is a good place to begin studying the way the poetry reflects regional influences.

Philosophy and Ideas Peter Stanlis asserts that all considerations of Frost’s poetry must recognize that it is based on philosophical dualism, which means basically that “reality consists of two distinct, absolute, and all-inclusive elements, most commonly identified as matter and mind, or as Frost preferred, matter and spirit”; the contrasting philosophy is that of monism, which holds that “reality consists of only one element” (2). Dualistic pairs permeate Frost’s poetry—Stanlis offers an introductory list that includes pairs such as body-soul, good-evil, justice-mercy, life-death, day-night, and fire-ice (3). The following chapters do not generally identify such pairs in Frost’s poetry, but you are likely to find them in any given poem. Once you start thinking of Frost in dualistic terms, it is hard not to notice the existing tension between these various dualities. Much of Frost’s poetry depicts loneliness and isolation, even when characters are together. In “Home Burial” the couple is estranged from each other to the point that they might as well each be alone for all of the comfort and companionship they can offer. The speakers do not always comment on their isolation, as in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” and at other times characters are shown to be terrifyingly alone even when surrounded by family, such as in “ ‘Out, Out’ ” and in the loneliness of death. An important factor to consider, however, is the degree to which Frost is depicting this isolation as opposed to teaching us how we might come to terms with it. Has he despaired? Has he found a way out of his isolation? Has he simply reconciled himself to it? According to the Bible, when Adam and Eve sinned, they ushered in a world that has fallen away from God and is no longer the perfect Garden of Eden. It has become, to use Frost’s line from “The Oven Bird,” a “diminished thing” to which we must reconcile ourselves. Frost’s theology is not readily grafted onto Christianity, although he employs biblical notions in his poetry and relies on biblical symbols as well. Still, there is a clear strain of postlapsarian (or after the fall from innocence) thinking in Frost’s poetry that is worth pursuing.

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Finally, there is Frost’s philosophy of rustic living and a life of simple contemplation. Frost’s isolation is often not despairing at all but simply the necessary quiet he values and requires for thinking about life and for his own introspection. The key question here is to examine how much Frost thinks the rustic life is somehow more true than urban life.

Sample Topics: 1. Dualistic pairs: How does Frost resolve the tension between competing ideals in any given poem? You might find it intriguing to identify the dualistic pairs present in a given poem and discuss how the poem either resolves the tension their presence creates or leaves it unresolved. Once you have identified a pair in one or more of Frost’s poems, interrogate it. Peter Stanlis suggests one example in “The Death of the Hired Man”—the tension between justice and mercy. Who embodies justice? Who embodies mercy? According to the poem, can they be reconciled? Must one always triumph over the other? Is there such a thing as just mercy or merciful justice? 2. Existential isolation: How does Frost investigate the nature of our existence? Frost’s speakers are often alone, especially his first-person speakers. In some poems, such as “Acquainted with the Night,” the speakers feel and comment on their isolation, while in others, such as “The Road Not Taken,” they are feeling their isolation but do not explicitly confront it. Looking at individual poems or pairings and groups, you could examine the nature of isolation in Frost’s poetry. Does he suggest that we are alone even when we are with other people? Are we alone in the universe? Are we alone with our choices? Is it possible for people to connect through or despite their individual isolation? 3. The postlapsarian world: How much is Frost’s universe a fallen one?

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost Frost’s poem “The Oven Bird” looks to a late-summer bird for instruction on how to sing about “a diminished thing.” This is one of Frost’s most explicit studies of the world as a fallen realm and our place within it. How much is Frost connecting his fallen world to the biblical fall of Adam? How much is he arguing outside specific religious traditions that we have lost touch with the divine or never were in touch with it to begin with? 4. Rustic simplicity: How much truth is there in the simple, quiet, examined life? Frost is a poet of introspection and self-reflexive contemplation. Practically speaking, it is difficult to think when we are distracted by busy lives and noisy surroundings, so there is something inevitably necessary about rural quiet for careful consideration of who we are and who we want to be. But is there more to it than that? Is Frost working within a romantic tradition that looks directly to nature in order to discern the truth about existence? Or is it a happy accident that a thoughtful person can study animals and the other products of nature and still glean life lessons?

Form and Genre Frost took the form of his poetry seriously. Early critics mistook Frost’s efforts to write a more natural-sounding blank verse for free verse, but Frost was never inclined to experiment with free verse. Blank verse does not rhyme but adheres to meter—traditionally, iambic pentameter— while free verse neither rhymes nor adheres to a consistent meter. Frost’s dedication to form manifests in several ways apart from his blank verse efforts. One is his experimentation with rhyme schemes, including traditional patterns such as terza rima, a form adopting the progressive rhyme scheme aba bcb cdc. His other formal preoccupation is his interest in the sonnet, “the only fixed form Frost ever employed” (Maxson 3). Frost’s poetry can also be examined as it fits within traditions of the lyric, the dramatic narrative, and pastoral poetry. Lyrical poetry is often brief and concerns itself with impressions, sensations, memories, and emotions more than with character and drama. “Fire and Ice” could be considered a lyric, for example, while “Home Burial” is a dramatic narrative because it tells a story. It might be helpful to think of lyrics as medi-

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tative and dramatic narratives as stories. Pastoral poetry can be lyrical or dramatic, but it traditionally emphasizes nature, the rustic life, the wisdom of simple things, and simple people living uncomplicated lives.

Sample Topics: 1. Form: How did Frost work within, and experiment with, formal poetic structures? You may want to investigate Frost’s reasons for working with strict poetic structures and why he disdained free verse. Some Frost poems are more clearly rhythmic than others and the rhymes more pronounced. Compare the rhyme and meter of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” to the more looseseeming “Home Burial,” for example. You might want to study the impact of rhyme and meter on the impression a poem creates or examine why certain material seems to benefit from rhyme while other material does not. Do not overlook Frost’s sonnets. You may want to study his sonnets compared to other poems and try to offer an argument about why Frost chose this traditional, standard form to work with but no other. Why might the traditional structure of the sonnet have appealed to Frost? You might want to consider how well the sonnet fits Frost’s from-sight-to-insight approach to writing poetry. 2. Lyrics, narratives, and pastoral poems: How does Frost employ different modes of poetry? If you choose to explicate specific poems, closely examining their imagery and structure, it may be helpful for you to think about the mode of the poem. You may also want to put Frost’s poetry into the context of other poets or even compare one Frost poem with another: How do two lyrics compare, for example, or how does the theme of a lyric appear in a more narrative piece? To get started, you can examine Frost’s lyrics, such as “Design” and “Desert Places,” in light of such narrative works as “Home Burial” and “The Death of the Hired Man.” “The Oven Bird” is a foray into the pastoral, as is “Mending Wall.”

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Language, Symbols, and Imagery Frost masterfully presents philosophical conundrums in the simplest, everyday language of the smart, thoughtful, but not highly educated parlance of common people. Frost’s poetry is so effortlessly simple that he has often been dismissed as a simple poet without much to say or much challenge to offer. Part of the joy of Frost’s poetry, in particular, is the tension between the unaffected language of his best poems and the complex thinking within. Frost’s irony is not often examined, and this element may give you some critical room to explore. Irony is difficult to unpack but often identified as the core quality of some of the best literature. There are many forms irony can take. It is present, for instance, in the way Frost’s language seems to present simple ideas that turn out, on examination, to be complex. There is irony in Frost’s pastoral poems (Robson 213). One critic finds a “curious brand of dramatic irony” (Coulthard 40) in the way the speaker of “Mending Wall” is probably supposed to be an upstanding individual but actually comes across as condescending and disingenuous. Harold Bloom labels Frost “one of the geniuses of a particularly dark irony, in which you do not so much say one thing while meaning another, but the meaning itself doubles back and undoes the one thing” (Genius 358). Frost is not a symbolic poet, which means that much of his poetry avoids attempts to be impressionistic or to offer an object as a symbol of something else. Of course his poetry is metaphoric, and this can easily be seen in “Fire and Ice,” where fire is a metaphor for destructive passion and ice a metaphor for hate. These are symbols, but for the most part Frost’s poetry does not present an object that is meant to suggest or represent something else entirely. The spider in “Design” is just a spider, for instance, even though studying the spider leads the speaker to think about the cruelty of fate or the whims of a creator who leads us unknowingly to doom. Frost did not think of himself as working with symbols but with a kind of metaphor called synecdoche: “I might be called a Synecdochist; for I prefer the synecdoche in poetry—that figure of speech in which we use a part for the whole” (qtd. in Bagby 381).

Sample Topics: 1. Language: What effect is achieved by Frost’s simple, natural language?

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You can study the language in a single poem, considering the way a poem’s speaker seems to be ruminating without trying to generate florid descriptions of his mood. Alternately, consider the way characters talk to one another in poems such as “Home Burial” and “The Death of the Hired Man.” You might want to study the scansion or metrical patterns of the poems, looking very carefully at how Frost balanced the need for structure (meter and rhyme) with his determination to make his language as natural sounding as possible. 2. Irony: How can Frost’s poems be said to be ironic? Where is Frost saying one thing and meaning another or presenting a certain tone that does not match the underlying message? How does this ironic tension help Frost make the arguments he wants to put forward? Is the irony inherent in the situation he describes, or is it his technique for helping us understand? 3. Synecdoche: What does Frost mean by calling himself a “synechdochist”? Frost considered himself to be a poet working primarily with synecdoche, which means using a part to refer to a whole (or sometimes a whole to refer to a part). Examples include “a hired hand meaning ‘laborer,’ ” in which the part (hand) refers to the whole person, “or the law meaning ‘a police officer,’ ” in which the whole (law) refers to one element (Frye 453). How does Frost use synecdoche in his poetry? What specific examples can you find in individual poems? How might his poetry overall be said to be synecdochic?

Compare and Contrast Comparing a poet to other poets—or even to his or her other writings— offers limitless opportunity for essay writing. Comparisons are useful when exploring themes (Frost as a nature poet juxtaposed with other nature poets), philosophies (Frost’s view of the divine compared to other

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poets’ views of the divine), form (Frost’s sonnets examined alongside Petrarch’s or Shakespeare’s), and symbols (does Frost use the seasons to invoke the idea of cycles like other poets?). The following suggestions are broadly defined topics intended to get you started in your analysis; more can be found in the chapters to follow. One ready source of essay topics is what other critics of Frost have asserted and argued through the years. Read as much of the criticism as you can find on a poem of Frost’s that you wish to examine in greater depth. Somewhere in that criticism you are likely to find one of three things: either an interpretation that you disagree with, an overlooked interpretation that is suggested to you as you review critics responding to one another, or an impasse or some form of disagreement. Critics, for example, have clearly defined their positions on and interpretations of the “luminary clock” in “Acquainted with the Night.” You can potentially add your voice to the debate or argue that the critics are overlooking a certain aspect or element of the poem. You might find it useful to go back and re-evaluate interpretations that were surprising when the critic first proposed them but that are standard readings now. Perhaps as more and more critics came around to the once-shocking perspective (Frost as “terrifying,” for instance), people stopped developing arguments about previous or contradictory perspectives. There may be plenty of evidence that Frost is not terrifying at all, for example. Finally, you should always consult a poet’s efforts to theorize his craft. Poets often write their own theory, either criticizing other poets or explaining what they think the aim of poetry should be. Frost is no exception. Read some of his essays about poetry and apply his theory to his own writings. Does his poetry reflect the theory? Does his poetry stray from the theory? Does understanding the theory help us comprehend any given poem or group of poems more clearly? Robert Frost on Writing is a good collection of Frost’s own commentary on poetry; the opening overviews of his theoretical positions are particularly helpful.

Sample Topics: 1. Frost’s precursors: How does Frost compare to other writers who came before him? Frost is most often placed in a literary tradition that includes William Wordsworth, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Henry

How to Write About Robert Frost David Thoreau. In brief, Wordsworth was a romantic poet— the romantics turned away from the Enlightenment ideals of intellect and rationality, instead privileging emotion and imagination. The romantics looked to nature to discover truths about life and even divinity, and poets such as Wordsworth wrote about the wisdom they divined from spending time in nature as well as the wisdom to be found in simple, rustic living. Perhaps you can begin to see why it is fruitful to compare Frost to Wordsworth. Romanticism was a thriving movement for only about 40 years at the beginning of the 19th century, but it provided a foundation for Emerson’s transcendentalism. The core of transcendental thought was the belief that every person had some aspect of the divine within him or her. This notion was enormously influential in early American thinking, because it meant that every person was inherently special and dignified. American individualism is largely the outgrowth of transcendental thinking. Harold Bloom has written a useful, quick overview of the complex relationship between Emerson and Frost in his introduction to Robert Frost in the series Modern Critical Views. The Harper Handbook to Literature offers good overviews of romanticism and transcendentalism. Frost himself explained his perspective on Emerson in “On Emerson” (which can be found in Selected Prose of Robert Frost). 2. Frost’s contemporaries: How does Frost compare to other poets writing at the same time? Two of the most dominant American poets of the early 20th century, other than Frost, are T. S. Eliot and Wallace Stevens. Both are experimental modernists, writing difficult poetry that has no surface similarities to Frost’s work. Frost’s apparent simplicity, in contrast to Eliot and Stevens, has led to assumptions that Frost’s simple poetry must not offer much to think about or work through. To explore this topic further, you could write about the differences in style, the different levels of critical respect the poets receive, or the foundational worldviews that inform their poetry. Key poems by Eliot to

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost get you started include The Waste Land, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” and “The Hollow Men.” Key poems by Stevens to get you started include “The Emperor of Ice-Cream,” “The Idea of Order at Key West,” “Anecdote of the Jar,” “Disillusionment of Ten O’Clock,” “The Snowman,” and “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird.” 3. Frost himself: How does Frost develop ideas across multiple poems? How do his poems and his ideas about poetry inform one another? You will find as you read more of Frost’s poetry that he works with consistent themes and ideas, and you will be able to write essays that study those themes as they are presented and developed in multiple poems. Does Frost contradict himself? Do the ideas build on one another? Is something clear in one poem that is not clear in another until you compare the two? Does the style of one poem resemble the style of another, only improved? There are a variety of approaches you can take to this kind of comparative analysis. You might also want to look to Frost’s more theoretical writings, at least “The Figure a Poem Makes.” In this brief piece, Frost offers several precepts that can be used to study his own poetry. For example, he writes that a poem “begins in delight and ends in wisdom” (Cox and Lathem 18). Does this seem true of any of Frost’s poetry? He also writes that a poem “ends in a clarification of life—not necessarily a great clarification . . . but in a momentary stay against confusion” (Cox and Lathem 18). How do Frost’s poems offer us a momentary stay against confusion?

Bibliography and Online Resources Bagby, George Jr. “Frost’s Synechdochism.” American Literature 58.3 (October 1986): 379–392. Barry, Elaine. Robert Frost on Writing. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers UP, 1973. Baym, Nina. “An Approach to Robert Frost’s Nature Poetry.” American Quarterly 17.4 (Winter 1965): 713–723.

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Bloom, Harold. Genius: A Mosaic of One Hundred Exemplary Creative Minds. New York: Warner Books, Inc., 2002. Bloom, Harold, ed. Robert Frost: Modern Critical Views. New York: Chelsea House, 1986. Cook, Reginald L. “Emerson and Frost: A Parallel of Seers.” The New England Quarterly 31.2 (June 1958): 200–217. Coulthard, A. R. “Frost’s ‘Mending Wall’.” Explicator 45.2 (Winter 1987): 40–42. Cox, Hyde and Edward Connery Lathem. Selected Prose of Robert Frost. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966. Cox, James, ed. Robert Frost: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1962. DiYanni, Robert. “Robert Frost in Context.” Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. 5th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2002. 868–899. Eliot, T. S. Collected Poems 1909–1962. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Company, 1991. Faggen, Robert, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Robert Frost. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2001. French, Roberts W. “Robert Frost and the Darkness of Nature.” Critical Essays on Robert Frost. Ed. Philip L. Gerber. Boston. G. K. Hall & Co., 1982. 155–162. Frost: Centennial Essays. Compiled by the Committee on the Frost Centennial of the University of Southern Mississippi. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1974. Frye, Northrop, et al. The Harper Handbook to Literature. New York: Longman, 1997. Gerber, Philip L., ed. Critical Essays on Robert Frost. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1982. Grenier, Donald J. “The Difference Made for Prosody.” Robert Frost: Studies of the Poetry. Ed. Kathryn Gibbs Harris. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1979. 1–16. Hoffman, Tyler. Robert Frost and the Politics of Poetry. Hanover, N.H.: Middlebury College Press, 2001. Holland, Norman N. The Brain of Robert Frost. New York: Routledge, 1988. Isaacs, Elizabeth. An Introduction to Robert Frost. Denver: Alan Swallow, 1962. Jarrell, Randall. “To the Laodiceans.” Robert Frost: A Collection of Critical Essays. Ed. James M. Cox. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1962. 83–104. Kemp, John C. Robert Frost and New England: The Poet as Regionalist. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1979.

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Lentricchia, Frank. Modernist Quartet. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Liebman, Sheldon W. “Robert Frost, Romantic.” Twentieth Century Literature 42.4 (Winter 1996): 417–437. Maxson, H. A. On the Sonnets of Robert Frost: A Critical Examination of the 37 Poems. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 1997. Meyers, Jeffrey. Robert Frost: A Biography. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996. Monteiro, George. Robert Frost and the New England Renaissance. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 1988. Oster, Judith. Toward Robert Frost: The Reader and the Poet. Athens, Ga.: The University of Georgia Press, 1991. Pack, Robert. Belief and Uncertainty in the Poetry of Robert Frost. Lebanon, N.H.: Middlebury College Press, 2003. Parini, Jay. Robert Frost: A Life. New York: Henry Holt and Company, Inc., 1999. “Poet’s Corner: Robert Frost.” Exploring Poetry. 3 March 2009 Poirier, Richard. Robert Frost: The Work of Knowing. New York: Oxford UP, 1977. Pritchard, William H. Robert Frost: A Literary Life Reconsidered. New York: Oxford UP, 1984. Righelato, Pat. “Robert Frost.” Reader’s Guide to Literature in English. Ed. Mark Hawkins-Dady. New York: Taylor & Francis, 1996. 307–309. Sergeant, Elizabeth Shipley. Robert Frost: The Trial by Existence. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1960. Stanlis, Peter J. Robert Frost: The Poet as Philosopher. Wilmington, Del.: ISI Books, 2007. Steele, Timothy. “ ‘Across Spaces of the Footed Line’: The Meter and Versification of Robert Frost.” The Cambridge Companion to Robert Frost. Ed. Robert Faggen. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2001. 123–153. Thompson, Lawrance. Fire and Ice: The Art and Thought of Robert Frost. New York: Russell & Russell, Inc., 1961. Thornton, Richard. Recognition of Robert Frost: Twenty-Fifth Anniversary. Ed. Richard Thornton. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1937. Trilling, Lionel. “A Speech on Robert Frost: A Cultural Episode.” Robert Frost: A Collection of Critical Essays. Ed. James M. Cox. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1962. 151–158.

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“Wallace Stevens.” Poetry Foundation. 3 March 2009 Wilcox, Earl J., and Jonathan N. Barron, eds. Roads Not Taken: Rereading Robert Frost. Columbia, Mo.: University of Missouri Press, 2000. Wordsworth, William. “I wandered lonely as a cloud.” Bartleby.com 3 March 2009 ———. “The world is too much with us, late and soon.” Bartleby.com 3 March 2009

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Reading to Write

ome critics consider “Directive” to be the last great poem of Frost’s career. Frost wrote “Directive” when he was in his early seventies, and the poem serves as a powerful capstone to his collected works. “Directive” can be read as a commentary on poetry itself; it incorporates nature imagery, invokes the ideas of loss and death, and even asks the metaphysical questions that inform so much of Frost’s poetry. The basic frame of the poem is the story of a guide leading the reader to the abandoned ruins of a family home. The opening two lines hint at why we are taking this journey: to leave our current time, when things have become too much for us, and to return to a simpler time. Along the way, we see that time has worn down the evidence of human presence as nature reasserts itself, present long before people occupied the land. There is a sense that the surrounding woods and the animals in them are watching us warily, and an ominous mood prevails that the guide suggests we can dispel by making up “a cheering song.” All that is left of the original house is a cellar filling with earth, a small field, and the remains of the “children’s house of makebelieve.” Finally the guide takes us to the stream that supplied water to the people who lived here, and, taking a cup from the children’s playhouse, bids us to “Drink and be whole again beyond confusion.” At its heart, the poem is a quest narrative. If drinking will make us whole and beyond confusion, then before we drink we must be empty and confused. Our quest then is to find the stream and drink, and the guide, the poet/narrator, is leading us on our quest. It is important to note that not everyone is capable of succeeding in this quest; the cup is “under a spell so the wrong ones can’t find it.” Our interpretive task as readers of this poem is to figure out why we are empty, what we are confused about,

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why drinking from this particular stream will make us whole again. Just as important is the need to determine who the “wrong ones” are, so we can do whatever we must to be the “right ones” for whom this particular redemption is possible. “Directive” is one of Frost’s most powerful poems, in part because the ambiguity of its imagery makes it possible for the reader to work out a variety of interpretations. At the same time, the poem makes enough explicit references to Christianity that it takes on the significance of a parable; the poem can readily be viewed and interpreted through the framework of a Christian story of redemption and salvation. Frost concludes on a positive note: However far we have strayed from whatever it is we were supposed to do or from whoever we were supposed to be, it is still possible to be made whole again.

Topics and Strategies The following topics are meant to serve as instigating questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes “Directive” tackles several themes: the loss of innocence, the fear of aging and the sense that opportunities to correct mistakes are slipping away, the power of the quest to give life meaning and purpose. One of the key images of the poem comes near the end, once the guide has led us to the old farm, where the only remnants of the people who lived there are the children’s playhouse and some of the broken dishes the kids played with. The family house is no longer standing, and little evidence of it remains, just a depression in the ground where the cellar was, overrun now with flowers. The fields of the family farm are also overgrown. One object that endures, the cup that our guide uses to drink from the nearby stream, is retrieved from among the playthings. This suggests that there is a resilience and a significance to the child’s world that contrasts with the transience of the adult realm, as embodied in the house. The basic motif of the poem is that of the quest: The speaker of the poem serves as a guide, leading us down paths he already knows to a truth he has already learned. In many quest narratives, the hero is led

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to a point where he must prove himself worthy of the knowledge, power, or redemption that is the goal. The guide can only take him so far. In “Directive,” some of those standard devices are overturned. The goblet from which we are told to drink is hidden so that the unworthy will not find it, but it remains hidden to the reader as well until the guide hands it over. Somehow the guide has found us to be worthy, though it is not clear what we have done to demonstrate our worth. In many quest narratives, simply completing the journey successfully is proof enough. Nature asserts itself in “Directive,” just as it does in so much of Frost’s poetry. The family who lived on the farm we are visiting was able, for a time, to tame the surrounding wilderness, but in their absence, nature has shown itself to have been subdued but not conquered. Frost refers to homes, farms, towns, and cultures that were once there but are no longer visible, and in their place we see not only the return of nature in the “belilaced” cellar and the overgrown fields, but in the evidence of glacial activity we see that nature was at work long before people had settled the region. Frost often presents nature as an indifferent entity or force that tolerates our presence. The poet/guide is ultimately leading us to the spring, which he describes as “Your destination and your destiny.” It is instructive to think about why this spring is identified as “your destiny,” an assertion the poem leaves unresolved and unclear. “Directive” suggests that we have lost our way and strayed from our purpose, and returning to this simple place is what is required to find and retrieve ourselves again. Frost includes a reference to the Gospel of Mark. The speaker/guide has placed a spell on the goblet so that the “wrong” people cannot find it and use it to drink from the stream. In Mark 4:11–12, Jesus explains to the disciples that not everyone can or will try to understand his parables: “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables so that, ‘they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!’ ” Rather than state a truth, Jesus tells a story—the parable—to illustrate the truth. To understand the truth of the story, you must first interpret the symbolism. Not everyone understands the parables, and, according to Mark, this was Jesus’s intention. If the truth is too plain, people will forget it or ignore it too easily. If they have to work to understand it by listening to the story, thinking about what it means, and figuring out the message, they are much more likely to remember the truth the story tells. This is true, of course, of poetry as well.

“Directive”

Sample Topics: 1. The sufficiency and necessity of childhood simplicity: What about childhood does the poem suggest we need to recall? A possible thesis might be that the poem begins by suggesting we would benefit from less complexity in our lives, and one way to achieve that is to recover some of the essentials of childhood. You will want to look for the imagery of erosion, as the fine details of gravestones or even homes are worn away to leave only their essence. In all of this, why do the things of childhood remain while other structures and objects wear away? Is the poem suggesting we should literally be childlike, or is it suggesting that adulthood is an elaborate construction that obscures an essential core that we should not forget? The interpretive work of this poem resides in the effort to argue to what exactly we need to return. The pervasive Christian symbolism and imagery of this poem invites a biblical reading. With that in mind, you might start by thinking about the lesson of Luke 18:16–17: “But Jesus called the children to him and said, ‘Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.’ ” 2. The quest: What is the nature or purpose of the quest in “Directive”? You might want to do some research into the basic nature of quest narratives; they follow a basic model, and your thesis could be a statement of how much “Directive” follows that model and how much it departs from it. You would want to be able to outline the model, give an example or two of quests in fiction or poetry, and then discuss how much “Directive” resembles or deviates from a standard quest. 3. Nature: What relationship does “Directive” suggest exists between nature and humanity?

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost The purpose of the journey in “Directive” is to return to “a time made simple by the loss / Of detail,” and that detail is the evidence of a human presence, lost now to time and nature. A possible thesis for this essay might be that nature is pushed back and tamed, but when people have moved on, the simplicity of nature returns. Provide evidence from the poem to support this argument, and consider also that the quest of the poem might be to learn something about our place in nature. You might also look at the nature imagery in the poem and consider how nature responds to us (see the section in this chapter on Language, Symbols, and Imagery). 4. Destiny: Why is the spring not just our “destination” but also our “destiny”? Begin by discussing the definition and concept of destiny, and then discuss the difference between the spring as a place we are going or headed to as opposed to a place we are meant to go. Destiny may also suggest a cosmological purpose that is larger than the individual. In what way does the poem suggest the individual’s destiny intersects with a world of other individuals, each pursuing his or her own fated course? Is it our destiny simply to find this spring and drink from it, or does drinking from it recall us to our destiny and make it possible for us to return to our original purpose and fulfill it? 5. The poem as parable: Is this poem a parable? What are the ramifications of Frost’s inclusion of Christian imagery in the poem? Frost’s references to the Gospel of Mark make an explicit connection between this poem and Jesus’s parables. A possible thesis for a strong essay might center on the notion that this poem can be interpreted as a parable. You will want to explain the purpose that parables served in Jesus’s ministry, define the basic model of a parable, then discuss the function and purpose of including a reference to Mark in the poem.

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Language, Symbols, and Imagery “Directive” presents us with explicit Christian imagery in its final lines, comparing the children’s cup to the Holy Grail (the cup Jesus drank from at the Last Supper) and referring to the Gospel of Mark. The presence of such imagery invites a Christian interpretation of the poem, in which the poem is viewed as a commentary on the need for redemption or as a gentle warning that we stray from the course we should be pursuing and need reminders to return us to the right path. Much of the imagery is obvious, including the grail, which is mentioned explicitly, but some of it is more obscure. Is the image of “tatters hung on barb and thorn” meant to evoke thoughts of Jesus’s crucifixion? The number forty is important in biblical stories (forty years in the desert, forty days and nights of Noah’s flood). Why might Frost have used that number in lines 21 and 22? Cumulatively, Frost’s use of Christian imagery references specific biblical concepts while also establishing a solemn or reverential tone in the poem. The descriptions of nature in “Directive” are highly personified and individualized. The road is described as a quarry, exposing huge “knees” of rock. There are also gouges created by glaciers, characterized as the “chisel work” of a glacier that “braced his feet against the Arctic Pole.” The woods are “excited” by the guide’s passage. In much of Frost’s poetry, people are depicted alongside nature, often failing to be fully integrated into it and often suffering in the face of nature’s indifference. In this poem, however, nature is keenly aware that people are present and far from indifferent. Working counter to or in concert with a Christian interpretation is the ambiguity that Frost achieves in “Directive.” One critic has noted that the first word is ambiguous: Is it a verb telling us to back out, or is it an adverb describing a past time? Such ambiguities do not necessarily need to be resolved. They can still be explored in an essay. Is the meaning of the poem affected by reading “back” as a verb or as an adverb? Is the ambiguity deliberate, starting Frost’s poem off on a note of tension and irresolution? Frost’s diction and word choice are other avenues worthy of exploring. Amid showing us where to find the goblet and then telling us to use it to drink from the stream, our guide tells us under his breath, as a parenthetical statement, “(I stole the goblet from the children’s playhouse)”. On its own it is an almost mundane line, clear and straightforward: He stole the cup from the children’s playhouse and hid it in the roots of a tree where no one can find it. But why does he use the word stole? That implies taking it

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against the owner’s will, but this cup belongs to children who abandoned the site long ago. Does the guide feel like he was doing something wrong? Is it possible the guide does not deserve the redemption he is offering us?

Sample Topics: 1. Christian imagery: What purpose does the Christian imagery serve? A strong essay could discuss how Christian imagery functions in the poem—how it signals or informs the reader that the poem’s quest is one of redemption or salvation. Examine the key Christian images, and explain their significance to the message or central tenets of Christianity. What is the Holy Grail, for instance? Why has it retained significance for many Christians through history? Discuss the images on their own terms, and then explain the role they serve in the poem. Frost likens the cup we drink from to the Holy Grail—why? To develop this topic further, you will need to offer an interpretation of the poem overall, then discuss how the images support that interpretation or make it possible. 2. Nature imagery: How is nature depicted in this poem? Frost potentially personified nature in his poem in order to make its interest in our affairs more immediate and more moving to us. An essay taking up this topic could argue that nature is shown to be tolerating or indifferent to a human presence. Alternately, an essay could argue that nature is desperately interested and invested in human activity. The biblical fall from grace, after Adam and Eve’s initial sin, can be interpreted as the fall of nature. How are the redemption of nature and human salvation linked, if at all, in the poem? 3. Ambiguity: What does ambiguity contribute to the meaning of the poem? How does it function in “Directive”? Identify some ambiguous words, phrases, or images that Frost uses. Construct an argument that explains why each example

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is ambiguous by demonstrating the possible meanings and the difficulty of choosing definitively between them. Then discuss the influence of that ambiguity on the poem’s overall meaning and the way such ambiguities contribute a tone of uncertainty or leave the poem resolved or open ended. Does a note of ambiguity add to the complexity of Frost’s poem, or does it detract from the serious and urgent message the poet is attempting to convey? 4. “I stole the goblet from the children’s playhouse”: What does this line do to alter the tone of the poem’s conclusion? This line appears as an aside. By putting the words in parentheses, Frost suggests that the speaker has whispered them or dropped his voice in order to say something that does not quite fit with the sentiment and nature of the lines surrounding the speaker’s confession. Is it a clarification, as if the speaker is acknowledging that he must tell us something before we proceed through the poem? Is it significant that he “stole” the cup from the children’s playhouse? In what way does the reference to the playhouse mitigate or offset the seriousness of the theft? One thesis might entail discussing how this parenthetical confession reminds us not to take the poem too seriously. Amid comparing the cup to the Holy Grail, and immediately before telling us to drink and be made whole again, the speaker makes sure we know it is really just a cup that children once used while playing. Another thesis might support the contention that this particular line reminds us of how important childhood innocence is to the poem’s message of redemption. Even the cup we drink from has to be tied to childhood because a cup used by adults would be tainted or ill suited for the task.

Compare and Contrast It is often helpful to compare two poems with similar themes; juxtaposing the treatment and development in each work can lead to an unexpected or more complex interpretation. The opening of “Directive” is reminiscent of the opening to William Wordsworth’s early 19th-century poem “The World Is Too Much with Us.” Compare:

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By repeating the idea that our lives have somehow become “too much,” Frost is echoing Wordsworth’s sentiment and referencing Wordsworth’s poem. The two poems then go on to investigate similar themes. Both express a concern that the modern world and our contemporary lives have distracted us from some essential truth, something that we can rediscover if we recognize that we have lost our way. For Wordsworth, the problem is that we are disconnected from nature. For Frost, the complication is more ambiguous; we are disconnected or alienated from the natural realm, because nature is indifferent to us. Both poems look back to religious and spiritual practices. Wordsworth wants the reader to reconnect with ancient myths that reinforced the intimacy of people and nature. Frost’s purpose is again more nebulous, for his efforts to reconnect with Christianity may or may not be ironic. Thoreau’s Walden also offers a potential companion piece to “Directive” (and to Wordsworth as well). The famous line from Walden in which Thoreau declares his purpose for returning to simpler things is fitting: “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” Thoreau lived in the woods for two years and wrote of his experiences, and the longstanding appeal of Walden lies in the philosophical insights Thoreau offers about life and the ways we lose sight of what is and is not important. For Thoreau, then, the busy material world is much like it is for Frost: “all this too much” that we need to “back out of.”

Samle Topics: 1. Wordsworth’s “The World Is Too Much with Us” and “Directive”: How do these two poems compare as directives? You might want to think of both poems as directives, or guides, that help us to understand how we can (and should) go about trying to regain our lost perspective. One thesis might center on the fact that both poems direct us to return to simpler

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things. Another approach could examine the ways the two poems look to spirituality. The essay could argue that Frost is serious when he updates Wordsworth’s paganism to Christianity. Or an equally as strong essay could take the opposite approach, arguing that Frost is being ironic, even dismissive of Christianity. 2. Thoreau’s Walden: How do reading Walden and “Directive” side by side enrich our understanding of each? What elements do both works share? One way to approach this topic is to suggest that “Directive” borrows some of its ideas and imagery from Walden, then argue that “Directive” expands on or contradicts those ideas in some way. Start with Thoreau’s explanation of why he went to the woods. How does that compare to why Frost wants us to seek out a similar natural setting? In the “Conclusion,” Thoreau writes, “The life in us is like the water in the river.” What is he suggesting? How does Frost’s poem reflect this sentiment in directing us to drink from the stream? Bibliography and Online Resources for “Directive” Borroff, Marie. “Robert Frost’s New Testament: Language and the Poem.” Modern Philology 69.1 (August 1971): 36–56. Dougherty, James P. “Robert Frost’s ‘Directive’ to the Wilderness.” American Quarterly 18.2 (Summer 1966): 208–219. Duvall, S. P. C. “Robert Frost’s ‘Directive’ out of Walden.” American Literature 31.4 (January 1960): 482–487. Thoreau, Henry David. Walden. 3 March 2009 Wordsworth, William. “The World Is Too Much with Us.” 3 March 2009

“Mending Wall”

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Reading to Write

ne way to approach writing about “Mending Wall” is to recognize that the poem is interrogating the proverbial expression, “Good fences make good neighbors.” You might begin simply by asking yourself what the expression means. Focus on each element: What is a fence? What purposes does it serve? How should neighbors interact? What are the barriers, if any, that should exist between them? What kinds of relationships should we have with the people around us? How does a fence between people make them “good” neighbors? These might seem like simple questions, but what many critics and readers find distinctive about Frost’s poetry is the way his simple language and ideas reveal a greater complexity the more they are interrogated and analyzed. Frost’s “Mending Wall” offers no answers to any of the questions it raises. Frost claimed, “I make it a rule not to take any ‘character’s’ side in anything I write” (Politics 108), and in “Mending Wall” he is careful to maintain the ambiguity of his characters’ positions. The reader’s focus is on the speaker of the poem, the one questioning the implications of building a wall between people. Nonetheless, the speaker still participates in building it, taking the initiative by going to get the neighbor. One idea for an essay is to examine the ambiguity of the speaker’s position, studying what compels him to build a wall despite worrying about the wall’s implications. Another potentially revealing essay topic could examine the irony of the situation, as the speaker and the neighbor work together, joining forces to keep themselves separated. Many of Frost’s poems develop a philosophical inquiry grounded in a simple observation, and you might write an essay that compares “Mending Wall” to poems such as “Birches” or “Design.” The speaker of the poem

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observes the way frozen ground will buckle and shift, dislodging the rocks in his wall, and from this simple observation he wonders if nature itself objects to partitioning the land and is trying to tear the wall down. You might question how seriously the speaker takes his own suggestions of nature or God or elves or whatever the “something” that does not love a wall might be. Does he seem to think nature is actively displeased, or is he merely expressing his own troubled conscience, noting that the natural effects of winter seem to be the work of offended spirits. Before you dismiss the speaker’s flight of fancy, it might be helpful to note two elements Frost integrates into his poem. One is the use of the word love. The speaker indicates that the destructive entity or force that does not love the wall is still capable of expressing love. A second factor to consider is the image of the hunters and their dogs. Hunters knock down parts of the wall as they chase and flush out rabbits, but note the curious way the speaker explains why they hunt: “To please the yelping dogs.” What are the implications of the speaker suggesting that the hunters are working for the dogs? The speaker seems inclined to think of nature as something to be contended with; a fruitful essay could explore our relationship to nature as depicted in this poem, perhaps even comparing it to other poems by Frost. You might also examine the way the characters are portrayed. What seems to be the speaker’s opinion of his neighbor? What does he think of his neighbor’s repetition of “Good fences make good neighbors”? Notice how the speaker describes his neighbor: “an old-stone savage” who “moves in darkness.” Everything we know about the neighbor is what the speaker tells us and thinks, so be sure to evaluate the speaker’s subjective or potentially misleading thoughts about his neighbor. What do you think of someone who looks at his neighbor and thinks of a savage? What do you think of someone who considers himself to be enlightened but his neighbor to be mired “in darkness”? What do you think of someone who will not share his idea with his neighbor until the neighbor comes up with “it for himself”? Finally, if the wall is a negative or undesirable presence, who is most to blame for repairing it: the person who has not realized the wall is a bad idea or the person who has already concluded that yet builds the wall anyway? The imagery of the poem deserves its own focused attention. Central to the poem is the wall, which is both a physical barrier but also a metaphor for personal barriers. The two men fix the wall together but keep it between them all the while. Other imagery is less obvious. Why describe the rocks as “loaves” and “balls,” for example? Why does the speaker tell us “we wear

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our fingers rough with handling them”? Why are cows the example the speaker offers as a reason why a fence might be worth having? Why does the speaker stop to observe his neighbor and describe the way he carries “a stone grasped firmly by the top / In each hand”? How does the realism Frost achieves affect the reader’s experience of the poem? What metaphors might these images contain?

Topics and Strategies The topics in the following pages are meant to serve as initial or triggering questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes “Mending Wall” explores some of the key themes that define other Frost poems, but the work also gives us the chance to explore some ideas less common in his poetry. The wall as a physical entity with a specific, defined function suggests issues of ownership and property rights. In addition, the literal wall in the poem becomes a symbol for figurative walls—the various divisions, concrete or abstract, that divide individuals. Frost’s meditation raises many potential questions to consider: Why is it important to us to define what is ours and what is not? How far should we go to protect what is ours? Is there anything undesirable about establishing boundaries against unknown and unproven threats? In other words, what might we lose in our efforts to secure property? Another approach to discussing “Mending Wall” is to examine how the poem presents and explores the ways we balance tradition and change. How do we know when traditions are no longer useful if we are not willing to rethink them? Traditions partially exist to establish ethical or behavioral precedents that succeeding generations do not necessarily re-evaluate. In light of this, how do individuals or a group know when change is beneficial? Ultimately, how do people balance their competing desires for progress and stability?

Sample Topics: 1. Property ownership: What does the poem argue about our desire to own and protect property?

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One reason fences might be said to make good neighbors is that they help to define what belongs to each. “Good neighbors” could potentially be defined as those who recognize and respect one another’s possessions. For all of the metaphorical walls that this poem potentially suggests, Frost begins with a physical wall. Consider the purpose that walls serve. An essay might start with the speaker’s ruminations, concentrating exclusively on how they relate to physical walls and the property they protect: “Before I built a wall I’d ask to know / What I was walling in or walling out, / And to whom I was like to give offense.” 2. Tradition and change: In what ways does the poem critique tradition? Is there an acknowledgment or glancing acceptance in the poem of the inevitability of change? How do we know when it is time to abandon tradition and outmoded practices? Traditions give us precedent and structure, but how can they interfere with new or better ways of behaving, thinking, or acting? How does the neighbor in “Mending Wall” represent old ways of thinking? How does the narrator represent the struggle to escape from worn-out traditions? Before you go too far toward arguing that the neighbor is wrong and the narrator is right, remember that the narrator is not a proxy or stand-in for Frost or for what Frost thinks is right. With that in mind, how admirable is the neighbor for honoring the lessons of his ancestors? How much does the narrator represent the potential folly of pursuing change for its own sake? Is the narrator as stuck in his way of thinking as he considers his neighbor to be? Be sure to note that the narrator makes a point of telling us that his neighbor repeats the “good fences” expression, but the narrator repeats his own expression about “something there is that doesn’t love a wall.”

Character An essay examining the poem’s characters would potentially need to address the fact that our understanding of each is limited by the first-person perspective. We develop an understanding of the speaker based on the words he uses, the thoughts he expresses, and the attitudes he seems

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to hold toward his neighbor. Our understanding of the neighbor is likewise limited by the speaker’s understanding, but the speaker’s perspective should not become too influential in your interpretation. The way the speaker describes the neighbor in actuality tells us more about the speaker than the neighbor. One example is found in the description of the neighbor carrying stones in lines 38–40: “. . . I see him there, / Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top / In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.” What do we know about the scene based on the speaker’s description? The speaker’s word choice indicates that he or the neighbor has moved out of proximity; the speaker sees him “there,” which suggests some distance. Would the stones have fallen and rolled so far that the neighbor must go retrieve them? If not, has the speaker moved away from the wall and paused to watch his neighbor work? What does it suggest about the neighbor that he would stop and observe? Is he trying to distance himself from the work? From his neighbor? We then learn that the neighbor will pick up two stones at once when they are small enough or if he is strong enough to do so. There is a degree of efficiency to this, but the speaker focuses instead on the brute force of lifting the weight and stresses it by comparing his neighbor to an armed savage. In what ways do the speaker’s words reflect his biases or limited vision?

Sample Topic: 1. The character of the poem’s speaker: What do the speaker’s actions and thoughts tell us about his character? What kind of person does the speaker seem to be based on how he treats his neighbor? Is he smug and condescending? Is he genuinely hoping to reach out to someone who prefers to keep barriers in place? Why won’t he tell his neighbor what he thinks? Why does he prefer to wait for the neighbor to come to the same realizations on his own? You might find it useful to imagine the poem from the neighbor’s perspective. How might it seem to him if the speaker came to get him to mend the wall, then questioned the wall’s purpose?

Philosophy and Ideas As much as the wall in “Mending Wall” is a physical entity, Frost is using the idea of a wall to examine the ways we build barriers between

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ourselves and other people. The philosophical implications of the poem encompass interpersonal ethics, which is the study of how we treat one another, how we should treat one another, and what we should expect of one another. One essay might consider the ideas inherent to the aphorism, “Good fences make good neighbors,” identifying and exploring the definition of “good neighbor” that the expression establishes. Another approach could examine these notions more deeply, considering the ways the poem suggests people are affected by the barriers they erect.

Sample Topics: 1. Privacy versus community: What does it mean to be good neighbors? On one level, this poem asks us to consider what obligations we have to one another. How accessible should we be and why? Do good neighbors intuitively recognize the limits of what they can ask or expect of one another, or is it clearly defined boundaries that establish these limits? What is the idea of a “good neighbor” as expressed in the saying, “Good fences make good neighbors”? 2. The ethics of barriers: What are the ethics of the barriers (physical, emotional, personal) that we construct? The speaker of the poem identifies the factors that should be considered when building a wall: “Before I built a wall I’d ask to know / What I was walling in or walling out, / And to whom I was like to give offense.” To write an essay exploring the ethics underpinning the concept of barriers and division, you will need to address both physical and metaphorical walls. What purpose do walls serve? What do physical walls protect or hinder? What do metaphorical walls protect or hinder? Do walls indicate that someone is not wanted, trusted, or needed? How cautious should we be about pre-emptively acting on our self-defensive impulses? To what degree do our barriers keep others out, securing our necessary privacy? To what extent do barriers seal or lock us in, securing our isolation?

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Compare and Contrast Many of Frost’s poems tackle different aspects of loneliness or isolation within a community, enacting attempts to find a balance between a necessary solitude and a reliance on and need to be part of a community. Throughout his career, Frost’s approach to this issue was often markedly different. “Birches,” for example, is an optimistic meditation in which the narrator remembers dealing with his isolation as a boy with a degree of confidence he is in the process of trying to regain. The more dire “Acquainted with the Night” presents the reader with a narrator who is resolutely alone but seemingly in search of companionship. A compelling essay could be written that compares “Mending Wall” with “Birches” and “Acquainted with the Night” by examining the way each presents a different perspective on isolation and community. You might also look at the role that fate plays in “Mending Wall” compared to its role in other poems. Fate often seems to exist in Frost’s poetry as a being or presence in its own right, a force with the ability to act to protect its own self-interests, offer a corrective example, or just to toy with people. Frost’s poems are reluctant to attribute anything to accident, but at the same time the poet is hesitant to identify the mysterious forces at work behind events. In “Design,” for example, he wonders if a white spider holding a white moth on a white flower is an accidental convergence or the work of some controlling force. In “ ‘Out, Out—,’ ” the saw seems to have a will of its own. In “Birches,” the narrator makes his intentions clear so that fate won’t “willfully misunderstand” his desires and give him only half of what he wants. In “Acquainted with the Night,” the moon or a clock tower seem to be the face of God watching over things, while in “Mending Wall,” the narrator playfully wonders if elves or some other force of nature tears down his wall every winter.

Sample Topics: 1. Isolation and community: How does Frost examine issues of isolation and community in “Mending Wall” and other poems? An essay analyzing the role of community and isolation in “Mending Wall” could readily draw on other poems for support, especially since “Mending Wall” seems poised firmly between the ideas of keeping to yourself and opening yourself up to others. You

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might begin by exploring the tension in “Mending Wall,” arguing that the narrator is on the brink of a realization about the barriers we place between ourselves and other people. What are the implications of avoiding community? What are the implications of surrendering privacy? How do poems that take more extreme positions than “Mending Wall” help us to understand the difficulties of navigating Frost’s often ambiguous approach to the existing tensions between the individual and society? 2. Fate and accident: What can we understand about Frost’s conception of fate by examining several of his poems? Frost’s narrators are often quick to wonder if some hidden force or cause is behind natural processes or apparent accidents that range from the extreme (as in “ ‘Out, Out—’ ”) to the miniscule (as in “Design”). Beginning with “Mending Wall,” you might note that the narrator begins by wondering if the apparently natural process of the ground freezing is actually the work of something trying to destroy a wall. You might also discuss the way the narrator imagines hunters working in service of their dogs. By studying examples from “Mending Wall” and other poems, your essay could work to build a comprehensive picture of Frost’s ideas about fate, addressing several key questions: Are we being instructed by fate in the form of accident and coincidence? Are we at the mercy of malicious or indifferent fates? Is there anything we can or should be doing to achieve balance between our desires and those of fate? Is it enough to imagine that things happen for a reason, or do we need to determine with certainty “If design govern in a thing so small”? Bibliography for “Mending Wall” Boroff, Marie. “Robert Frost’s New Testament: The Uses of Simplicity.” Robert Frost, Modern Critical Views. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1986. 63–83. Clarke, Peter B. “Frost’s ‘Mending Wall.’ ” Explicator 43.1 (Fall 1984): 48–50. Coulthard, A. R. “Frost’s ‘Mending Wall.’ ” Explicator 45.2 (Winter 1987): 40–42. Holland, Norman N. The Brain of Robert Frost. New York: Routledge, 1988.

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Lincoln, Kenneth. “Quarreling Frost, Northeast of Eden.” Southwest Review 93.1 (January 2008): 93–111. Marcus, Mordecai. “Psychoanalytic Approaches to ‘Mending Wall.’ ” Robert Frost: Studies of the Poetry. Ed. Kathryn Harris. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1979. 179–190. Oster, Judith. Toward Robert Frost: The Reader and the Poet. Athens, Ga.: The University of Georgia Press, 1991.

“The Death of the Hired Man”

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Reading to Write

he Death of the Hired Man” appears in North of Boston along with poems such as “Home Burial,” “Mending Wall,” and “After Apple-Picking,” and, while it is an acclaimed poem, it is generally not held in the same esteem as the other three. “Home Burial” confronts many of the same themes in a more emotionally powerful presentation, but it is the understated nature of “The Death of the Hired Man” that makes it such an enduring work in Frost’s canon. There are no histrionics, no emotional outbursts, just the pathos of an unlamented death. Comparing the poem to “Home Burial,” in particular, is instructive, since both poems are extended narratives that reveal their story and their context primarily through dialogue. “Home Burial” is marked by tragedy, from the death of an infant to the disintegration of a marriage and the mounting pain that its characters desperately need help from one another to manage. “The Death of the Hired Man,” on the other hand, addresses the same ideas but at a greater remove, in a more muted manner. It is this relative restraint of the work’s emotional core that arguably makes the poem more accessible. One crucial difference between the poems is that they approach the subject of death from different perspectives. “Home Burial” is concerned with the way people deal with death after it has occurred, while “The Death of the Hired Man” uses a man’s death as an occasion to look back at his life. The poem is about how much care and dignity a person deserves, and the nature of that discussion alters depending on whether

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the individual is alive or dead. The striking message of the poem is that there should be no alteration at all.

Topics and Strategies The topics in the following pages are meant to serve as questions and suggestions to guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes As in “Home Burial,” one of the prominent themes in “The Death of the Hired Man” is marriage. The reader is presented with a married couple that disagrees quietly about whether or not to take in a transient worker they know to be unreliable and irresponsible. As we listen to their conversation, we are given insight into their marriage, their respect for and attentiveness to each other, and their ability to disagree without anger. Frost infuses his portrayal of their marriage with a quiet solidity. Frost’s poetry often places a premium on the integrity of physical labor. In the best pastoral tradition, Frost exalts the farmer and field worker who tend responsibly and diligently to their work. In this poem, he provides us several models of work: Warren and Mary, Silas, Horace, and Silas’s brother, the doctor. As a corollary to work, the poem also comments on education. The traditional dichotomy between work and education is one of mutual distrust and disdain. The worker distrusts the educated person, potentially believing he or she is trying to get out of physical labor and is able to use knowledge to intimidate and manipulate the ignorant. The educated person, in turn, may look down on the worker for not wanting to use his or her brain and for toiling at repetitive tasks, year in and year out. For the worker, physical labor is worthy of pursuing because its results are clearly defined, while the life of the mind can be suspect as its goals and products are intangible. For the educated person, physical labor can be characterized as base and crude in its lack of an intellectual dimension, while education is seen as leading to refinement and self-betterment in mental and spiritual terms. Perhaps the central theme of the poem is the nature of home. Home is often a metaphor for comfort, safety, and refuge; even when not mentioned

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explicitly, the invocation of home suggests peace and safe harbor—consider the hint of home that awaits the speaker of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” On much the same note, family is linked to the concept of home, and the domestic sphere is portrayed as the place where the individual will be taken in and accepted. Silas is unwilling (or unable, given how poor his health clearly is) to go to his brother, so with no home and no family he feels he can turn to, Silas seeks out Warren and Mary. Finally, the poem asks us to think about death in terms of the life we have lived. Silas’s death occurs at the poem’s end; there are hints that it is coming in Mary’s descriptions of his odd behavior. The poem offers no discussion of death and only veiled portents, so in the end the poem is not about facing, confronting, fearing, or welcoming death. Rather, the poem is about how we live and how we treat others. The characters are not talking about Silas in retrospect, looking back over his life; for them he is still alive. The context for their discussion only becomes clear to us, and to them, at the end of the poem.

Sample Topics: 1. Marriage: What kind of marriage does this poem present, and is it an instructive model? Your thesis for an essay on this topic could essentially answer the question: What are we to learn about the mutual respect on display as it applies to married life? You will need to provide examples from the way Mary and Warren talk to each other, especially in disagreement, to assemble the pieces that make up a portrait of this marriage. You could then argue for or against this representation as a model for marriage. Using “Home Burial” for contrast would be a helpful counterpoint. 2. Work: What are the models for work that this poem investigates? The poem presents various models for work. An essay exploring notions of labor could argue that the poem does or does not value one model over another. Of the models, Silas’s is perhaps the most clearly defined, but remember that Warren is the one explaining it. Warren clearly does not trust or have patience with Silas, although he grudgingly grants that Silas is admirably meticulous

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost about bundling hay. Your task in exploring this topic is to sort out the various depictions of work and explain how the poem seems to rank them. 3. Education: What perspective does the poem have on education? An essay on this topic should isolate the few references to education made in the poem, most of which come to the reader thirdhand (Warren tells us what Silas said about Horace, but there is a narrator telling us what Warren said). Your thesis needs to make a claim about the poem’s perspective on education as a positive or a negative thing. Silas is frankly dismissive of Horace’s efforts to learn impractical subjects, like Latin, but Silas is eager to educate Horace about working with hay. Do not overlook the most educated person in the poem as another example: Silas’s brother, the doctor. 4. Home and family: What makes a homes and what makes a family? “The Death of the Hired Man” offers two competing definitions of home, one stated explicitly by Warren, the other by Mary. The poem also makes a distinction between family and friends, spoken by Mary (“Silas is what he is—we wouldn’t mind him— / But just the kind that kinfolk can’t abide”). To delve into this topic, offer an argument about the definition of home and the definition of family that the poem supports. What can or should we expect from family? What should we expect our family not to do? Does this poem indict Silas’s actual family? 5. Death and the life we live: How does Silas’s death affect our understanding of Warren and Mary’s conversation? Silas’s death is not meant to be a shock ending, but it does come as a surprise, because we, like Warren and Mary, are thinking of Silas as a trouble to be dealt with only to find out that he has died, alone, while people were discussing his negative qualities.

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Of course, Warren and Mary would have been having a different conversation if they knew Silas was dying. By extension, their conversation would have been perceived differently if the reader had known he was dying. A possible essay on this topic could suggest that the surprise of Silas’s death is not that a person has died but that the news of his death suddenly changes the way we think about everything we just overheard. The core of your argument could arise from a discussion of the difference between Warren and Mary’s conversation about someone alive and that same conversation, knowing it is about someone who has died.

Character As in “Home Burial,” we can glean more insight into character in “The Death of the Hired Man” than in most other Frost poems. There are four characters in the poem: husband and wife Warren and Mary, Silas (the hired man of the title), and Horace, a younger worker to whom Silas wanted to offer the wisdom of his experience. What we learn of each character comes to us through Warren and Mary’s conversation, so it is important to remember that we are learning about these characters through them. Warren and Mary tell us about themselves indirectly; the things they say inform us of their attitudes and the way they approach the world. Their speech hints at the kinds of people they are. Silas and Horace, on the other hand, we only hear about. Again we are listening to Warren and Mary, so what we learn about Silas and Horace is what Warren and Mary think about them. Do not assume that Warren and Mary are accurate in their impressions about Silas’s character. In the same way you are trying to figure out who Warren and Mary are by listening to them, they have learned who Silas and Horace are by observing and listening to them as well.

Sample Topics: 1. Warren and Mary: What do we know about the kinds of people that Warren and Mary are? A portrait of the kinds of people Warren and Mary seem to be can be assembled by paying close attention to the things they say and how they say them. Study the language Warren and Mary use to express their attitudes about Silas. What kind of worldviews do they each seem to have? What do they value?

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost How kind and forgiving do they seem to be? What can we tell about their marriage and how they interact from the way they discuss their differences of opinion? Categorize the specific things they talk about and track how they seem to feel about those things (and how their feelings do or do not change) in order to assemble your character study. Note that there is one significant clue about their characters supplied by Silas, since he chose to go to them instead of to his own brother. 2. Silas: What kind of person does Silas seem to be to Warren and Mary? Our understanding of Silas comes to us through the filter of Warren and Mary. They may know Silas, and they certainly have worked with him and been able to judge his work ethic, but they do not know everything about him. With this caution in mind, study the things Warren and Mary say about Silas to develop a character study of him. What kind of person do they understand or believe him to be?

Philosophy and Ideas One of the philosophical issues at the core of “The Death of the Hired Man” is the degree to which we should or must treat people according to what we think they deserve. And at the heart of that question is how we determine what people deserve. Silas has come to Warren and Mary with an offer to work, but Warren has found him to be unreliable in the past, and Silas seems to live an unstable, somewhat impoverished existence, which Warren disapproves of. Warren’s primary argument, never stated explicitly, is that Silas has not demonstrated that he deserves or is worthy of any consideration or care from Warren and Mary. Mary, on the other hand, argues from a different perspective. Silas may not deserve their help because of anything he has done for them, but he clearly needs help nonetheless; to turn him away would be cruel. Warren seems to want to know how their kindness will be repaid, while Mary wants only to extend the kindness. In this way, Frost introduces to his poem the concept of grace, an act of forgiveness or mercy. Theologically speaking, the Bible takes the idea of grace even further by defining it as God’s mercy on us even though we do not deserve it and can do nothing to earn it.

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Silas retains his own sense of personal dignity by not subjecting himself to the shame of facing his more successful brother. Instead, he turns to Warren and Mary, either because he senses that he can take advantage of them or because he senses that they have treated him more respectfully in the past. To some degree, it could be argued that people deserve to be treated according to how they treat others or even according to how they treat and respect themselves. From the perspective of Warren and apparently Silas’s brother, Silas has not treated himself or others with the same level of concern that he is now asking to receive. Mary, though, seems to respond more to Silas’s essential worth as a person, regardless of how reliable a worker he has been in the past. On a larger scale, this poem presents a debate between the ideals of justice, as represented by Warren, and the ideals of mercy, as embodied by Mary. Frost’s dualistic thinking informs this binary pair; sorting out the relationship, finding a balance if one is to be found, is a task that shifts to the reader.

Sample Topics: 1. Grace: How is Mary’s concern for Silas a model of grace? Mary offers the reader a model of grace in action. You will need to define grace as it informs and is characterized in the poem. Explain why Silas may not deserve any help based on what he has done in the past or what he can do to repay that help and kindness. Then argue whether or not Mary’s willingness to help Silas is an admirable example of grace or a weak act of kindhearted foolishness. 2. Personal dignity: To what degree do we, simply by being human, have a claim on dignity? A thesis for this paper might claim that Frost is arguing that we should all recognize a human being’s inherent dignity and value, irrespective of one’s willingness to work or even tend to one’s own needs in compliance with society’s expectations and standards. This seems to be Mary’s position; your task is to argue in what ways and to what extent the poem supports that position. Pay close attention to Warren’s views and the ways in

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost which they change, if at all, to conform to Mary’s perspective on the situation. 3. Justice and mercy: How does this poem dramatize the struggle between justice and mercy? Taking a cue from Peter Stanlis, who finds in this poem a duality of justice and mercy, an essay could explore how the poem weighs the merits of justice and mercy and concludes that they must be balanced. Alternatively, you could argue that the poem privileges on part of the duality as opposed to the other. You could then cite evidence from the poem, formulating your own argument that agrees or disagrees with the poem’s position.

Form and Genre A dramatic narrative is like a short story in verse form. “The Death of the Hired Man” tells a compact tale. At least one critic faults Frost for writing his poem too much like a short story. We are introduced to four characters. There is an unobtrusive narrator who offers only a few bits of imagery, while most of the poem is dominated by two of the characters talking about the other two. From their conversation, we learn all the details about their situations and relationships that we need. In this way, Frost is writing a poem that is reminiscent of Ernest Hemingway’s short fiction. (You might want to read Hemingway’s “Hills Like White Elephants” for a comparison.) Still, “The Death of the Hired Man” is a poem; it is written in blank verse, a form of iambic pentameter without rhyme, albeit Frost’s version does not exactly conform to the expectations early readers had for blank verse. Some of the earliest reviewers thought Frost was writing poor free verse, which follows no rhyme and no meter, when in fact Frost was writing a form of blank verse that prioritized the sound of natural speech over the steady beat of poetry (Greiner 5). Given the poem’s effort to illustrate or investigate moral principles, you might consider thinking of “The Death of the Hired Man” as a poetic parable. The point of a parable is to establish, through narrative, a moral difficulty that the characters must resolve or from which they must extricate themselves. There is some ambiguity to the instruction Frost’s parable offers, but mostly it seems to prize Mary’s compassion and concern for Silas despite his evident history of not entirely deserving the help.

“The Death of the Hired Man”

Sample Topics: 1. The form of the poem: How does Frost’s prosody, or use of poetic form, contribute to the overall tone and impact of “The Death of the Hired Man”? An essay exploring this topic might claim that Frost has successfully (or unsuccessfully) managed to replicate the sound of natural dialogue while adhering to the basic rhythm of iambic pentameter. To support your own assessment, you may want to analyze the lines that do the best or worst job of melding rhythm and natural speech. You may also want to consider why Frost would choose verse to tell what is essentially a short story. How does the form contribute to the meaning? How do the line breaks, the need to maintain rhythm, and the balance of poetic language (words chosen and ordered to fit a specific metrical scheme) and natural language (meter sacrificed in order to maintain the sound of everyday speech) call attention to what the characters are saying in a way that might be lost in a short story? For a comparative approach, consider citing an example of prose, such as Hemingway’s story “Hills Like White Elephants.” A passage from Shakespeare could provide a strong poetic comparison (Macbeth’s “tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow” speech from act 5, scene 5 is a good choice, and it also provides the source for the title of Frost’s poem, “ ‘Out, Out—’ ”). Consider also works by Wordsworth (to whom Frost is often compared; look specifically to the poem “Michael”), Alfred, Lord Tennyson (“Ulysses”), or Frost’s contemporaries Wallace Stevens (“The Idea of Order at Key West”) or W. B. Yeats (“The Second Coming”). 2. The poem as a parable: What moral lesson can you derive from this poem? A thesis for this topic could hinge on the assertion that the poem offers moral instruction much like a parable. You will need to identify the nature of that instruction (what does the poem teach us?) and you will need to offer a definition of a parable. Support your thesis and enrich your argument by citing an existing parable for comparison and as the model for

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost what a parable is and how it typically functions. The parables of Jesus would serve as an obvious and useful set of examples. Even more specifically, the parable of the prodigal son would be an exemplary model for a generic parable as well as for this specific poem, given the general similarity of theme.

Language, Symbols, and Imagery The narration that “The Death of the Hired Man” presents gives rise to the poem’s prevailing imagery. The image of the moon and Mary’s reaction to it is one example. The moon is often portrayed as a guardian or even as God (as in Frost’s own “Acquainted with the Night”); it is also a secondary source of light that prevents complete darkness. Frost presents the moon in a stylized passage in lines 103–106: Part of a moon was falling down the west Dragging the whole sky with it to the hills. Its light purred softly in her lap. She saw it And spread her apron to it. Later, when Warren goes inside to speak to Silas, Mary feels a companionship with the moon as well as a small cloud. Because Mary pays so much attention to the moon, and because it is not entirely clear if the narrator is telling us her thoughts about the moon or offering his own commentary, the function and implications of lunar imagery in the poem can be richly mined in an essay. Another key image is presented when the narrator (or perhaps Mary) describes the “harplike morning-glory strings” as she runs her fingers along the plant’s tendrils. As she does so, Frost describes her as playing a song that moves Warren to compassion. Still, the way the images are presented obscure for the reader just who is thinking these things. Mary may be thinking that the “morning-glory strings” look like harp strings. She might also be absentmindedly touching them, and it appears to Warren as if she is playing a harp. Alternately, perhaps neither of them notices, and it is the poem’s speaker who makes this associative leap, attributing a melodic quality to the physical movement of Mary’s fingers.

“The Death of the Hired Man”

Sample Topics: 1. The moon: What kinship does Mary seem to feel toward the moon, and what is its significance? An essay on this topic would formulate a conclusion about the role of lunar imagery in the poem. There are two notable aspects to Frost’s linking of Mary and the moon. She spreads her apron for the moon, giving it access to a smooth resting place. She also feels a companionship with the distant moon and a distant cloud, which suggests expansiveness in her ability to welcome and be at peace. How does this portrayal complement the poem’s other efforts to present Mary as a comforting nurturer? 2. The “harplike morning-glory strings”: How does the suggestion that Mary is playing the harp contribute to the poem’s overall depiction of her? To explore this topic, you would want to concentrate on traditional harp imagery. When and where are harps usually played? Who plays harps in poetry and paintings? How do these associations add to our sense of Mary as a character? 3. The mechanics of imagery: Who is telling us about the moon and the harplike strings? For most of the poem, Mary and Warren talk about Silas. Briefly, in only a few places, the dialogue stops, and the narrator fills the silence. When that happens, though, it is not clear who is the source of the imagery being presented. Does Mary consciously spread her apron for the moon? Does she think about the morning glories as harps? Does Warren notice? In all of these cases, is the narrator simply telling us what the characters are thinking? Or is it all the impression solely of the omniscient narrator? Your thesis for this paper should formulate a theory about who is relating these images and how that contributes to the poem’s overall effect.

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Compare and Contrast “The Death of the Hired Man” gives us insight into the state of a marriage by showing us the husband and wife in conversation, identical to the approach Frost took in “Home Burial.” In both poems, the couples are in disagreement, and as they speak, we come to learn the cause of their strife, the way each is handling it, and how well or poorly they are able to understand and accept the other person’s perspective and concerns. Both poems take the same formal approach in offering the reader a set piece that depicts a marriage; but the characters in each poem are responding to various situations and to each other with substantial differences. You might consider taking a cue from critic W. W. Robson, who compares “The Death of the Hired Man” to William Wordsworth’s poem, “Michael.” Wordsworth’s poem tells the story of a happy, hardworking family that keeps to itself on the farm until a debt requires that the son be sent away to work to pay it off. This arrangement works for a while, but eventually the son turns criminal and must flee. The parents, already elderly, endure the loss but eventually die. Both poems are pastoral, evoking and celebrating the simple lives of rural inhabitants, but Robson is interested in seeing how much better Wordsworth is able to write than Frost. In Robson’s estimation, Frost might as well be writing a short story to which he has added a few poetic touches, while Wordsworth has written a poem that honors and exemplifies the poetic.

Sample Topics: 1. “Home Burial” and “The Death of the Hired Man”: How do these two poems provide contrasts and complements to each other? There are several ways that you can write about these two poems comparatively. You can combine the insights into marriage offered by each poem as a way to generate a more complete sense of Frost’s perspectives on how marriages function. You may wish to argue that the poems function to increase our empathy by depicting people struggling to make sense of life’s hardships. You may even want to look at the two poems as strong examples of blank verse, explaining how blank verse works and demonstrating Frost’s skill in employing it.

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2. Wordsworth’s “Michael” and “The Death of the Hired Man”: How does comparing these two poems enrich our understanding of each? You may not want to address Robson’s specific critique of Frost’s poetry in comparison to what he thinks is Wordsworth’s superior effort. Wordsworth seems explicitly to be elevating the virtues of pastoral living. Is Frost pursuing a similar goal? Compare the lives that Warren and Mary live with the life that Silas lives, and do the same with Michael and Isabel in “Michael,” contrasting them to the change that overtakes their son, Luke. Where Robson criticizes Frost’s weaker poetic sensibilities, can you argue that Frost develops a more advanced technique by using the hints and subtleties of overheard dialogue to tell a story, in contrast to the narrated tale of “Michael”? Bibliography and Online Resources for “The Death of the Hired Man” Greiner, Donald J. “The Difference Made for Prosody.” Robert Frost: Studies of the Poetry. Ed. Kathryn Gibbs Harris. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1979. 1–16. Hemingway, Ernest. “Hills Like White Elephants.” Scribd.com. 3 March 2009 Robson, W. W. “The Achievement of Robert Frost.” Critical Essays on Robert Frost. Ed. Philip L. Gerber. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1982. 199–219. Shakespeare, William. Macbeth. The Literature Network. 3 March 2009 Stanlis, Peter J. Robert Frost: The Poet as Philosopher. Wilmington, Del.: ISI Books, 2007. Stevens, Wallace. “The Idea of Order at Key West.” The Poetry Foundation. 3 March 2009 Tennyson, Alfred. “Ulysses.” The Victorian Web. 3 March 2009 Wordsworth, William. “Michael: A Pastoral Poem.” Bartleby.com 3 March 2009 Yeats, W. B. “The Second Coming.” Poem of the Week. 3 March 2009

“Home Burial”

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rost’s oldest son, Elliott, died in 1900 at age four from what may have been cholera. Losing Elliott was traumatic for Frost and his wife, Elinor, and even though Frost claimed “Home Burial” was not about Elliott, the poem’s concerns certainly reference the reality of losing a family member. If the loss of a child informed the writing of “Home Burial,” Frost had the benefit of viewing the event from several years of remove; written most likely around 1912 or 1913, the poem appeared in North of Boston in 1914. The poem’s central narrative concerns a husband and wife who have lost their only child and whose marriage is suffering from the grief each feels. They express their grief differently and individually, and because they apparently cannot understand how the other mourns, they are rapidly growing apart. As they argue and accuse each other of caring too little or too much, the central action involves the wife, Amy, threatening to leave. The poem ends with the husband’s rage-filled threat to bring her back by force as she is opening the door to go. This poem offers an abundance of essay topics. As you read and study the work and prepare to write about it, you might begin by paying attention to the relationship between Amy and her husband and think about the degree to which the poem establishes each as individual characters. Be attuned to the poem’s position in relation to each character. Does the poem seem to take a side, suggesting that one of the two people is more right than the other, or does it present both characters neutrally? Take note of how each character expresses grief, and discern, in your close reading, the kind of comfort each character wants from the other.

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Topics and Strategies The topics in the following pages are meant to serve as suggestions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes “Home Burial” is about a marriage that is collapsing. The couple has suffered a tremendous loss in the death of their child, and we see through their dialogue that they have no means of comforting each other because they do not understand the nature of each other’s grief. Amy misinterprets her husband’s activity as a sign of indifference to the child’s death, while the husband is condescending and patronizing to Amy and what he seems to see as her inability to cope. The central conflict of the poem is a struggle of communication, and the marriage dynamic depicted offers lessons by virtue of counterexample. Amy and her husband miscommunicate their grief, another of the themes that the poem addresses. Both characters are mourning differently, and neither can understand the other’s grief. Amy accuses her husband of not caring about the death because he is able to think about other things and is even able to dig the grave so vigorously. The husband, meanwhile, thinks that if Amy can just talk through her grief she will be free of it or liberated from the control it has over her. Death is, of course, another of the poem’s central themes. Amy speaks of the way death isolates all of us. We all must die, and each of us will face death alone. This truth about the nature of existence is overwhelming for Amy, and if she cannot do anything about death, she can at least control the nature and expression of her grief. Because her husband does not grieve with her, she seeks someone else to grieve with and to give her comfort. Death may be a lonely undertaking, but grieving should not have to be. Communal grief is elusive, though, and part of Amy’s despair emerges from her realization that friends can only offer so much comfort before they have to return to the realities of their own lives. Amy already fears the loneliness of death, while the loneliness of grief is something she struggles to controvert.

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Sample Topics: 1. Marriage: How is marriage represented in “Home Burial”? What is the poem’s commentary about marriage? Marriage puts two people in a both intimate and dependent situation. If one of the purposes of marriage is to provide a support structure for each person in the marriage, what does this poem show us about the effects of that structure failing? Does the death of the son become symbolic of the death of the marriage? If so, in what ways is this established in the poem? 2. Forms of grief: How does grief manifest itself? According to the poem, how should we respond to forms of grief we do not understand? Many critics have faulted Amy for being hysterical, even strident in her grief, while her husband remains reasoned and calm. Is this a fair interpretation of the character of Amy or of the poem itself? A possible thesis could state that the poem is sympathetic to both characters, while another thesis could claim that the poem is sympathetic to one character more than the other. Gather clues from the language, tone, and imagery of the poem that enable you to argue one of these points. Some research into the psychology of grieving might help, but you can study the ways each character’s grief is presented in the poem alone to develop a position about the poem’s perspective on grief and, by extension, on each character. 3. Death: How do Amy and her husband confront and come to terms with death? Amy and her husband have lost a child, and through that experience Amy has found herself confronting the nature of death itself: Death is merciless (it claims children); death is cruel (it saddens survivors); death is inevitable (we all will die); death is permanent (she cannot get her child back); death is isolating (we die by ourselves). As Amy confronts these notions, she is anguished in a way that her husband is not. What does the

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poem tell us about how different people confront the realities of death? What can we take from this poem that might help us understand our or others’ responses to death?

Character There is little narrative description of the characters in “Home Burial”; what we learn of them is provided by their speeches. Scrutinize the things they say and the words they choose to say them. For example, notice the first things Amy’s husband says to her, as he asks her what she sees from the window. She does not answer, and as he climbs the stairs, he says, “I will find out now—you must tell me, dear.” What does this tell us about their relationship and what he thinks of her? Is he bossy and demanding? Is he condescending and patronizing? In this brief quotation, he seems to reflect all of these qualities. How does this initial impression bear out over the course of the poem? And what of Amy’s speeches, how does she respond to her husband? Look also at the descriptions the poem provides. Amy is described early in the poem as “doubtful,” her face “terrified” then “dull,” and as her husband climbs the stairs, she “cowered under him.” What does this begin to tell us about her? Toward the end of the poem, as Amy experiences her deepest grief, the husband responds by worrying that the door is open and someone walking by might overhear. What does this tell us about him?

Sample Topic: 1. The characters in “Home Burial”: What do we learn of the characters through their words, actions, and descriptions? To write an essay on this topic, first reread the poem carefully, identifying the impressions you get of each character and the elements of the poem (speech, actions) that convey that impression. Study those impressions, and use them to construct an overall sense of each character. Then argue for your understanding of each character using the evidence you have gathered from the poem.

History and Context Although “Home Burial” seems to be an explicit response by Frost to the death of his own son, Frost denied that was the case. It may be tempting

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to try to argue that “Home Burial” is about Elliott’s death or about the struggles of Frost and Elinor to work through their grief, but such an argument could never be proved and thus would not lead to a successful essay. Rather, begin with the fact that Frost experienced the death of a child and establish his firsthand knowledge of and authority in depicting how parents respond to a child’s death and to each other. Whether or not the poem depicts Frost’s actual response and the facts of his actual marriage is immaterial; that he wrote from experience and from a deep understanding of how people respond to tragedy is much more relevant. From that perspective, then, the poem is less about depicting Frost’s personal experiences and more about how personal tragedy can be transformed and universalized through his writings. Mortality rates in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were considerably higher than they are now: The life expectancy for adults was only in the late forties, and children under five died at rates that would be considered high today. Elliott’s death was not out of the ordinary, then, nor would the death of the child in “Home Burial” have been an unusual occurrence. At the time of its publication and in its historical context, “Home Burial” would have spoken to fears that readers today may not feel as acutely or even consider. Similarly, having death occur at home was much more common at the beginning of the 20th century than it is today. Children who died typically did so at home, and as parents aged and died, they were more likely to stay in the family residence and be cared for by their adult children. Before the rise of nursing homes, assisted living, and extended hospital stays, people were much more rooted to their family home. Thus, it is possible to view “Home Burial” as a means of supporting an argument that death is more of an abstraction for us than it was for people living just a hundred years ago.

Sample Topics: 1. The death of Elliott Frost: How does Frost’s personal experience with loss make this poem more resonant? To write a paper that analyzes “Home Burial” from a biographical standpoint, you will want to read some of Frost’s biographies and their accounts of Elliott’s death and its toll on Frost’s marriage. It is possible to argue that Frost’s experiences gave

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him an insight into the emotional strain that losing a child places on a marriage. Such a thesis enables you to contend that the lessons of the poem are delivered with a particular and respectable authority. 2. Death as abstraction versus death as reality: How does “Home Burial” provide perspective on how we view death now compared to how people confronted death a hundred years ago? Using “Home Burial” as your starting point, do some historical research into rural family life at the turn of the 20th century. You might also find a review of the poem that was written when it was first published. With this information, put the poem in its historical context. A possible thesis might be that we are likely to experience this poem much differently now than readers did at the time it was initially published. You might argue that the higher child mortality rates, the greater likelihood that adults would care for the elderly and dying parents in the family home, and the presence of family burial plots on family land gave people a different perspective on death than we have now. How is this now-lost perspective demonstrated in “Home Burial”?

Philosophy and Ideas As with many of his poems, in “Home Burial” Frost expresses an existential concern that we are all essentially alone. The heart of Amy’s grief, in lines 97–111, seems to be that death serves to highlight for us the realization that the connections we make with other people are fleeting and easily compromised or severed by the crises and challenges we face. Confronting death also reveals the truth about the living: We are really alone, no matter how much we think we are not. This kind of loneliness and isolation assumes far-reaching and potentially tragic dimensions when it transcends the comfort found in God or a personal belief system. We are alone personally, we are alone spiritually, and the poem demonstrates this forcefully not just because Amy states it, but because she and her husband are clearly isolated from each other both intellectually and emotionally. At the end of that same speech by Amy, she declares that the world is evil. She had been observing how people who are not immediately affected

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by death and grief are unable to offer real comfort to those who are, because those untouched by personal tragedy are distracted by or return too quickly to their own lives and concerns. For a parent losing a child, an inertia and disaffectedness can potentially ruin their lives. Yet as Amy’s friends try to comfort her, she can see that, for them, the world has not stopped and other concerns still matter. This makes her feel isolated in a way that she can barely endure; rather than attribute this feeling to a cosmic emptiness, she seems instead to identify a malicious force as the cause of it.

Sample Topics: 1. Existential isolation: Is Frost’s vision in “Home Burial” a bleak one? What is his poem saying about an existential sense of isolation? Amy clearly thinks we are all ultimately alone, as she articulates in her impassioned speech toward the end of the poem. But does the rest of the poem support this view? What evidence does the poem offer that Amy may or may not be right about this? Look, for example, at the way her husband responds to her. Does his treatment of her throughout seem to support her idea that personal connections are easily broken and give false assurance? Is it possible that she is misunderstanding the reactions of others? Could she interpret her friends’ and her husband’s reactions differently, in a way that leads to a less desperate worldview? Finally, if personal connections are illusions, why is she determined to leave the house and find someone with whom she can share her pain? Is she wrong that we are all alone, or is she right but cannot stop herself from needing human comfort anyway? 2. The world is evil: What does Amy mean by saying the world is evil? Frost often presents nature or the world as neutrally indifferent to human affairs, but in the poem he has Amy state that our fundamental isolation is evidence that the world is evil. What does she mean by that? Is she saying that people are evil, or is she insinuating that people do the best they can but are hampered by a larger evil force that we all live within and can-

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not escape? And if that is the case, what can she possibly do to change it, as she says she will try in line 111?

Form and Genre Frost did not like free verse, which is poetry that has no regular meter and no rhyme, but he did admire blank verse. Blank verse has no rhyme but does adhere to a meter, most often iambic pentameter. “Home Burial” is written in iambic pentameter blank verse, and the iambic cadence sounds most like natural spoken English. Because spoken English tends not to rhyme, Frost frees his characters to speak in a more natural-sounding way. At the same time, by adhering as strictly as he does to iambic pentameter, Frost provides a sense of order to a setting and narrative that are otherwise disintegrating and falling into chaos. The poem is also a lyric narrative; in some respects, you could argue that it is almost a short story. It is not a short story, however, and “Home Burial” effectively illustrates the difference between poetry and prose. Re-examine, for example, line 30 and notice how it is broken over three lines on the page; this is a visual effect that poetry makes possible in a way that prose does not. By writing this narrative as a lyric, with careful attention to meter, stanzas, and line breaks, Frost is able to contribute a closed, almost claustrophobic feel to the setting, a formal choice that reflects and reinforces the broken nature of the characters’ communication.

Sample Topic: 1. Blank verse and lyric narrative: How does blank verse help Frost construct a tone that is appropriate to or reflective of the poem’s subject? If “Home Burial” is a picture of a marriage collapsing because the husband and wife cannot understand how the other grieves for a lost child, how is the choice of employing blank verse an effective poetic form to convey such a message? Try reading the poem out loud and pay attention to the punctuation; that is, do not stop at the end of a line unless there is punctuation there to stop you. Notice how the rhythms of the poem contribute to the emotional import of what each character says. You might also try reading another poem or even a nursery

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost rhyme out loud just to see how different this poem sounds in comparison. Try to construct an argument about the effect of the poem’s cadences on the overall tone and meaning. In addition, add complexity to your essay by commenting on the effect of telling a narrative in lyric form. How do the compression of the language and the visual appearance of the words contribute a closed, almost oppressive atmosphere to the tense scene the poem describes?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery “Home Burial” is filled with striking images. Frost has a sharp eye and skillfully focuses our attention on small details that ultimately combine to construct a larger scene. Some of the details are Frost’s (or the narrator’s), but many are spoken by the husband or by Amy. Notice the way the simple word cowered establishes the dynamic of the characters’ marriage, and consider the significance of the two being located on the stairs. Consider the way the husband describes the family graveyard, the stones and the mound; consider as well the way the window “frames” the image, like a picture, or the way the husband compares the size of the graveyard to the size of a bedroom. What does such a comparison tell us about their marriage? Or what does it reveal about the husband’s possible equating of sleep with death? In regard to Amy, you might notice the way she describes how her husband dug the grave. She puts particular emphasis on the image of the gravel leaping, and there is a note of joy in the idea of leaping as ironically juxtaposed to the grim task of digging a grave. She is certainly not joyful, but does this image suggest that she thinks her husband was? Or is she unaware of how she is blaming her husband for an emotion he did not feel but that she unconsciously transferred from the gravel to him? A seemingly minor moment in the poem can be analyzed and expanded to reveal hidden complexities. Here, a strong if unexpected discussion could arise from a consideration of why Amy is essentially mad at her husband for the way the gravel, to her, seemed to be leaping. The repetition of don’t in line 30 is another area in the poem to which you could direct your focus; Frost thought “the four ‘don’ts’ were the supreme thing in [the poem]” (qtd in Meyers 49). It happens early in the poem, clarifying Amy’s vague unhappiness up to that point and showing the reader how truly anguished she is. The repetition also makes for an

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unusual and striking visual appearance on the page, suggesting jagged and broken emotions.

Sample Topics: 1. The key imagery of the poem: How does an image or set of images contribute to our emotional and intellectual experience of the poem? Choose an image or group of images and analyze their role in the poem, individually and as a collection. Do the image or images contribute a certain tone or help define a character? Your essay would then discuss the connotations of the words used, as well as the effect of their placement in the poem as it progresses. 2. The repetition of don’t: Why might Frost have considered this line to be the “supreme thing” in the poem? What was he possibly attempting to suggest in making such an observation? Do you agree with Frost’s idea that the repetition of don’t is of key significance to “Home Burial”? Try to figure out what he might have meant, because understanding the importance of this repetition will aid an understanding of the overall poem. You might begin by considering the placement of the don’ts. What do we know about each character before they occur, and what do we learn about the characters when they occur? Are they sudden and jarring? Do they introduce us effectively to the depth of Amy’s pain? Do they tell us something about the state of their marriage? Their presence interrupts the narrative flow of the poem and potentially encourages the reader to stop following the narrative and focus on the emotion. Do the repeated words serve as the poem’s strongest indicator of the overall emotional state of these characters? Have the lines up to this point simply served as a scene-setting introduction, and do the don’ts then signal the beginning of the real heart of the poem? Frost provides the reader with a lot to consider, as you construct an argument explaining what he might have

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Compare and Contrast “Home Burial” appears in North of Boston along with another of Frost’s lyric narratives “The Death of the Hired Man.” Each poem is presented as the dialogue between a husband and wife, and each uses that dialogue to sketch a picture of marriage. Each poem also confronts death, but the death in “Home Burial” has happened before the poem begins, and in “The Death of the Hired Man,” it happens while the husband and wife are talking, unaware. In “The Death of the Hired Man,” the husband, wife, and hired man are brought together, while in “Home Burial” the husband, wife, and child experience fracturing and alienation. Juxtaposing these two poems reveals a complex array of topics to compare and contrast. Amy’s argument that friends are too quick to return to their day-today living is echoed in “ ‘Out, Out—’ ”: A boy dies accidentally, and after the shock of his sudden death, everyone, including his family, “turned to their affairs.” Amy is emotionally broken by this exact response of other people to death; a strong essay could cite the example of “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” to support Amy’s position.

Sample Topics: 1. “Home Burial” and “The Death of the Hired Man”: How can “Home Burial” and “The Death of the Hired Man” be compared or contrasted to provide a richer reading of their shared interests? Each poem offers a perspective on marriage, death, and communication. Reading them comparatively provides you with the opportunity of presenting a richer discussion of each poem’s central concerns. Examine what each poem tells us about marriage (or another topic), and then explore the ramifications of Frost’s individual vision in each work. You might also look at the form, comparing the two as lyric narratives, arriving at conclusions about the uses and limits of the lyric narrative as a poetic form. 2. “Home Burial,” King David, and “ ‘Out, Out—’”: How should people respond to death?

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The people in “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” return to their business after the boy dies because “they / Were not the one dead.” As unemotional as it seems, it is a practical reaction, as there is nothing to be done for the dead, and the living still need to take care of their own business. You might begin an essay on this topic by looking at the biblical story of King David (see II Samuel 12), who mourns and prays for his sick child but gets up and goes about his business once the boy dies, saying that his prayers and fasting may have moved God to spare the boy, but once the boy is dead, there is nothing to do that will bring him back. This seems to be the perspective of the people in “ ‘Out, Out—,’ ” but it is not a reaction that Amy can abide in “Home Burial.” Is Frost referencing the biblical story in any way? An essay on this topic could bring these three works together and argue for or against the responses to death as demonstrated by David, Amy, and the adults in “ ‘Out, Out—.’ ” Bibliography for “Home Burial” Carroll, Rebecca. “A Reader-Response Reading of Robert Frost’s ‘Home Burial’.” Text and Performance Quarterly 10.2 (April 1990): 143–156. Isaacs, Elizabeth. An Introduction to Robert Frost. Denver: Alan Swallow, 1962. Kemp, John C. Robert Frost and New England: The Poet as Regionalist. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1979. Lincoln, Kenneth. “Quarreling Frost, Northeast of Eden.” Southwest Review 93.1 (January 2008): 93–111. Meyers, Jeffrey. Robert Frost: A Biography. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996. Oster, Judith. Toward Robert Frost: The Reader and the Poet. Athens, Ga.: The University of Georgia Press, 1991. Phelan, James. “Rhetorical Literary Ethics and Lyric Narrative: Robert Frost’s ‘Home Burial’.” Poetics Today 25.4 (Winter 2004): 627–651. Poirier, Richard. Robert Frost: The Work of Knowing. New York: Oxford UP, 1977.

“After Apple-Picking”

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Reading to Write

fter Apple-Picking” is one of Frost’s best known and most admired poems. Frost’s biographer Jeffrey Meyers calls it a “perfect fusion of pastoral and poetic labor” (116); critic Donald Grenier states, “it is my nomination for Frost’s greatest poem” (229); writer Joyce Carol Oates calls it “my favorite Frost poem” (9). The poem is a remarkable example of Frost’s signature ability to present a simple scene, moving in its own right, that still points to metaphoric depths that enable readers to interpret it in as many ways as they like. The surface hints at hidden depths receptive to varied interpretations that respond to and reward whatever degree of attention the reader cares to offer. “After Apple-Picking” first appeared in the collection North of Boston in 1923, along with other classic Frost poems such as “Mending Wall,” “Home Burial,” “The Death of the Hired Man,” and “The WoodPile.” Alone among even those great poems, “After Apple-Picking” is the wrenching depiction of someone on the verge of existential collapse. He has worked himself to exhaustion and is giving up, noting that there may be a little work left to do, but he is not going to do it. Perhaps he will be rejuvenated to begin again the next time the task needs to be performed, but perhaps not. He does not know, and he does not seem to care. That final melancholy exhaustion may be the key to why the poem is so cherished and highly respected. The speaker has displayed an admirable work ethic, working through physical pain, working in the cold, and working with care. Yet he is worn out by it, in a way that we all can appreciate and may even have experienced, and he does not seem to think that

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his effort has amounted to much. The apple barrels are full, but he could not save them all from damage no matter how carefully he worked. Now, to the speaker, such caution and investment in the task do not seem to matter. He displays no sense of accomplishment, only indifference. There is something pitiable in the speaker, but there is also something to be feared as we wonder if our individual labor—no matter what its nature or character—is as pointless as the speaker seems to think his has been.

Topics and Strategies The following topics are meant to serve as triggering questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes The central image of the poem is of labor, the process of and actions involved in apple picking. The speaker describes the physical strain of picking the fruit, the care of inspecting each and treating it carefully in order not to bruise it. His labor is successfully completed as the apples are gathered and sorted. But then what? The title tells us that the poet is concerned with what happens after the apples are harvested, but the poem does not reveal it or transport the reader to that moment or time when the chore is complete. We know the speaker is tired and preoccupied with the idea of sleeping, but he does not know what kind of sleep he will have. Moreover, the final image we get of the labor is that of discarding any dropped apples. None that fall can be salvaged, which hints at a kind of futility in the effort by suggesting that even the greatest of care results in a damaged product. Working with this notion of labor, you might want to consider apple picking as a metaphor for creative labor. The apple can be seen as representing a poem, and each is handled carefully by the speaker/poet. Not all can be used, and many are damaged in the act of working with them to the point that they have to be cast aside. Frost’s poem can be interpreted as offering an insightful and moving commentary on the craft and labor of writing poetry. Dreams are a key part of many works of fiction and poetry. Dreams can offer the writer a chance to show how his or her characters create or provide their own metaphors for their situations. What is the

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significance of Frost’s speaker being able to tell what form his dreaming will take during the sleep he so eagerly anticipates? What does it reveal about the speaker’s attitude, his sense of control and capacity for wonder? What is the significance of the speaker discussing dreams immediately after relating the image of the pane of ice he looked through before letting it break and melt?

Sample Topics: 1. Labor: What is the poem saying about the nature of labor? Is it practiced for its own sake, or must it be expended in order to accomplish a specific goal? Frost’s speaker gleans satisfaction from his work to a point, but he is tentative about it; when it comes to an end, he does not always know what he wants next. Frost’s speaker enjoys his work, even actively seeks it out at first, but then grows so tired of it that he derives no joy in being finished, only exhaustion. For an essay revolving around this topic, consider Frost’s descriptions of labor, the assertion of how tedious the work can be, and identify clues in the poem that indicate whether or not the speaker thinks the end results were worth the effort. Pay close attention to the idea that some conclusion is sought or arrived at, as suggested by the title, but the poem does not reveal to the reader what it is. Examine the hints and offer your interpretation. 2. The labor of writing poetry: How can we read this poem as a commentary on the writing of poetry? Begin by thinking of poems and poetry in place of every reference to apples and apple picking. Note how easy it is to follow the poem’s evolving line of thinking by replacing the apple picker with a poet and the actual act of apple picking with the labor of crafting poetry. Examine every image in the poem, discussing how the poem’s surface imagery of working with apples is a way of illustrating the effort that goes into producing poetry. Be sure to note the poet/speaker’s weariness and his desire to harvest the “poems,” only to be worn out by this very act of creation to the point that he is willing to leave some unpicked/unwritten.

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3. Dreams: What does the speaker’s dream tell us about his perspective on his situation? The dream contained in “After Apple-Picking” shows us the character’s efforts to contextualize and find significance in his situation. He describes the “form [his] dreaming was about to take”; in developing a strong thesis for this topic, you will want to examine the images and sensations of that dream. Imagine the situation of someone who is physically drained from the work of picking apples, is almost finished, and knows he can soon rest. Interpret his dream. What are the implications of the fact that he describes the dream as an indicator of “what will trouble / This sleep of mine”? Why does the speaker choose the word trouble?

History and Context Frost owned a farm but was at best a lackadaisical farmer. He was no doubt familiar with apple picking, and his descriptions of the work and the specific pains it causes (the ache in the feet from standing on the ladder’s rounded rungs) are the kinds of details that help a poem achieve an authenticity and a sense of realism. The poet displays his knowledge of and familiarity with the process, and he clearly has had time to think about the significance of that labor, so his observations and attempts at unearthing poetic truth are given weight, seriousness, and the ring of veracity. But the industriousness of Frost’s speaker in “After Apple-Picking” transcends the physical industriousness of Frost the farmer. One critic has written a scathingly funny short article that mocks Frost for being “chronically lazy” and sees in the poem a “rare glimpse of Frost completing a full day’s work, one that just about kills him” (O’Connell 97). Such an approach injects a more skeptical note into possible interpretations of “After Apple-Picking,” forcing us to reconsider how seriously we should take a poem that expresses familiarity with a level of honest labor that some would argue Frost himself worked to avoid.

Sample Topic: 1. Frost’s ethos as hardworking farmer: How does knowing the biographical details of Frost’s life influence our reading of the poem?

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost Some of Frost’s appeal as an author derived from his public persona, an image that consisted in part of him being a genial, wise, gentleman farmer. Frost worked hard to cultivate his public persona—to his advantage. It is difficult not to think that a firstperson poem is being spoken directly by the author. When we read first-person fiction, we recognize that the narrator is a character, not the author, but in first-person poetry, some readers more readily think of a disembodied voice speaking than a specific character being presented. An essay plumbing the depths of the speaker/ author relationship could focus on three topics: Frost’s biography and his actual experiences as a farmer and someone who relished outdoor life; Frost’s efforts to create a public persona; and the relationship between the real Frost, the persona, and the speaker of this poem. You will want to demonstrate how the persona and the actual Frost differ, and you will want to discuss how our idea of Frost influences how we receive, read, and interpret his poems.

Philosophy and Ideas “After Apple-Picking” can be read as an existentialist exploration of the nature and inherent goals of labor. The poem is not solely about a man tired after picking apples; rather, it presents a man tired because we all live and work in an imperfect world in which efforts expended often accomplish little change or discernible result. This notion is a common concern of Frost’s poetry; you might wish to consult “The Oven-Bird” to see how he presents the notion there.

Sample Topic: 1. A compromised world: Is the poem set in a dystopian or fallen world? Is Frost’s choice of presenting the specific task of apple picking a biblical reference to Adam and Eve and the fall from innocence? How would such an interpretation affect your overall understanding of the poem? To discuss this topic, you will need to explain the nature of the fallen world Frost presents. How is the biblical notion of a postlapsarian world (meaning after the Fall, as described in the book of Genesis) borne out in “After Apple-Picking.” Focus on the opening image of the ladder pointing toward heaven.

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What does it signify that the speaker has left the ladder in place but is finished using it? Is the fact that it is “two-pointed” of any relevance to the poem? Does Frost inject a tone of futility from the onset?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery Apples are the central image of the poem, and while they certainly represent literal apples, they also take on extra significance as the key image in the dream the speaker relates to the reader. In it, apples are magnified, and while it makes sense that someone who is exhausted from climbing ladders, picking apples, and trying not to drop and bruise them might dream of giant apples, we should consider what else the apple might stand for. In addition to the notion that the magnified dream apples represent all of the apples that have filled the dreamer’s recent days, there is the possibility that the dream is a means of stating that the speaker has been working with thousands of apples but not truly seeing them, thus a giant apple is conjured that he is then forced to study and think about. The question, though, is what has he been missing? What will he learn if he pays close attention to an apple? What does the apple represent that he needs to pay more attention to? Biblical imagery gives the poem an additional interpretive layer. The poem can be read as the story of someone tired after the apple harvest, but it is also possible to view the poem as a Christian allegory. The speaker of “After Apple-Picking” looks through a pane of ice and, through it, the world appears dreamlike. A number of critics have compared this qualified vision to a reference made in the King James Version of I Corinthians 13:12 to seeing “through a glass, darkly.” Subsequent translations have rendered that somewhat ambiguous phrase as the equivalent of looking into a cloudy or dim mirror. Other biblical images are potentially present as well, as the speaker invites a religious interpretation by referencing heaven in line 2. As previously noted, the apples are reminiscent of the Garden of Eden, and the ladder that points to heaven suggests Jacob’s ladder, which he sees, also in a dream, populated with angels. The final lines of “After Apple-Picking” identify two kinds of sleep: The long sleep of the hibernating woodchuck is one, while “just some human sleep” is the other. By using the word just, Frost diminishes the value of human sleep and, by contrast, elevates the value of an animal’s sleep. Why would Frost distinguish among various forms of sleep? Are

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they metaphoric as well, or is sleep merely the sole refuge of the physically and mentally fatigued speaker?

Sample Topics: 1. Apples: What might the apples represent? The poem is about picking apples, and so that task supplies the central image. But if we read the act of picking apples as a metaphor for some other activity, then the apples acquire symbolic import worthy of investigation in greater depth. For example, some critics read the activity of apple picking as a metaphor for writing poetry. Alternately, the act of picking apples might be symbolic of all work, the labor of living, and the dream of magnified apples might be a dream that cautions us against letting our work consume us. Your thesis for an essay on this topic should state what you believe the apples could represent; your assertion needs to be well supported with examples from the poem. 2. Biblical imagery: In what ways can “After Apple-Picking” be viewed as a Christian allegory? To address this topic, you will need first to identify the objects and presences in the poem that allude to biblical images. Next, you will need to identify the biblical stories and themes that those images refer to and evoke. Finally, identify how such themes fit the poem’s narrative. Is Frost referencing the world that resulted from Adam’s sin in the Garden of Eden? Or is Frost arguing that he or people in general desire rest from their struggle with and alienation from their own spiritual natures? 3. The two kinds of sleep: What is the difference between the woodchuck’s “long sleep” and the speaker’s “just some human sleep”? You may want to concentrate on the metaphor of hibernation, of sleeping through the season of dormancy in preparation for the season of birth and renewal. A thesis for this paper could claim that the sleep of hibernation is a metaphor for death; you might

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then be able to develop an argument about what precisely is limiting about human sleep. Note that the speaker expects either form of sleep to be troubled. You will want to spend some time explaining that disturbance: Is it the dream he anticipates and has described? If so, what is distressing to the speaker about it?

Compare and Contrast Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s sonnet “Sleep” contains lines that almost exactly mirror lines from “After Apple-Picking,” and Frost’s poem projects the same sense of mental and physical exhaustion that is evident in Longfellow’s poem. By alluding so clearly to Longfellow, Frost invites the reader to examine how he has borrowed elements or themes from Longfellow’s poem and integrated them into his own. Longfellow is vague about the cares and toils that have made him so tired, while Frost is specific. Frost’s clearly identified toils can also be read metaphorically (the labor is not just his burden but everyone’s struggle; the apples he picks represent the creative labor of writing poems). “After Apple-Picking” shares a similar preoccupation with sleep with “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Both poems present a speaker who is tired, although “After Apple-Picking” makes the speaker’s weariness much more explicit and the focus of his attention. “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” on the other hand, invokes sleep and its attendant weariness only at the poem’s conclusion. The sleep of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” can easily be interpreted as death (although not necessarily so), while the sleep of “After Apple-Picking” is more difficult to interpret as death. If we read it as death, it somehow acquires less ominous associations. Comparing these poems could lead to some powerful insights about the nature of interpretation.

Sample Topics: 1. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “Sleep”: How does Frost use the Longfellow poem as a starting point? Does he then add complexity to Longfellow’s original handling of the topic of sleep and spiritual weariness? A paper on this topic would focus on identifying the major ideas in Longfellow’s poem and then discussing the ways Frost uses those ideas as building blocks for constructing his own

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost poem. Longfellow introduces the idea of work as wearying, for example; how does Frost build on that idea? What ideas or themes does Frost introduce that are not in Longfellow’s poem? How does the structure of each compare? The poems are not formally similar (rhymes, rhythm, stanzas, etc.), but they do construct their arguments in similar ways.

2. “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”: In what ways are the two poems similar in their turning to the escapism of sleep? Is sleep just sleep in each of the works? When is it meant as an invocation of death? “After Apple-Picking” takes place in the fall, with winter soon to follow; “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” takes place in the depths of winter. Winter is the season not only of dormancy but one frequently represented as a time of death. Many but not all critics believe that “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” is about death. “After Apple-Picking,” though it looks to winter and longs for sleep, is less often read as a poem explicitly about death. The surrounding context of each poem determines the way we interpret its metaphors. Examine the images and themes of each poem, arguing why one courts death more explicitly than the other. Does the speaker of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” feel some attraction toward death, while the speaker of “After Apple-Picking” simply wants to rest? Bibliography and Online Resources for “After Apple-Picking” Grenier, Donald J. “The Indispensable Robert Frost.” Critical Essays on Robert Frost. Ed. Philip L. Gerber. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co.: 220–240. Henry, Matthew. “Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, Unabridged.” Christian Classics Ethereal Library. 3 March 2009 Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. “Sleep.” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: A Maine Historical Society Website. 3 March 2009 Meyers, Jeffrey. Robert Frost: A Biography. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996.

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Oates, Joyce Carol. “First Loves: From ‘Jabberwocky’ to ‘After Apple-Picking.’ ” American Poetry Review 28.6 (November 1999): 9. O’Connell, Mike. “Frost’s After Apple-Picking.” Explicator 64.2 (Winter 2006): 97–98. Reed, Kenneth T. “Longfellow’s ‘Sleep’ and Frost’s ‘After Apple-Picking.’ ” American Notes & Queries 10.9 (May 1972): 134–135.

“The Wood-Pile”

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he Wood-Pile” was included in Frost’s second collection, North of Boston, along with such well-known poems as “Mending Wall,” “The Death of the Hired Man,” and “After Apple-Picking.” “The WoodPile” is often anthologized but still overshadowed by the poet’s other canonical works, and the poem has received little attention from literary critics. While the glancing attention it has received has been positive, critics generally praise the poem in passing before turning their attention to Frost’s other poems. In many respects, “The Wood-Pile” is a representative Frost poem. It is told from the first-person perspective of someone alone and outside, far from home and lost but not panicked about being so. He or she is surrounded by trees; it is winter. There is a single bird and then a pile of wood to occupy the speaker’s attention. In typical Frost fashion, the bird and then the woodpile begin as objects for the speaker to observe but quickly give way to deeper observations and meanings. The objects are not entirely noteworthy because of their own properties but because of what those properties signify: The careful stacking of the wood embodies the handiwork of someone who carefully ordered the logs, for instance, and it is to thinking about what the woodpile means that the speaker devotes his efforts. “The Wood-Pile” is a rewarding poem to explicate. The poem is loosely structured in four parts. The first part introduces the speaker, trekking through the woods in winter. The second part introduces the bird, the third part introduces the woodpile, and in the fourth part the speaker offers thoughts about the person who chopped the wood, stacked it, and then left it without ever coming back for it. As simple as this poem appears to be at first, complexities and ambiguities quickly emerge. If the

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title of the poem is “The Wood-Pile,” and the key object is a stack of logs, what is the purpose of the bird? What reflections does the speaker offer about the bird that either tell us something about who he or she is and how he or she thinks or that help to set up the reflections about the wood pile? What of the woodpile itself? Is there anything the speaker or reader might think of other than the person who made it? Nature is reclaiming the wood as it decays and as the vines grow around and through the pile. Is this a commentary on the transience of our presence compared to the resilience of nature? The speaker imagines the person who chopped and stacked the wood. What do you make of the way the speaker projects a happy ending, rather than assuming that some unhappy event has kept the woodcutter from returning for the wood after all this time? The interpretive task that this poem presents is more complex than it may at first seem, but it is one that is not difficult once you begin sifting through the elements of the poem and teasing out their implications.

Topics and Strategies The following topics are questions and commentary that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes The speaker of “The Wood-Pile” is lost or at least unsure of his whereabouts. The speaker considers turning back but decides to press forward. Now that he is telling us of the trip, the walk in the woods, he does not think it important to identify exactly where he was; either he does not know, or it does not matter to his purpose now. All we need to know is that he “was just far from home”—and lost. Frost’s poems often present their speakers as being lost and alone, and the heightened focus that comes with being in uncertain surroundings seems to lead to the insights at the heart of so much of his best work. Being lost is somehow crucial to the speaker’s ability to discover some new thought or to ruminate effectively. The speaker chooses an optimistic reason why the woodpile has been abandoned: The woodsman has moved on to other “fresh tasks” and forgotten about the wood he so carefully cut and stacked. There is something naively blind about this interpretation, though, for it seems much

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more likely that something must have happened to prevent the woodsman from returning for his wood. Frost reinforces that interpretation for us by having his speaker come to another, unconvincing conclusion: that something tragic must have happened to the woodsman preventing his return. This is so probable and obvious a conclusion, however, the speaker may tacitly and willfully reject any such notion. Frost thus infuses his poem with the pathos of the speaker’s refusal to think realistically and to confront the unpleasant. One of the more apparent themes of the poem is that of futility. The woodsman has labored to prepare firewood that he never then uses. The wood itself has been cut to be burned, and as such it is not much use for anything else. No one is using it, though, and the poem states that the firewood produces heat the only way it can, through decay. This underscores the ways in which the poem calls specific attention to the idea of people and things being useful and productive. The woodsman has been productive but unable to complete the entire project, and the wood is unproductive because it cannot get to a more “useful” place, such as a fireplace.

Sample Topics: 1. Being lost: Why is it important that the speaker of the poem is lost? One approach to an essay on this topic would be to argue that being lost requires you to pay more attention to your surroundings, and thus you are more likely to notice things, think about them, and find meaning in them. Being lost in a physical sense is also a metaphor for being lost spiritually or mentally. Does the speaker seem lost on a metaphorical level? What argument can you make for how the woodpile, thoughts of the woodsman, or even the bird help the speaker find himself? 2. Denial: Is the speaker refusing to acknowledge fatalism? The speaker’s denial of reality ironically emphasizes reality all the more. To develop this topic further, you will want to discuss what the speaker thinks has happened to the woodcutter with evidence that something more tragic has occurred in actuality. You do not have to argue that tragedy is the more likely

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outcome, just that the speaker fails to acknowledge the option. Your goal in an essay on denial is to argue that Frost’s technique of indirectly getting the reader to think about something the poem does not mention helps to make the poem’s intended point all the more powerful. 3. Futility and purpose: How does the poem’s image of rotting wood suggest a universal futility? Where does the poem’s meaning lie? You might argue that it is contained both in the pile of wood that is unable to fulfill its purpose and the image of the woodsman whose effort and labor have accomplished nothing. What do these images indicate about the human condition? Are we doomed to leave things uncompleted? Is the wood’s inability to fulfill its inherent function (to burn and generate heat) representative of the ultimate futility of life?

Philosophy and Ideas “The Wood-Pile” can be viewed as a meditation on poetry. The speaker of the poem responds to the pile of wood as if it was something to be interpreted. He thinks of the effort of the woodsman to assemble the individual elements of the pile, and he notices the care and precision evident in the woodsman’s efforts. Then he thinks about how the woodsman moved on to other tasks, leaving the wood for someone else to find and think about, perhaps to even use. The speaker then becomes the reader of the poem, confronting someone else’s creative labor, thinking about the creator and the purpose and significance of the act of creation. How does the woodpile’s history—from creation to dormancy to decay to being found by the speaker—symbolize the history of a poem?

Sample Topics: 1. The woodpile as symbol for a poem: How might this poem be a meditation on poetry itself? “The Wood-Pile” potentially offers a commentary on the relationship between poet, poetry, and reader, with the woodpile representing poetry, the speaker representing the reader, and the woodsman representing the poet. What does the poem

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost have to say about each? Your essay could consider each in turn, starting with the way the three main elements are presented and characterized in the poem, and then imagining how that characterization might apply to what the poem, poet, or reader each stands for. For example, are we to understand that a poem is like an abandoned woodpile, carefully constructed but then forgotten when the poet moves on to other things? The speaker of the poem goes about the task of imagining what the wood pile signifies. Is this also the reader’s job?

2. The woodsman as a deity or spiritual presence: How might we read the woodsman as a representative of or the embodiment of an invisible spiritual presence? You might argue that the woodsman is a stand-in for an abstract creator figure or spiritual force: The reader never glimpses the woodcutter, only the work that he has performed and abandoned. The woodpile emerges in the poem as something the speaker seems to think the woodcutter has forgotten about. How full a picture of the woodsman and his work does the speaker produce? What does the poem suggest about us, moving through a world that has been created for us?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery Some of the language of “The Wood-Pile” hints at confinement, even imprisonment. As the speaker walks through the swamp, all he can see are “lines / Straight up and down of tall slim trees”; the woodpile is bound by the clematis vines that have grown around it, as well as by a stake and a prop. The bird that the speaker follows seems to be trying to flee. Through the interplay of these various images, actions, and ideas, Frost is able to establish a tone of tension and containment. Before the speaker finds the woodpile, he watches a bird flit ahead of him through the trees. Just as he will later interpret the woodpile’s abandonment, he also interprets the birds actions: To his mind, the bird avoids him because it thinks he wants to steal its white tail feather. The speaker has no interest in stealing from the bird, and he compares the bird’s vanity to that of people who think all conversations are about them. The speaker directs a surprising amount of disdain toward the

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animal, which is acting on instinct but to whom the speaker attributes human motives—and unflattering ones at that. But the bird also serves as a prelude to the poem’s main theme of futility. The woodsman’s efforts have come to waste, as the wood he cut so carefully rots instead of being used for its purpose. Similarly, the bird’s efforts are wasted, as it works to defend itself against a nonexistent threat. The speaker does not acknowledge that the bird’s actions are logical or defensible for their own sake; rather, the speaker dismisses the bird’s work as foolish preening.

Sample Topics: 1. Confinement: Is a sense of confinement one effect Frost was attempting to achieve? How do the poem’s imagery and language create a mood of claustrophobia? The imagery and language of “The Wood-Pile” can be viewed as highly confining, despite the open, outdoor space in which the poem is set. To develop this topic, you will need to find and explain the imagery that contributes to this mood or tone. You will also want to argue how a general sense of confinement relates to the poem’s larger themes, such as futility. 2. The bird: What role does the bird play? How does the bird’s portrayal speak to the role and function of symbol in the poem in general? To discuss the intersection of symbolism and the bird in the poem, you might argue that the bird reinforces the poem’s primary preoccupation with futility and fatalism. To this end, you will need to write an extended discussion of the ways the bird’s efforts parallel those of the woodsman. Notice also how the speaker responds to each, admiring the work of the woodsman and dismissing the work of the bird. How do these contribute to the poem’s broader meaning?

Compare and Contrast In “Directive,” the speaker/guide notes that we have to get fully lost before we can find ourselves (“if you’re lost enough to find yourself”). In “The Wood-Pile,” the speaker acknowledges that he is so lost he can

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identify his location with no more precision than merely noting he is “just far from home.” The poem suggests that the speaker is only able to make sense of the woodpile he finds because he is lost enough to focus on it and think about it when he stumbles across it. Being lost somehow pushes distractions out of his mind and leads him to a place of mental clarity that will enable him to draw a lesson from his predicament. The bird darts away from the speaker of “The Wood-Pile” as if the speaker were a threat. The speaker is not concerned with the bird and means it no harm, but he also fails to realize that it is natural and expected that the bird would be on the defensive. This sets up an interesting relationship between humans and the natural realm, a relationship in which we see ourselves interacting with nature in a way that is not entirely accurate. We are intrusive and out of place, and the work we do in nature is absorbed back into the wild, if we let it be. The woodpile is beginning to crumble, just as the home and farm of “Directive” have been reclaimed by the natural order.

Sample Topics: 1. Getting lost in “The Wood-Pile” and “Directive”: How does being lost inform and function in each of the poems? Have the speakers needed to lose themselves in order to find themselves? An essay on this topic could consider the way the play on words of “lost” and “find” in “Directive” helps to explain the situation of the speaker in “The Wood-Pile.” Consider and explain why the guide in “Directive” needs us to become lost. Why must we be lost before his teachings will make sense? Why must we be lost physically before we can find ourselves metaphorically? Then, argue how the speaker of “The Wood-Pile,” once he is accidentally lost, is able to find some perspective or meaning that he would otherwise never have found. You might also consider drawing a parallel between the poem’s guides. Is the bird a guide of sorts, like the speaker of “Directive”? 2. Nature in “The Wood-Pile” and “Directive”: What do these poems tell us about our place in nature?

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To compare the role and portrayal of nature in these two poems, the essay will need to adopt a position on human relations to the natural world. Do we have a balanced or imbalanced relationship? Explore the images and ideas of each poem that indicate how tenuous our control over nature is and how poorly we seem to understand our place in nature. Bibliography for “The Wood-Pile” Bagby, George F., Jr. “Frost’s Synecdochism.” American Literature 58.3 (October 1986): 379–392. Hinrichsen, Lisa. “A Defensive Eye: Anxiety, Fear and Form in the Poetry of Robert Frost.” Journal of Modern Literature 31.3 (Spring 2008): 44–57. Kemp, John C. Robert Frost and New England: The Poet as Regionalist. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1979. Spurr, David. “Architecture in Frost and Stevens.” Journal of Modern Literature 25.3 (Spring 2005): 72–86.

“The Road Not Taken”

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he Road Not Taken” may be one of the most misread and misunderstood of all of Frost’s poems. The poem is in the mode of Frost’s reverie poems, like “Birches,” in which the speaker is older and thinking back on events from his past. It is set in the woods, yet another commonplace of Frost’s poetry, in the early fall when the leaves have turned but have not completely fallen to the forest floor. The final lines are the source of confusion for readers who view the poem as a warning against the dangers of conformity: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I — I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. Taken by themselves, the lines can be read as the satisfied reflection of someone pleased to have followed a path that most people did not pursue. But the lines, even by themselves, do not have to be read that way. The speaker has no doubt taken the less common road, but he tells us only that it made all the difference, not what that difference was. There is nothing in these lines that insists the difference was a positive result or outcome from making the divergent choice. When the poem is considered as a whole, such an explicitly anticonformist reading bears less credence. Preceding the lines previously quoted, the speaker states, “I shall be telling this with a sigh / Somewhere ages and ages hence.” Why a “sigh”? Is it a sigh of contentment or

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of regret? The speaker is looking to the future. He will be talking about the choice he made one day in the perhaps distant future, and he will be telling what a difference the decision made. How does he already know the outcome of this choice? Is it not possible to imagine that he made an irreversibly bad choice that he found hard to recover from rather than an informed, smart choice that has set everything in order? Frost’s poem leaves the issue less resolved than certain prevailing interpretations and common perception have led readers to believe. Nonetheless, this openended, ambiguous nature that infuses “The Road Not Taken” is a hallmark of some of Frost’s best poems. Ultimately, the poem is not about outcomes; rather, as biographer Jeffrey Meyers puts it, the poem is about “the decision about which road to take” (141). By shifting the focus to the process of deciding and not its intended or desired result, the poem is opened to a wealth of interpretive analysis, once the foregone happy conclusion has been qualified or questioned.

Topics and Strategies The following topics are intended to prompt your own interpretive direction as you work closely with and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes The idea of choice lies at the center of the poem. This view has been noted by a number of critics, but what exactly does the poem have to say about choices? The title of the poem asks us to think about the road that was not chosen. Thinking in terms of general human indecision, the poem may be telling us simply to be satisfied with our choices, whatever they are, since we know they are always based on imperfect knowledge. The speculation that the poem is based on an actual experience Frost once had centering on the notion of the doppelgänger (see the History and Context section) calls special attention to the speaker’s recognition that he is only one person, so he cannot take both paths; this realization emphasizes the importance of choice, since we cannot undo our decisions. Finally, several critics have grappled with the speaker’s apparent distortion or misrepresentation of the nature of his choices: If the paths are the same (the speaker looks long at one path but then chooses the

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other, “as just as fair”), why does the speaker distinguish what are essentially the same paths at the end and say he took the “one less traveled”? The speaker of the poem imagines growing old and looking back over his life, reflecting on the choices he has made and analyzing and discussing them. The “sigh” with which he tells the story is ambiguous. Is it a sigh of regret or a sigh of contentment? The poem offers no clarification to these ambiguities. How we choose to interpret the mood of the speaker’s sigh may ultimately say as much about how each of us views life as it does about the poem. A standard reading of the poem finds in its last stanza a rousing embrace for nonconformity. There is ample evidence in the poem that the two paths are similar. Neither presents a clear choice in any regard, so many critics bristle at the notion that the poem champions individualism. Many other readers still interpret the poem as a nonconformist’s ode. Is it possible to read it this way and be fair to the entire poem?

Sample Topics: 1. Choice: What commentary does the poem provide about the nature of choice? An essay on this topic could consider the way choice is depicted and reflected on in the poem. Is Frost simply arguing that we should be more respectful of the act of making choices? Because we cannot take both options (“I could not travel both / And be one traveler”) we cannot be careless in our choices. Another might be that the speaker is lying not to us but to himself, trying to make the choice he made seem more daring than it actually was. Yet another view might be that the speaker made a completely random choice and the poem is a comment on making instinctive or foolhardy decisions. 2. Regret: Does the poem suggest the speaker is regretful or content? In taking on this topic, one could argue that the sigh is neither one of regret or satisfaction but is the wordless expression of an older, wiser person who has learned that the choice he did not make will always hold the mystery of the unknown. For every

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choice made, there is the potential tease of the options that were not selected or that were denied to us. Is the speaker lamenting the fact that choice was somehow forced upon him and that neither was the ideal choice? Or does the speaker derive a sense of thrill and comfort in knowing his present course contained an element of the random, of conclusions and challenges not clear to him at the time the decision was made? 3. Conformity and individualism: Can the poem be read, fairly, as a treatise in support of individualism? To thoroughly analyze a poem, you must account for everything in it when offering your interpretation. You cannot take a line out of context in support of your thesis, while ignoring all that has come before it or the words that follow. While Frost asserts that he took the road less traveled, your interpretation must still factor in or compensate for the lines earlier in the poem when he says the diverging roads were about the same. Still, the speaker notes that the paths were worn about the same—close, but not identical, that is. He may have taken the road that was less traveled, even if it was only slightly less used. One approach to this topic might be to argue that Frost’s poem makes it clear that one road was less worn, just not as much as some readers would like to imagine.

History and Context Frost says that “The Road Not Taken” arose from the impulse to mock an indecisive friend, but some critics have identified it as “a poetic rendering of a doppelgänger experience by Frost” (George 230). Jeffrey Meyers explains this in more detail, quoting a letter Frost wrote about walking alone on country roads in the middle of winter. Frost says he was surprised to see someone else out walking, someone who “looked for all the world like myself. . . . I felt as if I was going to meet my own image in a slanting mirror. . . . I stood in wonderment and let him pass by” (qtd. in Meyers 141). According to biographer Lawrance Thompson, Frost introduced the poem by saying, “You have to be careful of that one. It is a tricky poem— very tricky” (qtd. in Finger 478). If we wish to take Frost at his word, the idea that the poem is “tricky” is an intriguing and somewhat tantalizing

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invitation. It would seem to mean that any obvious interpretations we apply to the poem are overlooking some deeper meaning and that we should not be lulled into thinking we have figured the poem out until we have spent time pursuing an alternate meaning or discerning what the trick might be. Frost could also be suggesting, as some critics have noted, that the poem makes it clear that the paths are not very different, yet the speaker says choosing one over the other has “made all the difference.” The question for many critics, then, is why choosing one over the other makes any difference at all since the paths seem virtually identical. Taking a writer’s comments about how to interpret his or her writing is always precarious. Some writers enjoy being misleading when they discuss their work, and even if they mean to offer an accurate, truthful answer, what they meant a poem to do is not necessarily what it actually accomplishes in its final form. Frost once wrote in warning, “Do not trust me. Trust the poems” (qtd. in Meyers 94). Frost did not want people to read “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” as a pessimistic poem, yet it seems to invite a dark reading. Frost may have wanted people to believe that “The Road Not Taken” was tricky or unusually complex, but perhaps it is not. Perhaps his efforts to be difficult or evasive are so obscure that they do not translate directly to the reader, leaving us with a poem that presents a satisfying surface meaning that cannot support efforts to pry it apart. One of the more condemnatory criticisms of Frost comes from the critic Yvor Winters in an article called “Robert Frost: or, the Spiritual Drifter as Poet.” Winters critiques Frost for having no perspective outside his poem. “The Road Not Taken” presents an arbitrary choice between two paths and claims that this somehow makes a difference in the speaker’s life. For Winters, the poem is incomplete for stopping at this point and not pushing on to a richer epiphany or elucidation. The speaker is a “spiritual drifter,” someone who makes “whimsical, accidental, and incomprehensible” moral decisions (61). Winters acknowledges that such people exist and that their lack of moral compass or guidance is fair subject for a poem. But the poet cannot actually or fully assume the guise of a spiritual drifter because the poet should be able to offer some perspective on the spiritual drifter’s limitations. Frost cannot provide this perspective, which means his poem “puts on the reader a burden of critical intelligence which ought to be borne by the poet” (61).

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Sample Topics: 1. Doppelgängers: How might the poem enact or reflect the concept of the doppelgänger? Doppelgänger combines two German words: doppel (“double”) and gänger (“goer,” or “one who goes”). We use the term to mean anything from a look-alike to a ghostly version of ourselves. Frost notes in the poem that he could not go down both roads because he is only one traveler. Is there an element of wistfulness? Did the experience he had walking in the wintry woods and seemingly coming across another physical version of himself focus his attention on the fact that there is only one of each of us? Does that make the poem a realistic statement about the nature of experience as limited to one consciousness trapped in time? Or is the poem perhaps an imagining or fanciful consideration of what it would be like if we could be more than one traveler? In developing an essay on this topic, consider the ways Frost’s poem is a testament to the ways our lives are circumscribed by our physical limitations. 2. “It is a tricky poem”: What is tricky about “The Road Not Taken”? What complexities and ambiguities are present, and how do they contribute to a clearer or murkier understanding of the poem? “The Road Not Taken” presents several key themes, such as the nature of regret and choice. Perhaps Frost would have his readers dig a little more deeply into the poem, looking past the surface themes for something more obscure but all the more rewarding. You might look to the speaker of the poem for possibilities. Notice that he is telling us about his past experience as well as about his future thoughts on the experience. He is somewhere in the middle. What is his perspective on his younger and older selves? How is looking back in our lives and also looking forward to imagine our futures a useful approach to living in the present?

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3. Is it a tricky poem?: Is it possible that Frost is misleading us, or that he does not understand his own poem? Is it possible he is presenting the illusion that the poem has a discernible solution, like a puzzle or a mystery, when it actually does not? The science fiction author Isaac Asimov once noted that he got so caught up in the technique of a story he was writing that he lost sight of the content, and the story wound up supporting a position he disagreed with. He says that another critic “once said that he liked this story, even though he disagreed with its philosophy, and to my embarrassment, I find that that is exactly how I myself feel” (172). This anecdote illustrates that authors cannot be trusted to know exactly what they have written, that they can mean for their writing to convey one thing only to find that it conveys something else. With that in mind, you could write a paper that argues “The Road Not Taken” is not tricky at all and that efforts to overcomplicate its meaning require ignoring or misinterpreting the poem as it is written. 4. Frost as spiritual drifter: Do you agree or disagree with Yvor Winters’s characterization of Frost? Does the philosophical or spiritual aspect of some of Frost’s poetry encourage lazy thinking on his part and thus unfinished or not fully realized poems? Read Winters’s essay and pay close attention to the limits he sees in Frost’s skills as a poet, which primarily are limits of intellect. You may want to argue that Frost is not the spiritual drifter as represented by his poem’s speaker. Alternately, you may want to argue that calling attention to the plight of the spiritual drifter is a useful role of poetry even if the poet cannot provide a means of transcending that plight. Finally, you may want to argue that the poem does not depict a spiritual drifter as defined by Winters at all.

Form and Genre Frost says in a letter that this poem was written as a way to make fun of his friend Edward Thomas. The two would go for walks, and Thomas “had a penchant for choosing one path to show Frost some botanical delight

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and then fretting over the fact that he had not chosen another, perhaps better path” (Bassett 42). Jeffrey Meyers calls the poem “mildly satiric” (140), while others have called it a “slightly mocking parody” (George 230). Satire and parody are not the same thing. Satire, in its broadest sense, is a way of making fun of something in order to correct it. The goal of satirical representation may be, for example, to highlight hypocrisy. Satire always has a serious purpose behind its jokes. Parody, on the other hand, is a sort of caricature, a way of emphasizing the defining features of a genre. One goal of parody may be simply to isolate and make fun of conventions, and as such parody tends to have less serious implications.

Sample Topic: 1. Parody or satire?: How can “The Road Not Taken” be read as either a parody or a satire? If the poem really is a joke based on Edward Thomas’s constant worry that he has made the wrong decision, can that joke be categorized as parody or satire? Your approach to an essay on this topic could center on claiming that the poem is a parody, a satire, both, or neither. You will need to rely on critical definitions; The Harper Handbook to Literature offers useful definitions of each term that will help you make your argument. Then, explicate the poem, imagining Thomas himself as the speaker of the poem. To what degree, and for what purpose, is Frost making fun of him? To what degree, and for what purpose, is Frost making fun of indecision in general?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery Seasons of the year are commonly used in poetry to refer to periods in a person’s life, moving from the spring of youth to the winter of old age. The time of year is always significant in Frost’s poetry. You might want to think about poems like “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” set in the deep of winter, or “The Oven Bird,” set in late summer, or “After Apple-Picking,” set in early fall. The speaker of “The Road Not Taken” notes that he is in a “yellow wood,” and this establishes the season for us from the beginning. Just as the season indicates the stage of the speaker’s life, the road is easily interpreted as a metaphor for one’s movement through life. Robert Fleissner argues that the road is Frost’s personal path and that the road he

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chooses is that of aesthetics and the life of a poet, while the road he did not take is the road of traditional employment or entering academia, since Frost moved in and out of teaching. Other readings stay away from viewing the poem as autobiographical, looking instead at the poem as a commentary on how any of us makes our way down the road of our own lives.

Sample Topics: 1. The yellow wood: What is the significance of the season in “The Road Not Taken”? For this paper, identify the time of year that the “yellow” wood indicates and argue the significance of that season to the poem. You may want to look to other Frost poems for examples of the way he uses the seasons to establish moods or to imply something about the speaker’s stage of life. Your thesis for this paper could connect the season—fall—to the speaker’s time of life and, using clues from the poem, argue that the reflections the speaker is having are somehow appropriate to middle age. 2. The road of life: How does this poem depict the road of life? A possible thesis for this paper is that life stretches before us like a road and that as we travel that road we will have to make decisions about where to go next. You would want to discuss the imagery, how the poem hints that we try to determine how worn or obscure certain paths are before we set off down them.

Compare and Contrast It can be instructive to consider the way other writers have depicted choice in their works. One of the best known literary works exploring how we make choices is Henry James’s novel The Portrait of a Lady. One of the central ideas of the novel is the exploration of Isabel Archer’s choices, which she makes carefully and thoughtfully based on the information she has, but that information is always incomplete. Her choices make sense based on what she knows, but as she finds out more, she discovers how unfortunate and ill-informed her choices are. Another, perhaps less obvious, comparison is to T. S. Eliot’s poem, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” Prufrock is afraid to do anything

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(he asks, “Do I dare disturb the universe?”) and so does nothing. It might seem as though he makes no choices, but he chooses, perhaps in spite of himself, to do nothing. In contrast, Frost’s speaker does not suffer from indecision but perhaps makes an impulsive, impetuous decision.

Sample Topics: 1. The Portrait of a Lady: How do Isabel Archer’s decisions and decision-making process compare to those of the speaker in “The Road Not Taken”? When taken together, James’s novel and Frost’s poem provide a comprehensive consideration of how to make choices and how choices affect our lives. It may not be necessary for you to be familiar with the entire James novel; chapter 42 depicts Isabel Archer thinking about her decisions, what she did and did not know at the time. Such deliberation may give you enough to work with to compare the way decisions are made in the novel and the poem. 2. “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”: How do Prufrock’s indecisions compare to the decisions faced in Frost’s poem? Both poems offer a commentary on how choices comprise the substance of our lives, but Frost suggests that we make the choices we make for good or for ill, while Eliot suggests that we fear making choices and taking action to the point of paralysis. Given how ambiguous “The Road Not Taken” is, however, could it be that both poems offer the same commentary on the nature of choice in the modern world? Bibliography and Online Resources for “The Road Not Taken” Asimov, Isaac. Nightfall and Other Stories. Greenwich, Conn.: Fawcett Publications, Inc., 1969. Bassett, Patrick F. “Frost’s ‘The Road Not Taken.’ ” Explicator 39.3 (Spring 1981): 41–43. Eliot, T. S. “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” Bartleby.com 3 March 2009 Finger, Larry L. “Frost’s ‘The Road Not Taken’: A 1925 Letter Come To Light.” American Literature 50.3 (November 1978): 478–479.

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Fleissner, Robert F. “A Road Taken: The Romantically Different Ruelle.” Robert Frost: Studies of the Poetry. Ed. Kathryn Gibbs Harris. Boston: G. K. Hall, & Co., 1979. 117–132. Frye, Northrop, et. al. The Harper Handbook to Literature. 2nd ed. New York: Longman, 1997. George, William. “Frost’s ‘The Road Not Taken.’ ” Explicator 49.4 (Summer 1991): 230–232. Meyers, Jeffrey. Robert Frost: A Biography. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996. Winters, Yvor. “Robert Frost: or, the Spiritual Drifter as Poet.” Robert Frost: A Collection of Critical Essays. Ed. James M. Cox. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1962. 58–82.

“The Oven Bird”

“T

Reading to Write

he Oven Bird” can be seen as a quintessential Frost poem, in which the central ideas are solidly defined, but the ways to interpret those ideas are varied. You might begin with the final lines, which provide a key to interpreting the rest of the poem’s images and abstractions: “The question that he frames in all but words / Is what to make of a diminished thing.” To frame a question is to set the parameters of a topic you want to investigate, and the speaker of the poem tells us that the oven bird investigates and sings about a diminished thing. What object or notion is the bird singing about? And what can we learn from his song? You can write successfully about another critic’s interpretation, arguing for or against it, and this is an approach that can be helpful to you as a reader trying to understand the poem in the first place. John Cunningham, for example, argues this about the poem: The bird looks around at the diminished state of nature (summer is not as lush, beautiful, or promising as spring) and sings a song “offered with the confidence that comes of freedom from the illusion of beauty’s permanence . . . ; moreover, he knows and accepts that worse is to come with ‘the other fall.’ ” From this Cunningham determines that the bird’s advice is “relevant to a human being desirous of understanding his place in a universe where nothing gold can stay.” And what is that advice? Simply “to be rid of foolish illusions about the universe.” How did Cunningham come to this interpretation? Start with his idea that beauty is not permanent. Where does the poem address that? Lines 6–7 read, “He says the early petal-fall is past, / When pear and cherry bloom went down in showers”; Frost’s words refer to the change from spring to summer as the flowers of spring die and fall. Cunningham seems to extract from these lines the idea that beauty is not permanent, but note

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that he goes further in assuming that some of us believe, incorrectly, that beauty is permanent. After all, he says the oven bird is free from that illusion, and its advice to us is to be rid of such foolish illusions. Reading the poem closely generates a number of questions for you to sort through, many of which other critics have addressed and disagreed about. Is the oven bird speaking on behalf of nature, instructing us somehow? Does the oven bird represent the poet, and does that mean the poet’s job is to tell us what to make of diminished things? What might those diminished things be? The concept of entropy tells us that everything wears down over time. Since everything diminishes, could anything be an object of the oven bird’s song? If the bird represents the poet, are all things, then, subject to the poet’s attention? The poem tries to tell us what to make of an oven bird. Is the oven bird itself a diminished thing? Does that mean the poet is a diminished thing? Perhaps you can see how readily this poem lends itself to writing topics, because the oven bird, as a symbol, readily functions as a bird, and/or as the voice of nature’s perspective, and/or as a poet, while the diminished thing can be anything you think it worthwhile and supportable to analyze. Pay attention to the first part of that final line as well. The phrase “what to make” contains an ambiguity and points in two opposite directions. By singing of what to make of a diminished thing, is the oven bird able to stop things from diminishing further, or is it simply making the best of a bad situation that is only going to get worse? Or is it reminding us that something we have discarded, forgotten, or turned away from still has value and is worth another look?

Topics and Strategies The following topics are meant to serve as questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes One central idea in “The Oven Bird” is the notion of change. Frost employs the image of the seasons, changing from one to the next, and each a little less vibrant than the preceding one. The key to understanding the poem, then, may be in determining the nature of change as we experience it.

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Do we take a short view or a long view? The short view is that things will continue to change noticeably in our lifetimes. The long view is that we live in a time that is not as vibrant as what came long before us but that is somehow more vital than what will come long after us. How do we live meaningfully in either version of transience?

Sample Topics: 1. Transience: How do you interpret the poem’s perspective on transience? The oven bird is described as a “mid-summer and a mid-wood bird,” associated with midpoints or transitional spaces. What does it mean to be in the middle? How might you distinguish between being in the middle and being in-between? Does the poem suggest that we should wait for what is coming (“that other fall we name the fall”), or do we make the most of the moment we are currently in? If the bird represents the poet, what does the poem suggest the poet should do to help us understand our place in history, in relation to what has come before and what will come after? 2. Entropy: Is the poem offering us solace in the face of inevitable decline? The poem assumes a didactic function; it attempts to instruct us how to find joy or value in a world that is never going to be as glorious, pure, or vibrant as it once was. Our options are despair and self-pity or to find happiness, beauty, and meaning in our immediate situations and in the world around us. An essay could argue which option the poem supports, citing textual evidence to substantiate your claim.

History and Context Some critics have noted that Frost researched the oven bird extensively before writing about it, and an interesting paper could be written about the oven bird itself. What do we know about the bird’s coloring, song, diet, nesting habits, and territorialism, for example, that might help us understand why Frost chose this particular species? How does understanding the bird itself provide insight into the poem? The oven bird is relatively plain

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looking, even difficult to see. Its call is loud and distinctive, though, and Frost’s speaker assumes that we all have heard the oven bird’s song. A plain bird that is more likely to have been heard than seen becomes a disembodied voice, and as a disembodied voice it is no longer the routine cry of a bird but the voice of nature or nature’s representative. As you learn more about the oven bird’s distinctive characteristics, analyze the degree to which the oven bird is well chosen for the role it plays in the poem. Learn more about oven birds and think about how the facts you uncover expand and refine your understanding of the poem. What type of relationship do humans have to the oven bird? In the first line, Frost establishes the idea of our commonality through shared experience, and as the poem develops and we discover that the thing that ties us all together is the unremarkable oven bird, the poem suggests that we may have other mundane and easily overlooked connections.

Sample Topic: 1. W hy does Frost choose an oven bird?: Why is the oven bird a fitting messenger for the poem’s concerns? Frost has chosen the oven bird as somehow representative or illustrative of his points. An essay could be written that researches the oven bird and then suggests why the species is an apt choice for the poem. You will first need to discuss the poem’s key themes and identify the role that the bird plays in the poem. How common is the bird? How can the speaker of the poem be certain that “everyone has heard” the call of the oven bird? How does this familiarity help the poet/speaker to move on to his more significant points? How does the bird’s call compare to that of other birds? What does the oven bird look like? What does the poet mean describing the bird as “mid-summer” and “mid-wood”? Why is it called an “oven” bird? Is it more likely to be found in a tree or on the ground? Finally, how do any or all of these characteristics make the oven bird an apt proxy for or representative of the poet or as the voice of nature?

Form and Genre “The Oven Bird” is one of Frost’s sonnets, the only traditional form that Frost ever chose to experiment with (according to H. A. Maxson). Its

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rhyme scheme does not follow any of the standard sonnet patterns, nor does it break traditionally into two sections of 8 and 6 lines, or 12 and 2; instead, it breaks into 10 and 4 lines. An essay discussing the formal concerns and implications of “The Oven Bird” could discuss the ways the poem departs from Petrarchan or Shakespearean sonnet structures and explain how those variations contribute to the poem’s overall impact.

Sample Topic: 1. Experimental sonnet: How does the form contribute to the meaning of “The Oven Bird”? A possible thesis for this paper could center on the assertion that the structure of the poem enables Frost to achieve an effect he would not otherwise be able to using traditional sonnet forms. For example, by using a four-line conclusion, instead of the Shakespearean two lines or the Petrarchan six, Frost is able to make two equally balanced statements that sum up his observations. What other effects are enabled by the rhyme or structure of the poem?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery The central symbol in the poem is of poet-as-bird. Frost chooses to identify the poet with a specific bird. How does that choice affect or limit the poem’s range of interpretation? If the bird was a robin or a crow, for example, Frost’s strategy and overall effects would be altered. The poem describes plainly what the oven bird does and how it differs from other birds. What insight does it have that the poet shares? Marie Borroff argues that the bird helps us understand “the poet’s predicament in the contemporary world” (136). How might you describe that predicament, and what does the bird do about it? One potentially jarring or unexpected image is the reference to highway dust. After a string of lines in which the bird is said to tell us various things about nature, Frost concludes with, “He says the highway dust is over all” (10). The previous lines have described the way leaves and flowers and nature are in decline, no longer in their lustrous spring. To follow this by saying that the “highway dust is over all” suggests that the dust is the reason everything is in a state of decline. What is the dust exactly, and why do you think Frost includes this reference?

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Finally, you might consider the identity or nature of the “diminished thing.” The bird tells us about the world around it, which in the broadest sense could be what is intended by the “diminished thing.” Other possibilities abound. Is it poetry? Song? The individual poet (is the bird singing about himself)? If the entire world is declining, are poetry and its vitality declining with it? What else might the “diminished thing” represent?

Sample Topics: 1. The poet as bird: How does thinking of the bird as representing the poet affect an analysis of the poem? Viewing the bird as a representative of poets adds a new layer of interpretation to the poem. One way to approach this topic would be to consider that the bird does not choose to sing on its own. Rather, it cannot contain its song, and even the decline of the world around it cannot stifle it. What is the lesson for poets? What does the bird make of a diminished thing, and what can the poets learn from its example? 2. Highway dust: What is the significance of the highway dust? Why would Frost include it? One potential source of diminishment and decline in the poem is the relentless push of development. This notion is most notably embodied in the image of the highway dust. Of all the symbols of progress, why would Frost choose the highway? Is there something lost when modernity advances? Is there an intended irony in the notion that the objects and items associated with progress and improvement are here depicted as responsible for diminishment? 3. The diminished thing: What is the “diminished thing”? To develop this essay topic, identify what the reader is meant to believe is the diminished thing. Poetry, poets, nature, the universe, humans, the things people create—consider if Frost

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is addressing one or all of these. The bird identifies something as diminished and tells us how to appreciate it. How does your interpretation fit with this general understanding of the poem?

Compare and Contrast “The Oven Bird” lends itself readily to comparison with other poems because it is concerned with themes and symbols that are common in Frost’s poetry as well as in the work of other poets. Themes such as impermanence and our relationship to nature, symbols such as the birdas-poet and the Edenic portrayal of nature abound; writing an essay comparing two Frost poems or Frost’s work to another poet’s gives you a chance to generate fresh perspectives.

Sample Topics: 1. Impermanence: Compare “The Oven Bird” and “Nothing Gold Can Stay.” How does Frost address the idea of impermanence in “The Oven Bird” and “Nothing Gold Can Stay”? Both poems present the idea that everything falls into decay, that nothing can sustain its initial glory. Is the poet in “Nothing Gold Can Stay” professing the same or a similar message to that of the oven bird's song? Is there anything different in its tone or presentation? Compare the form and tone of the two poems, as well as the explicit reference to the Garden of Eden in “Nothing Gold Can Stay” and its indirect reference in “The Oven Bird” (“the fall”). The ideas of impermanence, entropy, or our existence in a fallen world are clearly important to Frost. Can you find other poems that he wrote that address this topic? 2. The poet as bird: Compare “The Oven Bird” to other poems that use birds to represent poets. The bird is a frequently used symbol that poets employ to represent poets. An essay analyzing this particular mode of symbolism would cite examples from other poems in support of your argument about the bird as poet/poet as bird. One useful

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Bibliography and Online Resources for “The Oven Bird” Baym, Nina. “An Approach to Robert Frost’s Nature Poetry.” American Quarterly 17.4 (Winter 1965): 713–723. Borroff, Marie. “Sound Symbolism as Drama in the Poetry of Robert Frost.” PMLA 107.1 (January 1992): 131–144. Costello, Bonnie. “ ‘What to Make of a Diminished Thing’: Modern Nature and Poetic Response.” American Literary History 10.4 (Winter 1998): 569–605. Maxson, H. A. On the Sonnets of Robert Frost: A Critical Examination of the 37 Poems. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 1997. Monteiro, George. “Robert Frost’s Solitary Singer.” The New England Quarterly 44.1 (March 1971): 134–140. Yeats, William Butler. “Sailing to Byzantium.” Poemhunter.com 3 March 2009

“Birches”

“B

Reading to Write

irches” is one of Frost’s most frequently anthologized poems, in large measure because it rewards multiple readings and leaves considerable room for interpretation. In order to begin the work of understanding and writing about “Birches,” it is important to note that nothing explicitly happens as the poem unfolds. A poem like “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” tells a story, as does a poem like “Home Burial” or “The Death of the Hired Man.” With “Birches,” the significance emerges from unpacking the images and feelings the poem evokes as you read it. Critic Judith Oster has asked, “How, in ‘Birches,’ do we divide the experience of the poem from the meaning of the poem?” The answer is that we do not. The meaning of the poem is the experience of the poem, so as you are confronting the poem, it is important to remember that you are not reading for plot but rather scanning Frost’s lines for ideas. The central image of the poem is that of a boy “swinging” birches, and the rest of the poem builds around that image. You may want to begin by concentrating on that image and working to understand its significance to the speaker. When does he think of a boy swinging birches? What comfort does that image offer him? He notes that he once was a “swinger of birches”; what is he nostalgic or wistful for? He wants to be a swinger of birches again—why? Note that the speaker’s desire to swing birches is not a yearning to return to childhood or to permanently escape adulthood and its cares. Specifically, he says at the end of the poem that he wants to climb a birch as high as he can before it bends under his weight and puts him back on the ground. Is there more to this activity than recreation or diversion? He describes climbing the tree as moving “Toward heaven,” suggesting the point of the

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activity is the climbing, not the arrival. If he does not want to get to heaven, but just to move in that direction before coming back to earth, what does he hope to gain? Is the climb a metaphor for a spiritual quest? If the speaker values the movement toward heaven but wants to return to earth, what has he gained from his upward journey that helps him back on earth? Part of the appeal of “Birches” comes from the number of ideas it invites us to think about, all the while carefully avoiding telling us exactly what to think or what Frost wants us precisely to conclude about them. In addition to spirituality, the poem comments on the burdens and rewards of earthly living, which is both a “pathless wood” and the “right place for love.” The speaker mentions love only once in the poem, but it is the only specific reason he gives for wanting to stay on earth. The speaker seeks movement toward heaven but also distrusts fate; apparently his spiritual viewpoint values an idea of heaven but distrusts what he might find once he gets there. He even looks at the piles of ice that fall from birches and imagines that “the inner dome of heaven had fallen.” Why heaven? Why does he not describe it simply as the sky? What does it tell us about the speaker that he seems, perhaps unconsciously, to want the barrier between earth and heaven to shatter? Many critics detect in the poem a commentary on factual thinking and imaginative thinking. Notice that the speaker acknowledges the truth about the birches: They are bent by the weight of ice during repeated storms, not by the weight of a boy who has been playing in them. Still, that “Truth” distracts him from what he really wants to think about. Imagining a boy swinging on the trees enables the speaker to consider weightier, more abstract concerns; where the factual truth offers a closed and final explanation, the imagined truth is open-ended and far reaching. What does the poem ultimately suggest about the value of facts compared to the value of imagination? Is the poem somehow about poetry and poetical thinking? Is the poem arguing for the benefits of poetry?

Topics and Strategies The topics in the following pages are meant to serve as questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to

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develop a thesis that you can argue and support. Bear in mind that these ideas are not meant to be comprehensive. This poem in particular opens itself to a wide variety of topics to study and write about.

Themes “Birches” invites us to consider a variety of themes, from the relatively simple to the extraordinarily complex. On one level, the poem offers a reverie, a respite from work as the speaker remembers when he was a boy playing in birch trees. The image he conjures of a boy taking a break from his chores to play is wistful and longing since the boy is able to step away from responsibility so easily without abandoning it altogether, while the speaker, as an adult, seems less able to disengage. Whatever disengagement he seeks would only be temporary, however, since earth is “the right place for love.” The speaker mentions love just this once, but in doing so he identifies love as the key reason for living. The ambiguity of the reference leaves the idea of love open for us to interpret as neighborly love, familial love, that of husband and wife, even erotic love (partially suggested by the sensual image of girls drying their hair in the sun); perhaps the speaker is referring to one of these forms of love; perhaps he is referring to them all. In any or all of its forms, love seems for the speaker to be of central importance. At the same time, he balances the companionship of love with healthy isolation. He makes a point of telling us that the boy he imagines is alone—“too far from town to learn baseball”—tending to his chores but also amusing himself without apparently feeling alone. While the speaker believes we need love, he suggests we also need to be able to be alone, either for self-contentment’s sake or because the only way we can tend to spiritual matters is when we are isolated, without distractions. Spiritual matters seem centrally important to the poem, for the entire image of climbing the tree to get above the dense thicket below, to gain perspective and simply to take a break, is presented with such spiritually themed language (fate, heaven) that we must consider the act to be more than simply climbing a tree. The poem suggests that we benefit from moving continuously between the poles of heaven and earth, that we gain something at one side of the spectrum that makes it possible for us to better appreciate the other end.

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Sample Topics: 1. Work and play: How does “Birches” comment on the necessary balance of work and play in our lives? When does the speaker tell us he is most likely to think back to his own boyhood experiences of swinging among the birches? You may first want to consider how well the boy that the speaker envisions is able to balance his chores with his playful diversions, then examine how well or how poorly the speaker is able to achieve the same balance. Analyze the tone and the perspective of the poem. Does the speaker think he can ever balance work and play? Has he lost something (time, youth, priorities) that he can never reclaim? Does he think he needs to be able to swing in birches again, or is it enough simply to be reminded not to let work overwhelm him? Is there an adult alternative to swinging in the birches? 2. Love: What role does love play in this poem? Love is mentioned once, briefly and suddenly, in the poem, but its appearance is highly significant. To write a paper about love in “Birches,” first examine the context in which the speaker mentions it. What has he been dreaming of doing to this point in the poem, and what does he fear some “fate” might do to him? What does the speaker’s attachment to love tell us about his experiences with love? What kind(s) of love is he referring to? 3. Isolation: What does the poem tell us about the value of being alone? The boy in “Birches” is by himself, and yet the speaker does not seem to feel empathy for the child’s isolation. Instead, the speaker seems to admire the boy’s ability to entertain himself, as the speaker says he once did in his own boyhood. Is the speaker projecting his own isolation onto the image of the boy? Does this suggest that he wishes he could be more content? Is he lonely, or is he simply arguing that we need to balance isolation with companionship or love?

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4. Heaven and earth: What does the poem argue about balancing transcendence and earthly living? The poem ends with the image of climbing a birch toward heaven until the speaker’s weight causes the tree to bend, bringing him back down to earth. An essay could explore the significance of balancing transcendence and the quest for spiritual and higher meaning or understanding with the desire to stay on earth. How does escaping earth in the pursuit of transcendence put earthly living in perspective? How does earthly living put the pursuit of transcendence in perspective? What do we gain from spiritual inquiry that we can apply to daily living, and how does our daily living help us profit from spiritual inquiry? 5. Fate: What is the speaker’s attitude toward fate? Like love, fate is mentioned once, briefly and suddenly. How does the speaker envision fate, or the Fates? What degree of skepticism or mistrust does he display? How playful or serious do you think he is being?

Philosophy and Ideas Frost confronts the notion of truth directly in “Birches,” and it is well worth exploring what he means by the concept and how he treats and regards it. While the speaker of the poem is confronting the particular emotions and memories the birch trees provoke and the ideas they bring to mind when he sees them, he is interrupted by truth telling him—and the reader—that his fanciful imagination does not accurately explain why the trees are bent. The poem presents us with objective and subjective knowledge and asks us to weigh them against each other. As an additional concern, the poem asks us to examine what we think truth may be. Do we get at truth by understanding as many of the facts as we can? Or do we get at truth by probing our emotional response to the facts?

Sample Topics: 1. Fact and imagination: How do fact and imagination complement each other?

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost To write an essay about the interplay of and relationship between truth and imagination, examine the way the speaker describes Truth. Why does he use a capital T in referring to it? Truth is “matter of fact” and “broke in,” effectively interrupting what the speaker wanted to say about the birches. The speaker is careful to distinguish between what he wants to say about the trees and what Truth wants to say about the trees. What is different? The speaker does not dispute the “Truth” about how birches are permanently bent under the weight of ice and snow but clearly wants to get that explanation out of the way so he can turn back to the image of a boy playing by himself in the trees. The true explanation is not enough for the speaker; he acknowledges it but wants something more, saying, “I should prefer to have some boy bend them / As he went out and in to fetch the cows.” Why is the truth not enough? An essay exploring this topic can also be recast as a compare/contrast essay; see the Compare and Contrast section of this chapter for more ideas.

2. Truth as reality versus truth as deep understanding: How do varying representations or views of the truth factor in to the poem? The speaker of the poem refers to reality as “Truth,” but we often see Truth used to identify a deeper philosophical understanding. How is the speaker’s imagined scenario of a boy taking a break from his chores to play in the trees a form of truth in contrast to the indisputable fact that it was ice, not a boy, that bent the trees?

Form and Genre Frost seldom allows himself to be trapped by rigid forms of poetry, although he often experiments with traditional forms. In “Birches” he uses blank verse, which is usually written in iambic pentameter, but he rather loosely adheres to the meter. He also enjambs many of the lines, intending them to continue unbroken and unhindered into the next line or lines, rather than stopping them with periods, commas, or other marks of punctuation. The result is a natural-sounding monologue, as if the speaker of the poem were simply talking to us, telling us his thoughts more or less as they occur to him. The conversational tone lends the poem immediacy and

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intimacy; the speaker is sharing with us something deeply personal, and we are privileged to hear it. The ethos of the speaker is established through his conversational reverie, and Frost helps us construct an image of the person speaking to us as warm and somewhat vulnerable, as he reveals to us his concerns and his dreams. You might argue that the speaker is brave and trusting, as willing as he is to expose to us his innermost feelings and thoughts. How does our willingness to be worthy of that trust affect how we attend to what the speaker has to say?

Sample Topic: 1. Blank verse: The poem is written in blank verse; what impact does this have on how you read the poem? Blank verse does not rhyme but adheres to a defined metrical scheme, most often iambic pentameter as is the case with “Birches.” Read the poem aloud (as you should with any poem) and notice how blank iambic pentameter sounds like natural, spoken English. An essay discussing the poem’s formal concerns, then, would be a study of the way Frost is able to generate a personal, intimate feel through the use of blank verse. Notice as well the role that enjambed lines play; enjambment occurs when a line of poetry continues into the next line without punctuation. When you read an enjambed line aloud, do not pause at the end but continue reading to the next line. Notice how much more natural and easily the language flows. How does the relaxed, informal language obscure the structure of the lines? What does this informality contribute to your experience of the poem (and thus to your understanding of the poem’s meaning)? What does the tone do to establish an image of the speaker, and what kind of person does he seem to be?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery Some of the more readily accessible images found in the poem are the comparison of bent trees, dragging their branches and leaves on the ground, to girls drying their hair. The speaker compares day-to-day life to a trek through dense woods, where it is difficult and potentially painful to find your way. He also imagines the inner dome of heaven shattered on the ground. An essay exploring any one of these images (or others) would potentially need to do

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three things: locate the image in the progress of the poem (is it early, middle, late); explain the more complex or abstract ideas in the poem that the image introduces, concludes, or elaborates on; and discuss the emotional significance of the image in conjunction with its literal meaning.

Sample Topics:

1. Trees as girls: How does the image of the trees as girls drying their hair in the sun contribute to the poem’s tone and overall argument? One of the similes in the poem is the comparison of birches, bent and trailing their leaves, to girls drying their hair in the sun. To consider the purpose of this image in the poem, you might want to think about the contrasts it provides between the reality and the image: In reality, the trees are burdened and made to bend, while the girls choose to crawl; in reality, the trees eventually stay bent, while the girls, we can assume, will stand up again. How does this image help the poem avoid a bleak or fatalistic tone? What does the sensuality of the image contribute to the poem’s tone and message? How does this sensuality anchor the idea of love and its importance later in the poem? 2. Life as a forest: How does the image of life as a “pathless wood” contribute to the poem’s tone and overall argument? Another simile in the poem is the description of life as a walk through dense woods. Examine this image in relation to the poem’s idea that climbing a birch and coming back down helps us with perspective. What relationship does the poem establish between action or movement and the stasis of observation and introspection? 3. The inner dome of heaven: The speaker says that so much ice falls from the trees that it looks as though the inner dome of heaven has collapsed. How does this image introduce the idea of heaven that figures so prominently at the end of the poem? This early image of heaven introduces the idea of that realm, specifically heaven coming to earth. Later in the poem, the speaker

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imagines leaving earth to climb to heaven. An essay concentrating on references to heaven in the poem should consider how the images and ideas become more and more serious and weighty as the poem progresses. The first image of heaven collapsing is replaced by the idea of heaven still in place, as a goal to be sought. One approach to an essay about this particular mode of imagery could be to compare the language, looking at how the speaker presents the two different ideas of heaven and analyzing the role the first image plays in setting up the second.

Compare and Contrast “Birches” works with themes and ideas that are common to Frost’s poetry: weariness, spirituality, cosmological skepticism, isolation, the attraction of death and the demands of life, love, and nature (especially woods). You could profitably compare this poem’s treatment of any of these ideas with their treatment in other Frost poems. One distinct feature of “Birches” is its optimism; Frost does not always reflect so warmly on his typical themes as he does here. You might also look to other authors to see how they grapple with a similar notion. Edgar Allan Poe confronts the relative merits of factual thinking versus imaginative thinking in “The Purloined Letter” just as Frost does in “Birches.” The ideas below are just a beginning, especially in regard to comparing two individual Frost poems.

Sample Topics: 1. Factual knowledge versus poetical knowledge: How do truth and imagination complement each other? A similar topic is presented in the Philosophy and Ideas section of this chapter, but note that you could also examine the idea of truth/imagination in terms of fact/poetry. Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Purloined Letter,” in particular, addresses this duality explicitly. In Poe’s story, the main character discusses the power of imagination to help us develop a deeper understanding than factual truth alone. A character that thinks only about facts is shown to be smart but limited by his lack of imagination, while the main character is shown to be the smarter, better thinker for his ability to round out the truth. How does this compare

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2. Nature as conscience: How does nature serve as the conscience for the speaker in “Birches” and the speaker in “Mending Wall”? Ice is destructive in “Birches,” weighing down trees so that they are permanently bent. Ice is similarly harmful in “Mending Wall,” buckling the ground during hard winter freezes and causing a rock wall to tumble. In both poems, the speaker is led to imagine something beyond the factual truth: In “Birches” the ice is replaced by a boy playing in the trees, and in “Mending Wall” the ice is nature’s means of tearing down a wall it does not approve of. How do these poems suggest that nature works on our consciences? Find examples in each poem of the actions the speaker is performing that he is uncomfortable doing, has doubts about doing, or tires of doing, and examine the way nature serves as a corrective influence, example, or reminder of how life should be in contrast to the way the speaker has let his life become. Bibliography for “Birches” Ghasemi, Parvin, and Elham Mansooji. “Nature and Man in Robert Frost.” CLA Journal 49.4 (June 2006): 462-481. Kemp, John C. Robert Frost and New England: The Poet as Regionalist. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1979. Kilcup, Karen. “ ‘Something of a Sentimental Sweet Singer’: Robert Frost, Lucy Larcom, and ‘Swinging Birches.’ ” Roads Not Taken: Rereading Robert Frost. Ed. Earl J. Wilcox and Jonathan N. Barron. Columbia, Mo.: University of Missouri Press, 2000. 11–31. Lentricchia, Frank. “The Redemptive Imagination.” Robert Frost: Modern Critical Views. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1986. 23–41. Monteiro, George. Robert Frost and the New England Renaissance. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 1988. Oster, Judith. Toward Robert Frost: The Reader and the Poet. Athens, Ga.: The University of Georgia Press, 1991. Paton, Priscilla M. “Robert Frost: ‘The fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows.’ ” American Literature: A Journal of Literary History, Criticism, and Bibliography 53.1 (March 1981): 43–55.

“ ‘Out, Out—’ ”

“ ‘O

Reading to Write

ut, Out—’ ” is one of Frost’s most respected poems, but it has not received the same depth of critical attention and explication as poems such as “The Road Not Taken” and “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” If you consider the final two lines of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” for example, you see that they present an intriguing ambiguity that cannot be resolved, inviting critics to work extensively to present and justify their interpretations. “ ‘Out, Out—,’ ” by way of contrast, presents no such obvious ambiguity, and critics fundamentally agree about the poem’s basic point and meaning: A boy’s tragic death while working alongside adults who have no time to relax and no apparent capacity for simply enjoying their surroundings demonstrates the cruelty, capriciousness, and hardscrabble nature of life. Yet the poem is considerably more subtle than it at first seems to be, and it provides a variety of entry points for analysis, starting with the title. Notice the quotation marks; if you do not recognize the allusion, the quotation marks are an indicator of a specific reference that demands your attention and investigation. You may recognize the quotation from Macbeth, and if not, some research would readily point you to Macbeth’s well-known description of life’s pointlessness:    To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing. (Act 5, scene 5, 19–28)

You do not have to know the full context of Macbeth’s soliloquy to recognize the futility he expresses in these lines. Dreary day follows dreary day, from the beginning of history to the end of time; all too briefly the candle of our life is lit, and then it goes out, and our lives amount to nothing more substantial than an actor making a spectacle of himself while delivering a pointless speech. From the title itself, then, even before we begin the poem, Frost has asked us to think about whether or not life has any meaning. The opening lines of the poem are not obviously related to the title, although the introduction of a dangerous buzz saw immediately following the title’s invocation of the themes of life and death could signal a potentially ominous feeling. The first three lines of the poem describe the saw and its activities: “The buzz saw snarled and rattled in the yard / And made dust and dropped stove-length sticks of wood, / Sweet-scented stuff when the breeze drew across it.” Notice there is no overt reference to people; all of the action is attributed to the saw itself, which creates noise, makes dust, and drops wood. The poem shifts its attention away from the saw briefly, and when it returns, the saw continues to be described as though it were alive, snarling and rattling, recognizing the announcement of “supper” and attacking the boy’s hand. One of the early questions the reader has to consider—and one that would provide the foundation for a compelling essay—is why the saw is described as something alive, something that can think and act according to its own will and desires, an object that could be deliberately malicious, callously indifferent, or ignorantly innocent. While the first three lines obscure the role of people in the scene, we know they must be there, and the poem subtly shifts our focus from the saw to the individuals present by directing us to think about how sweet the freshly cut wood smells to them. Lines 4–6 then turn our attention directly to the people: “And from there those that lifted eyes could count / Five mountain ranges one behind the other / Under the sunset far into Vermont.” Any of the people in our scene would see mountains extending into the distance under a setting sun, if they bothered to look up in the first place. That they do not indicates they are too preoccupied with

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their work to appreciate the vistas and landscape around them, and the poem suggests that this neglect is regretful. The scene is grand, almost epic in its scope; five mountain ranges must extend across an enormous space, giving us some perspective on the people in the poem. We can see how vast the world around them is, but they cannot see beyond the tight confines of their labor, and the resulting loss of perspective (work is all that matters) is commented on directly by the narrator in lines 10–12: “Call it a day, I wish they might have said / To please the boy by giving him the half hour / That a boy counts so much when saved from work.” The speaker here wishes the boy could be given some free time at the end of the day; work is necessary, but so is play. Play is especially rewarding and valuable to a boy who is given an unexpected break. Moreover, the adults around the boy are either so burdened by their work that they cannot spare him, or they are so distracted by their tasks that they fail to notice that the boy’s childhood is being slowly sacrificed. Recognizing these points may lead you to overlook the oddity of the speaker’s intrusion here. Remember that the speaker in a poem must not be confused with the author of the poem. The speaker is a character, a persona, and while he may reflect the actual poet’s viewpoint and perspective, he is not necessarily directly equated with the work’s author. In short, you must not make the mistake of writing about this “I” as if he were Frost himself. So who is the speaker, then? He only mentions himself this one time, explicitly calling attention to how much he wishes the boy could have been allowed some time for recreation. Is he at the scene, wishing the boy could be allowed to play, or is the speaker expressing his wishes after the fact, after knowing that the boy is about to have a tragic accident? Is he one of the adults in the scene who is not involved in the work somehow? Is he a neighbor or a friend? Why does he notice the five mountain ranges but no one else does? Is he possibly an omniscient presence, a deistic, godlike figure who observes but does not get involved or interfere? The curiosity of this intrusion is that Frost has explicitly directed us to imagine an observer and commenter, when he easily could have obscured the narrator. The question, then, is why? The boy is apparently distracted when his sister calls out that it is time to eat. The saw, described in living, animalistic terms, is portrayed as leaping at the boy’s hand, but the speaker acknowledges that this is only how it seemed, and the boy must have slipped. In shock, the boy holds his severed hand and laughs but quickly recognizes what has happened and in fear

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appeals to his sister not to let the doctor remove his already severed hand. What are we to make of the fact that the boy turns to his sister for help and not one of the adults? Of course he is in shock, laughing and not seeming to understand that his hand is “gone already” (27), and his sister has called attention to herself by announcing “Supper” (14). At this point, though, it is becoming more and more obvious that the adults in the poem are distant and indistinct; the boy lives in a child’s realm but is being made to labor in the world of adults. The tragedy of the poem is only in part that the boy dies; another aspect of the poem’s tragedy is that the boy dies without ever having been allowed to live a boy’s life; he dies doing grown-up work. The grimness of the poem emerges fully in the final lines and the adults’ reaction to the boy’s death. They are afraid and disbelieving as he dies, but once he has died, their thought is only, “No more to build on there. And they, since they / Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs” (33–34). There is tragedy in the boy’s lost future and lost adulthood; the sentiment “no more to build on there” invokes an image of the boy as the foundation for the man, the child as the foundation for the adult. But is the tragedy compounded by the apparent heartlessness of the way the adults unemotionally note the child’s passing and then turn to their affairs? Are they unfeeling and cruel, or does life simply demand that they carry on? Is it heartbreaking that the adults do not seem to mourn, or does the poem argue that the boy’s death is clearly tragic, but once he has died there is no point in wallowing in anguish? Or does the poem argue that the adults have learned nothing, that their lives are so physically hard that they must rely on the labor of children whether they want to or not? Ultimately, “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” demonstrates once more that Frost writes poetry of deceptive simplicity. His language is easy to read and easy to understand; the scenes he creates are easy to conjure; and the thoughts he expresses are easy to internalize. At the same time, though, he is a poet of considerable subtlety and complexity, and poems that seem to offer easy answers on their surface are actually working to open complex questions for us to grapple with.

Topics and Strategies The following sections offer some topic ideas for essays about “ ‘Out, Out—.’ ” These topics are designed to guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem; they will all need further refine-

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ment and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes Death, childhood, and innocence are all recurring themes for Frost, all prominently featured in many of his poems, and all provide a productive starting point for an essay. How are the themes of “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” introduced and developed? A good place to start your exploration could be with the unexpected death of the boy. Investigate how Frost constructs the narrative so the reader will register the shock. Why does Frost want his readers to feel shock in the first place? The shock alone cannot be the point; if the poem is to have any lasting worth, there must be something beyond an unexpected jolt of emotion provoked in the reader, something that the shock prepares us to think about that we would not otherwise consider. What might that be? Critic Marie Borroff notes that “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” is “a poem that Frost never would read aloud because it was ‘too cruel’ ” (75). One way to approach the themes of the poem is to start with the idea of cruelty. What might Frost have meant by calling the poem “too cruel”? How is the poem too cruel, and to whom? Is the death of the boy the cruelty? Is the cruelty found in the way the family immediately goes back to work? If so, is it cruel because the family is heartless, or is it cruel because the family leads such a rugged life that they cannot spare the time for mourning as winter is coming and firewood must be stacked and stored? Thinking carefully about what Frost might have considered to be the nature of the poem’s cruelty quickly leads you to realize that the obvious cruelty of the poem—the tragic death of a boy—is only one manifestation of a heartlessness that is evident in the poem. Moreover, such thinking can help you identify a number of interpretations that emerge from a careful reading of the poem. One aspect of the poem’s cruelty that may deserve additional consideration is that of nature’s indifference to our concerns. This theme recurs in Frost’s poetry. Frost looks to nature for insight; he typically discovers something to consider and peruse, but he seldom finds comfort or assurance. In this poem, the indifference of the surrounding woods to the tragic death of the boy is compounded by the apparent indifference of the adults, who turn back to their work and the demands of their lives as soon as the boy has died.

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In this poem, life is equated with work. The adults are working, the two children we see (the boy and his sister) are both working­—one outside and one inside. The poem gives us the briefest hint that there is beauty in the world around them—in the expansive mountain ranges— but these particular individuals are too busy to notice or to think about it. They are unable to balance their work with pleasure. The work-defined nature of these people’s lives is reinforced by the ending lines, which tell us that, since they are still alive, they must return to their chores. What conclusions are we made to draw from this? Is there a lesson about how we must stop and find enjoyment in play and in the beauty of the natural world? Is the poem critical of these people for working so hard? Or is the poem more critical of the nature of our existence? In other words, is the poem arguing that life is hard and pushes us to scramble and work just to survive? Is Frost simply pointing out that, in pursuing a life of struggle and toil, that individuals, children, will die tragically and early and that is just the unhappy way things are? Does the poem offer any perspective for dealing with this reality, or is it pointing toward another way of thinking altogether?

Sample Topics: 1. Cruelty: What is cruel about the poem? To approach this topic, you will need to identify the existence and function of cruelty in the poem. Starting with the questions above, this is one topic that would benefit from brainstorming or freewriting. Simply start writing about the various ways the poem could be seen as cruel, shifting your focus from the boy to his sister to the adults to people in general. Your thesis will identify the scale of the cruelty: Is it cruel that a boy dies so violently? Is it cruel that we all could die so violently and suddenly? Is it cruel because life goes on for the living, and the adults in the poem must return to their daily concerns whether they want to or not? Is it cruel simply because it illustrates a fundamental truth about the precariousness of life that we might all rather not consider? 2. Nature’s indifference: Is the poem’s cruelty to be found in its depiction of indifference?

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Nature’s indifference to the activity of people is arguably reflected in the response of the adults. You may want to consider the mountains to be representative of nature’s response to the boy’s death and the adults as representative of human response. What is different? What is the same? 3. Death and life: According to the poem, what is the meaning or purpose of life? Readers’ response to the poem would potentially be different if death claimed one of the adults. Since the death is that of a laboring child, we are guided toward thinking the tragedy never would have happened if the boy had been playing instead of working; the speaker makes that point directly in lines 9–11. Think about whether or not the speaker is criticizing the adults for not letting the boy play or if the speaker is lamenting the harsh conditions that make it necessary for the boy to work in order for his family to survive. Is it a shame that the adults do not care about letting the boy play, or is it a shame that they cannot let him play even if they want to? Look for other clues in the poem, other moments that present this same pairing of questions, such as the final two lines. Your final essay will need to make a claim about the poem’s perspective on life and death and then use evidence from the poem to support that claim.

Character There are many characters in “ ‘Out, Out—,’ ” giving you the opportunity to examine what we know about these people and their actions. There is a boy, his sister, the adults (referred to generally as “they” or “them”), the doctor, the person who sits with the boy as he dies, and the speaker of the poem, the strangely intrusive “I.” Character-themed essays could be written about what we know of each or all of these personages and how what we know about each of them shapes our response to the poem. Many of Frost’s poems are written in the first-person voice. While the narrator is not necessarily intended to be a representative of the poet, what are the implications of adopting this mode of address? Is it

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important to determine if the “I” is an observer of the action or a participant? That is, do we need to worry about whether or not the speaker is one of the people working in the poem or just a passerby, neighbor, or someone who happens to be there when the boy cuts his hand off? Or is it more important just to recognize that having an “I” in the poem provides us with a filter for the events? Are the events objectively or subjectively told, and what difference does that make? When analyzing this or any poem, it is important not to forget that the events are told to us by someone who has his or her own ways of thinking and interpreting what he or she has seen.

Sample Topics: 1. The characters: What do we know about each of the characters in the poem? How does Frost depict the various characters in the poem? Each has a response to the boy’s death, and each is in the poem to provide context and a representation of how populated the boy’s life was, in contrast to the loneliness of death. But what can we say about the people in the poem based on what we are told about them? How might they serve as representative types (the sister standing for all children, for example)? 2. W ho is “I”?: How does his perspective shape our understanding of the poem’s events? In developing this topic, you will need to think about what precisely the “I” in the poem knows or does not know. By carefully introducing the first person into the poem, Frost clearly indicates that he is not dealing with an omniscient third-person observer. “I” is, rather, a person with all of the limits of knowledge and insight that any individual has. As just one example, notice how the boy holds up his severed hand “Half in appeal, but half as if to keep / The life from spilling” (21–22). How does “I” know why the boy holds his hand the way he does? How does “I” know the boy is making an appeal? How, basically, does he know what the boy is thinking? Is his description merely his own interpretation of the boy’s actions?

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History and Context Understanding the historical realities of the people portrayed in “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” may contribute to your understanding of the poem’s overall argument. Are the concerns the individuals face unique to a certain place or time? Why are these people working so hard that the son must assist them and cannot be allowed to play or the daughter must be working inside to help prepare the evening meal and also unable to take a break, even for a brief “half hour” (11)?

Sample Topic: 1. The nature of rural living in the northeastern United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries: What kind of work are the people in the poem doing, how important is that work, and why do they turn so quickly back to it after the boy dies? The boy in the poem is cutting “stove-length sticks of wood” (2); he is running the buzz saw to cut firewood for the coming winter, which in Vermont will be long and cold. We do not know what the other people in the poem are doing, but they are presumably working as well, alongside the boy or at other tasks. Understanding some regional history and the day-today life of people who must work to provide their own food, clothing, and shelter will offer considerable insight into the conditions under which the boy was raised. To write an essay on this topic, you would need first to read histories of rural life in the northeastern United States. Learn what kinds of work the people had to perform and how critical it was to complete the work in preparation for long, hard winters. Once you can describe the conditions of rural life at the turn of the 20th century, you can then discuss the specific conditions of the poem and work to address the poem’s central concern: What are we to make of the boy’s death and the response of the adults?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery As with much of Frost’s poetry, “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” is not as simple or obvious in meaning as it first appears. The simple surface imagery of the poem gives way to complex readings and analysis. The quick, almost throwaway reference to the mountains is an example of this; the allusion of the

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title—which was discussed in the Reading to Write section of this chapter—is another. Having read the poem and started to make sense of its elements and prevailing narrative, go back and look more closely at the imagery and the language. You are likely to find that your first impression of what the poem means is deeply enriched, and perhaps radically altered, when you look closely at the images Frost creates. Mountains are often used to represent the beauty and power of nature, and the vast scope of mountains is often cited by poets to put the scope of human affairs in perspective. Are the mountains that the people in the poem are ignoring used in this way? Do these natural features offer us any perspective? It can often be illustrative to examine the use of similar types of images in other works of literature. One well-known example of mountains in poetry that might help you contextualize the function of mountains in “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” occurs in the first book of William Wordsworth’s The Prelude. Wordsworth tells the story of stealing a boat at night and paddling into a lake. He is facing the land, watching a ridge in the distance, but as he gets farther from the shore, a mountain looms up from behind the ridge: . . . lustily I dipped my oars into the silent lake, And, as I rose upon the stroke, my boat Went heaving through the water like a swan; When, from behind that craggy steep till then The horizon’s bound, a huge peak, black and huge, As if with voluntary power instinct, Upreared its head. I struck and struck again, And growing still in stature the grim shape Towered up between me and the stars, and still, For so it seemed, with purpose of its own And measured motion like a living thing, Strode after me. With trembling oars I turned, And through the silent water stole my way Back to the covert of the willow tree . . . (373–387) He does not know the mountain is back there when he sets out, and since he already feels a measure of guilt for taking the boat, he feels like the mountain is pursuing him. As a result, Wordsworth’s speaker returns

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the boat. For Wordsworth, the mountain serves as a natural rebuke for such guilty actions. How does this compare to the role of the mountains in “ ‘Out, Out—’ ”?

Sample Topics: 1. Mountains: What do the mountains symbolize, and what role do they play in helping us understand the lives these people lead? The only direct reference to nature in the poem is the single sentence running from lines four through six: “And from there those that lifted eyes could count / Five mountain ranges one behind the other / Under the sunset far into Vermont.” The people are looking down at their work; in order to see (and count) the mountain ranges and see the sun setting, they must lift their eyes from the work they are doing. The poem implies that this does not happen often, if at all. What is the emotional impact of this image on us, as readers of the poem? To write an essay on this topic, you will first need to think about why Frost has his speaker mention the mountains at all. Notice how the people in the poem do or do not react to the mountains, and think about why the speaker notices them while the others do not. You do not have to work with the excerpt from Wordsworth here; it simply serves as an example of how you can find mountain imagery in other poems and relate their usage to Frost’s. The core of your essay will most likely center on a consideration of why the speaker wants the reader to be given a glimpse of the mountains and why he highlights the fact that the people in the poem take no notice of the natural world around them. What are they missing? What would they gain by noticing the mountains? What do we gain by having our attention drawn to them? 2. Literary/biblical allusions: How do Shakespeare’s Macbeth or Psalm 121 provide context for this poem? To write about allusions, you must be able to write convincingly about the source material. To write about the title of the poem, for instance, you would need to demonstrate that you

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost understand the original speech from Macbeth and put it in its original context: What has happened to make Macbeth utter these lines, and what do these lines mean in the original play? From there, you can discuss how the meaning of the original source transfers to the current poem. The same approach would work for an analysis of Psalm 121: Examine the psalm, interpret it, and then bring that interpretation to bear on Frost’s poem. Does the meaning of the psalm help us to better understand the situation “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” relates? Does familiarity with the psalm help us to see something in the poem we might otherwise miss? Does it help define or change our perspective on the poem?

Compare and Contrast Frost explores themes in the poem that recur throughout his poetry, notably notions of death and of the human relationship to nature. You might want to look to some of his other poems—“The Death of the Hired Man,” “Home Burial,” “Design,” and “Departmental”—and consider how similarly or differently they confront, depict, and attempt to make sense of death. To think about nature, you might consider poems like “The Oven Bird,” “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” “The WoodPile,” or “Birches.” Consider how reading multiple poems alongside one another helps provide a more comprehensive understanding of a particular unifying element found in Frost’s work. To compare Frost’s poem to the work of another poet, one potentially strong choice is W. H. Auden’s “Musée des Beaux Arts.” Auden’s poem asserts that death is simply woven into the fabric of life, an argument that Frost seems to make in his poem as well. Compare the final lines of each poem, and you will see how closely linked they are.

Sample Topics: 1. Comparisons to other Frost poems: How does “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” compare to other Frost poems? One possible goal in producing an essay on this topic is to show how multiple poems help to illuminate one another. How does another of Frost’s poems compare to “ ‘Out, Out—’ ”

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in its treatment of death or in its treatment of nature? Your thesis would assert that reading “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” comparatively with another poem helps us to understand one or both with greater clarity. Explain how each poem approaches its theme, the point we are to take from each poem, and how the two support each other. 2. Comparisons to W. H. Auden’s “Musée des Beaux Arts”: How does “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” compare to Auden’s poem? W. H. Auden’s poem begins by observing a painting; Frost often begins by observing a scene and then commenting on it, but that is not the approach he adopts in “ ‘Out, Out—.’” Here, his speaker is providing almost a journalistic report. Auden makes a claim and then backs it up; Frost describes a scene and leaves us to draw conclusions. Yet each poem comes to almost exactly the same conclusion. Compare the final observation each poem makes about the response of the living to the death of a boy. A possible thesis is that these poems help us to understand that we place too much emphasis on suffering, either on our own or someone else’s. Using evidence from each poem, build your case that the poems encourage us to adopt a different perspective. Bibliography and Online Resources for “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” Auden, W. H. “Musee des Beaux Arts.” Classic Poetry Pages 3 March 2009 Borroff, Marie. “Robert Frost’s New Testament: The Uses of Simplicity.” Robert Frost: Modern Critical Views. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1986. Cunningham, John. “Human Presence in Frost’s Universe.” The Cambridge Companion to Robert Frost. Ed. Robert Faggen. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2001. Locklear, Gloriana. “Frost’s ‘Out, Out-.’” Explicator 49.3 (Spring 1991): 167–169. Moore, Richard. “Frost’s ‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’ and ‘Out, Out—’, and Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels.” Explicator 58.2 (Winter 2000): 95–97.

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Psalm 121. BibleGateway.com: A searchable online Bible in more than 100 versions and 50 languages. 3 March 2009 Rosendorf, Valerie, and William Freedman. “Frost’s Out, Out. . .” Explicator 39.1 (Fall 1980): 10. Shakespeare, William. Macbeth. The Literature Network. 3 March 2009 Wakefield, Richard. “Thomas Eakins and Robert Frost: To Be a Natural Man in a Man-Made World.” Midwest Quarterly 41.4 (Summer 2000): 354–369. Wordsworth, William. The Prelude. Bartleby.com 3 March 2009

“Fire And Ice”

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poem as brief as “Fire and Ice” may seem at first glance as if it offers few significant entry points for developing and writing a cogent essay. While it may not be as expansive as Frost’s longer narratives, such as “Home Burial” or even his longer lyrics such as “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening,” it is still complex and rich enough to reward close reading and examination. It is one of Frost’s more anthologized poems, and not solely because of its length. Frost manages—in a remarkably short space—to mix the epic with the personal in a moving depiction of someone who has learned painful lessons in life. The poem begins with an epically large scope, discussing the ways the world itself might be destroyed, consumed by fire or frozen solid. Natural forces can certainly cause either to happen, as the history of ice ages show or as the prediction that the sun will one day expand as it dies and swallow the inner solar system. But the speaker of the poem turns quickly from scientific explanations of the end of the world to much more personal meditations. Fire becomes a metaphor for desire, and ice emerges as a metaphor for hate. The speaker tells us he has experienced both and found them each to be powerful enough to destroy the world. The intrigue of the poem comes from imagining what the speaker has experienced, as well as from recognizing that our own experiences with desire and hate are likely to support the poem’s argument. Emotions can be strong enough to overwhelm reason, yet the speaker does not seem to be broken. The speaker is hurt, certainly, but not destroyed­—a state underscored and reinforced by the humor of the poem, bittersweet as it is. Of all the strong and affective poems that Frost wrote, this poem is a marvel for being able to condense so much thought and feeling into so compact a space.

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Topics and Strategies The topics in the following pages are meant to serve as questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes The speaker in “Fire and Ice” tells us that desire and hate are equally capable of destroying the world. Hate seems rather obviously destructive, but the destructive power of desire may be less obvious or harmful at first. Yet of the two, the speaker seems to choose desire as the more destructive. But is desire necessarily bad in and of itself? Desire is how we know what we want and the foundation for our life goals and our willingness to help other people. But when desire turns selfish and petty, then complications can arise. If that kind of shading is possible for the concept of desire, is it also possible for the concept of hate? The speaker of the poem also indicates, indirectly, that desire and hate do not necessarily destroy everything. After all, the speaker indicates that he has “tasted” desire, all the more reason perhaps he warns of its negative effects. What keeps these emotions from taking over and reaching their most destructive peak? Do other people help to rein us in? Or is it our own ability to think and to reason? Desire and hate are both instinctive emotions. Can reason rein them in?

Sample Topics: 1. Desire and hate: How are desire and hate destructive forces in equal measure? An essay exploring this topic might begin with the thesis that desire and hate are the destructive extremes of less dangerous emotions. Discuss examples of hate and desire leading to destruction, then turn your attention to the forms that the less passionate, less destructive versions of desire and hate might take. How might we nurture the constructive aspects of these emotions and protect ourselves from the destructive extremes and the consequences they provoke?

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2. Emotion and reason: How do we balance emotion and reason? Is reason the only safeguard we have against the destructive power of emotions, particularly desire and hate? The speaker of the poem has apparently experienced both hate and desire yet does not seem to have been destroyed by either. How might he have managed to check his desires and his hatred before they consumed him? Given the brevity of the poem, these kinds of questions require some interpretive speculation. Why would Frost choose this particular binary—desire and hatred—as the crux of his poem?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery Much of the poem’s enduring appeal derives from its tone. For a poem about the possible end of the world or the personally destructive power of desire and hate, there is a conspicuous lack of strident warning or despair to the poem’s tone. Several aspects of the poem contribute to its tone. One is the meter—iambic tetrameter—which is a four-beat line that results in more of a sing-song sound than the more typical five beats of iambic pentameter. Another is the word choice: What does the speaker mean by saying that ice is “great” for destroying the world? What does the sarcasm of that word choice contribute to the poem’s overall tone? Other intriguing words include “tasted” and “favor”; to taste something is to try it, not necessarily to consume it, and why would anyone “favor” fire/desire as the force to destroy the world? Overall, the poem’s tone helps to create a picture of the speaker as someone who has experienced some form of emotional pain through desire and hate (perhaps unrequited desire led to hate?) and is now embittered or melancholy because of it.

Sample Topic: 1. Tone: What is the poem’s tone, and how is it developed? To write this paper, you would first determine the tone you think the poem presents. Your thesis could emerge from the contention that the poem establishes that tone through various devices, and you would then devote your essay to exploring

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Compare and Contrast Many critics have noted similarities between Dante’s Inferno and Frost’s “Fire and Ice”; Jeffrey Myers claims that Frost was inspired by the description of the ninth circle of Dante’s Hell, where sinners are trapped in a lake of ice, while John N. Serio works to demonstrate that “Fire and Ice” is intimately intertwined with the Inferno. If you choose to contrast these two poems, keep in mind that your goal should be to show how an understanding of Dante that makes your reading of Frost more compelling, emotionally engaging, intellectually engaging, or simply more clear. Your goal is not just to explain that Frost uses Dante as a starting point and then list similarities between the two poems; your goal is to identify and discuss an aspect of Dante’s epic work that helps to elucidate an element of Frost’s poem. A few years after Frost published “Fire and Ice,” T. S. Eliot published “The Hollow Men,” which makes its own statement about the way the world ends in its final lines: “This is the way the world ends / This is the way the world ends / This is the way the world ends / Not with a bang but a whimper.” Where Frost suggests that the passions are destructive, Eliot seems to say that the world ends with, and because of, the absence of any kind of passion.

Sample Topics: 1. Dante’s Inferno: How does Frost’s poem relate to Dante’s? Writing about these two poems requires you first to identify the degree to which you think Frost is trying to reflect, encompass, or build on Dante and his work. Is Frost simply borrowing the idea of Dante’s Hell, where the damned spend eternity frozen in a lake of ice? Or is Frost somehow trying to represent all of Hell, all of the Inferno, in his tightly compacted poem? To write this essay, you will need to discuss the various passions of the sinners Dante encounters as he travels deeper into Hell; then discuss how effectively Frost summarizes or condenses the lessons of the Inferno in “Fire and Ice.”

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2. Eliot’s “The Hollow Men”: How do Frost and Eliot comment on passion in their respective poems? Eliot seems to be arguing for people to have some kind of passion or some kind of conviction, spiritual or otherwise, that will give their lives meaning. To compare Frost’s poem with Eliot’s, you might want to consider whether or not Frost is arguing against passion because of the threat it contains. One productive approach to comparing these poems would be to consider them as correctives to each other. In other words, Frost may be arguing against passion, while Eliot is endorsing it. Put side by side, the two poems help us see the middle ground each poet seems deliberately to be avoiding. Bibliography for “Fire and Ice” Alighieri, Dante. Inferno. Trans. Allen Mandelbaum. New York: Bantam, 1980. Eliot, T. S. Collected Poems 1909–1962. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Company, 1991. Hansen, Tom. “Frost’s ‘Fire and Ice.’” Explicator 59.1 (Fall 2000): 27–30. Meyers, Jeffrey. Robert Frost: A Biography. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996. Serio, John R. “Frost’s ‘Fire and Ice’ and Dante’s Inferno.” Explicator 57.4 (Summer 1999): 218. Wormser, Baron. “Meeting the Agony: Three Poems of the Twentieth Century.” Sewanee Review 116.3 (Summer 2008): 411–427.

“Nothing Gold Can Stay”

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espite its brevity and apparent thematic simplicity, “Nothing Gold Can Stay” can be the subject of any number of original essays. In typical Frost style, the poet has packed a range of ideas into an accessible poem that contains greater depths than its eight brief lines may initially indicate. Frost’s central concern in the poem is the notion of change, that situations may start out seemingly vibrant or full of promise, but they quickly settle into something not quite as exhilarating as they first appeared. The question, then, is what to make of that transience. One way to sort out a poem’s meaning is to work through it line by line and image by image, studying each part carefully. The individual words even warrant close scrutiny, and in a poem such as this one, with only forty words, the poet’s word choices are highlighted all the more. To explicate this poem, start by teasing out the image each line contains. Explain the images and the apparent meaning of each. For example, the first line reads, “Nature’s first green is gold.” Green is one of the dominant colors in nature and may be the color most symbolically linked with nature. Green also signifies life and growth, the color of foliage and the seasons of growth. So, in the first three words, we see that the poem is focused on spring, new life, and its re-emergence after the hibernation and death of winter. Moreover, the second word of the poem suggests that things will change, that a state of flux or transition is being portrayed here; the line focuses on the “first” green, which not only suggests that a different green will appear later, but also that the line refers

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to observing nature in springtime, when the browns of winter give way to new leaves. What about the gold, then? It is hard to imagine that the reference is to actual wealth or riches, so it is likely Frost is limiting his reference to its implications as a color. How can the first green be gold? Spring leaves tend to be a brighter, lighter green than the darker leaves of summer. Various critics have noted that in the Northeast, the first leaves of some plants are so light that they appear yellow, while other plants produce yellow flowers before their green leaves appear. With this in mind, the first line tells us that in early spring, as nature revives and displays signs of renewed life, the green that we associate with nature and with the spring and summer seasons actually begins as gold. Because that is just the “first” green, though, we know it is in a transitional state and will not last. The second line supports this notion, telling us that gold is the hardest color for nature to retain. All too quickly, the gold gives way to other shades, in this case the evolving greens of the foliage reanimating the landscape. In this way, you can proceed through the poem, thinking carefully about the components and implications of each line. As you study the poem closely, consider as well the way Frost constructs tone. The changes the poem describes do not seem at first to be positive ones—especially the biblical Fall that occurred in the Garden of Eden—but at least one critic has argued that the “poem is not one of sadness but of triumph” (Quinn 622). Do you agree? A strong essay could be generated either by agreeing or disagreeing with this contention.

Topics and Strategies The topics in the following pages are meant to serve as questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes Each of the images in “Nothing Gold Can Stay,” even the sentiment of the final line, points to the idea that things decay, lose their initial luster, or at least change. Frost’s poem can be seen, on one level, as a warning that nothing is permanent. On one hand, Frost returns to the idea of entropy, which states that systems deteriorate over time, moving from order to disorder.

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You can see this at work in nature (an untended flowerbed fills with weeds) or in human-made objects (abandoned houses fall apart). Inherent to the concept of entropy is an inevitability, because even though the process of entropy is slow and its effects can be staved off, destruction is imminent, and the final reality is that nothing is permanent. At the other, more positive extreme, is the idea that things move in cycles. Entropy may be the inescapable long-term disorder of the universe, but in the meantime nature pursues its own cycles, moving from birth to growth to death, then back to birth again. From this perspective, the examples the poem provides are simply part of larger cycles at work in the world. Spring may pass to summer, and summer will give way to fall and then winter, but spring will eventually return again.

Sample Topics: 1. Entropy: Does this poem point toward the inevitable decline of all things? What insights does it offer about this inevitable tending toward chaos and destruction? Frost’s poem serves as a melancholy reminder that all of our efforts will be for nought; they will pass away. This is not an uplifting message to take from the poem, but you could argue that what we know about decay and disorder in the universe makes this a realistic point for the poem to make. Still, why would Frost feel compelled to make this point? What purpose could a poem about entropy serve? How does it help us come to terms with our own lives and efforts to create, knowing that nothing we do will last? Is Frost encouraging us to temper or qualify our expectations? 2. Cycles: Does this poem point toward a cyclical reality? While the world may be tending toward breakdown and decay, nonetheless within this process is contained the notion of cycles. By starting with the imagery of spring, the poem reminds us that unquestionably spring arrives anew each year. A thesis for this paper might establish that the poem injects an uplifting reference to rebirth within a larger context of decay, sounding a note of encouragement within a more grim

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and all-encompassing notion of destruction. Are cycles a vital and necessary distraction from an awareness of such pervasive decay? Alternative to the flux of time is stasis. Perhaps nothing gold can stay, but would we want it to?

History and Context One way to explain the poem’s imagery is to describe the actual process of budding and leafing that occurs in the spring. For some plants, flowers appear before leaves. For other plants, early leaves are such a light green that they appear yellow before turning a darker green as spring and summer progress. Frost is describing natural processes, and as he so often does in his poetry, he uses the observation of natural processes as a starting point for commenting on the state or condition of life itself. Do some research into the flowering of plants. Laurence Perrine identifies plums, peaches, cherries, and redbuds as species relevant to a botanical exploration of the issues raised in the poem.

Sample Topic: 1. The natural world as context: How do specific examples from nature clarify the poem’s imagery? The poem’s abstract images describe and reference the process of leafing and budding that occurs in spring. An essay centered on this phenomenon would potentially identify certain plants, describe the stages they go through as they emerge from dormancy in the spring, and then argue the significance of that process for the meaning of the poem. For example, is it tragic that a plum tree’s flowers last for so short a time? Or is that a projection of human emotion, expectation, and interpretation? Do the flowers make it possible for the tree to have a healthy spring and summer?

Philosophy and Ideas Among the examples the poem gives of how things change is the example of the Garden of Eden. The Eden image is explicitly tied to an emotion— grief. This reference is unusual when compared to the other images, which limit themselves to natural processes and occurrences. The Eden reference, however, invokes the biblical story of the fall of humanity from

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grace. With this line, the poem asks us to think about much larger issues relating to human nature, evil, transgression, and even the possibility that nature declines as a consequence of humanity’s sin.

Sample Topic: 1. The fall from grace: What comment does this poem make about the nature of postlapsarian existence? Postlapsarian is the word used to describe the fallen world that resulted from Adam and Eve’s sin in the Garden of Eden, as portrayed in the Bible. A thesis for this paper could argue the significance of the reference to Eden in the poem. How does it relate to the other images? What tone does it impart to the poem as a whole? Are we in a helpless, tainted state? If one of the points of the Garden of Eden story is that Adam and Eve caused their own expulsion, did they also cause the entire fallen/entropic state of existence? Does the biblical story give us hope for recovery, or are we living in a state in which things will get only irretrievably worse? You might contrast the line about Eden to the line that follows it, which possibly suggests that the fall from grace was little more than the movement from dawn to the entire rest of the day. We do not associate daytime with sadness or sin, so what is Frost suggesting through this pairing?

Form and Genre Frost’s formal choices in “Nothing Gold Can Stay” offer numerous avenues for interpretation and discussion. The rhythm of the poem is noticeably pronounced, assuming regular nursery rhyme–style cadences. Other conspicuous elements of the poem’s form and construction are the prominent rhymes and the end-stopped lines. The poem is a series of rhyming couplets, and each line ends with punctuation that forces a pause or even a stop before continuing to the next line. These deliberate and intended pauses at the ends of the lines, combined with the heightened or artificial language of prominent rhymes, gives the poem the essence of an aphorism, which is a short and memorable saying that offers some insight into human character or conduct. Aphorisms can be insightful or meaningful, but because they are so short, they are not intended to present or develop truly weighty ideas. The ideas in “Noth-

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ing Gold Can Stay,” particularly the notion of Adam and Eve falling from grace, reference complex issues involving morality and the origins and nature of human existence. The juxtaposition of the lightheartedness we associate with nursery rhymes and aphorisms and the seriousness of the poem’s central image raises tensions worth exploring.

Sample Topic: 1. Form and tone: What tone emerges from the combination of form and topic in this poem? There is an interesting pairing at work in this poem, with the use of nursery rhyme rhythms to present an idea as large and consequential as the fall from grace in the Garden of Eden. A thesis for this paper would introduce an argument about the message that emerges from this juxtaposition. Is the poem asking us not to take the fall too seriously? Or is the poem asking us to take the fall very seriously through the ironic use of an incongruent tone? Consider as well the prominent rhymes and end-stopped lines: How do they contribute to the poem’s tone and help us understand what to make of Adam and Eve’s fall?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery Another way of unlocking Frost’s poem is to consider it as a meditation on aging. The poem focuses primarily on the passage from early to late spring and then to summer. For most of spring and summer, after the first explosion of spring colors, nature is simply green. Perhaps the poem is asking us to compare this to the state of our individual lives, which is spent more in adulthood than youth. Is adulthood a fall from childhood and its associated innocence or simply an inevitable change?

Sample Topics: 1. Aging and maturity: How do the poem’s symbols for youth and aging give us greater perspective on maturity? An essay on this topic might begin by noting that all of the images in the poem represent a brief beginning followed by a longer, more sustained existence that is less vibrant. Specifically, you would read the poem as a commentary on adulthood

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost compared to childhood, reading the early images—gold, flower, Eden, dawn—as symbols for youth, while the leaf/grief/day images are equated with adulthood. The question your paper would work to answer is whether or not the less vibrant adulthood-associated images signify a lesser state. The key line for this reading is the final one: If nothing gold can stay, is the “can” somehow meant to suggest that we want gold to stay or would prefer that it did? Does the poem, then, lament that fact or suggest that we do not need or want gold to stay?

2. The poem as metaphor for poetry: Can you read this poem as a commentary on poetry in general? The poem’s central metaphor can be seen as relating to the act of reading and interpreting Frost’s poetry in general. Frost’s poems often leave a first impression of simplicity that gives way to more sustained complexity as you work with the imagery and symbols. Perhaps this poem can be explicated to describe the process of reading poetry, responding to its first emotional impact, and then followed by more lengthy and careful interpretation and study.

Compare and Contrast In “The Oven Bird,” Frost makes much the same point about the passage of spring into summer, but there he explicitly refers to summer as something diminished or lesser. The song of the oven bird is interpreted as an example of how to sing about things even when they are diminished shadows or fragments of what they originally were. Reading these two poems comparatively may enable you to find a new or greater perspective for understanding “Nothing Gold Can Stay.”

Sample Topic: 1. “The Oven Bird”: How might a conception of the elements and themes in “The Oven Bird” pave the way for a greater understanding of Frost’s aims and attentions in “Nothing Gold Can Stay”? “The Oven Bird” depicts summer as a “diminished thing” that the bird still finds ways to sing about and celebrate. In much

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the same way, “Nothing Gold Can Stay” seems to suggest that summer is a diminished time or concept, and that as much as we might want to hold on to spring, it cannot stay. If the natural order of things is to start gloriously and then settle into something more mundane, should we despair or celebrate what we have? Explain the message of “The Oven Bird.” Does “Nothing Gold Can Stay” carry a similar, albeit more pessimistic, outlook? Does “Nothing Gold Can Stay” maintain the perspective of “The Oven Bird,” or is it a gloomier reconsideration in which the poet’s initial vision is modified or altered? Bibliography for “Nothing Gold Can Stay” Berger, Charles. “Echoing Eden: Frost and Origins.” Robert Frost. Modern Critical Views. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1986. 147–165. Freeman, Donald C. “Burning Gold for John Robert Ross.” Style 40.1/2 (Spring/ Summer 2006): 128–132. Perrine, Laurence. “Frost’s Nothing Gold Can Stay.” Explicator 42.1 (Fall 1983): 38–39. Quinn, M. Bernetta. “Symbolic Landscape in Frost’s ‘Nothing Gold Can Stay.’ ” The English Journal 55(5) May 1966: 621–624. Rea, John A. “Language and Form in ‘Nothing Gold Can Stay.’ ” Robert Frost: Studies of the Poetry. Ed. Kathryn Gibbs Harris. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1979.

“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”

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topping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” is one of Frost’s most anthologized, memorized, recited, and analyzed poems. Much of its enduring popularity is due to how readily it lends itself to a variety of interpretive approaches. It is possible to read the poem as nothing more than the simple story of a tired traveler who stops to relax by staring at a quiet, beautiful nature scene. At the other extreme, it is possible to read it as a meditation on death. One critic argues that it is not about the “big death” that ends life but the “little death” of giving up on the things we want to do in order to meet our obligations; another critic makes the tongue-in-cheek, but compelling, argument that the speaker of the poem is Santa Claus. Who else has to travel so far at that time of year? All of these interpretations and their contradictory analogues are supportable because the poem masterfully presents images that are clear and easily ascertained on the surface but that reveal layers of complexity the more they are analyzed and unpeeled. Consider the woods, which the poem describes as “lovely, dark and deep.” We instinctively recognize the beauty of the scene, and we sense the pull that scene has on the speaker, but the ominous, mysterious, even threatening aspects of the setting emerge as well. Why is the speaker enchanted by observing this combination of the beautiful with the potentially dangerous, to the point that he has to be roused by his horse?

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The achievement of the poem is that it accommodates so many interpretive possibilities without forcing or excluding any of them. Frost denied that he meant for the poem to evoke thoughts of suicide, yet many people interpret the poem that way, and they can do so without stretching the limits of logic and sense. As strong as the arguments for a suicidal interpretation may be, however, other interpretations make equally strong cases. The poem’s imagery gives us just enough of the speaker’s psychology to compel the reader to wonder why he describes the situation precisely as he does. We know what promises are, for example, and we know that they should be kept, but we have no idea what exact obligations the speaker has made and we have no idea why he feels the need to fulfill them. Ultimately, this poem and “The Road Not Taken” manage the extraordinary task of telling us just enough of what someone thinks for us to understand the situation but still so little that we have compelling questions that can never be answered or that Frost willfully leaves unresolved. Frost often writes poems that present a scene and then offer some observations about the scene’s significance; his short, first-person reveries, however, stand out from his other poems by hiding the observations about the scene’s significance within a subjective perspective that either does not fully understand what it is thinking and feeling or does not share those impressions or struggles with us completely.

Topics and Strategies The following topics are meant to serve as questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes As with so many of Frost’s poems, “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” situates a person in nature and asks us to reflect on the relationship of the two. Here the speaker is looking into the woods, far from the village or community he most likely calls home. The woods draw the speaker away from his life among people, but in the end he “chooses the world of humanity” (French 161). The woods are often a foreboding and dangerous place for Frost—see “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” for an example—and

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here they are as dark and ominous as they are mysterious and attractive. Still, there is little sense that the woods and the speaker have something in common or joint concerns. Once again we see Frost revealing the indifference of nature toward the activity of people. Filling this gulf or divide between the two entities is the horse, a form of domesticated nature, which might be understood to serve as a kind of bridge between the human and natural realms. The poem never mentions where the speaker is going, but the ending is suggestive, concluding as it does with a reference to sleep. If this is not the sleep of death, then where is the speaker going to sleep? Is he merely yearning for a domestic setting that can comfortably contain him? What role does home play in this poem, if in fact home is his final destination? Is it warm and welcoming? Is it a refuge? Is it a place he is going so that he can hide? Or is it simply the place where you rest briefly before you head back out to keep more promises? The presence of the promises looms in the poem. The speaker accords great respect to the people in his life he is bound to, by recognizing that he must meet his responsibilities. His willingness to consider the oblivion of the woods suggests that he is weary of his chores, yet he rouses himself and continues on. In spite of his sense of responsibility, though, the speaker seems wary of encountering anyone. More specifically, he seems wary of being seen. Notice that he assures himself that he will not encounter the woods’ owner by saying, “He will not see me stopping here” in line 3. Describing their possible meeting as the owner seeing the speaker trespassing, the speaker manifests a degree of self-consciousness in his confession. He knows his behavior is odd, and he knows that he is focusing on the woods to the exclusion of other thoughts; after all, he does not imagine seeing or talking to the owner of the woods, just of being watched or possibly caught by him. Furthermore, even though no one is around to see the speaker stop in the middle of the road—as darkness descends and snow falls—to stare toward woods that are too dark to see into, the speaker still imagines that the horse finds his behavior odd. The speaker seems to see himself as standing apart from people and even from at least some representatives of nature in the form of his horse. Even though he will eventually re-engage the human realm by riding off to fulfill his promises, he is somehow alone.

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Sample Topics: 1. The world of nature and the world of humanity: How does this poem depict the relationship between people and nature? In his poem, Frost establishes a contrast between the woods and the horse, both of which represent nature, albeit in a different form, but each of which has a different relationship to the speaker of the poem. Identify the way the speaker relates to the woods and the way he relates to the horse. Does the speaker project a human relationship onto his interactions with the horse? 2. Home: Is the comfort of home waiting for the speaker? Is it actually a comfort at all or a temporary reprieve from the inevitable need to fulfill one’s obligations to the world? The speaker is potentially on his way home when he becomes entranced by the woods. Home is thus established as a place that either rescues him from that enchantment or to which he grudgingly must go. To discuss the domestic sphere in an essay, determine how willingly, thankfully, or ruefully the speaker continues on his journey home. In what ways do the woods parallel or replace the notion of home in the solitude, escape, and isolation they provide? 3. Obligation and responsibility: What is the poem’s perspective on responsibilities? The poem can essentially be seen as a call to readers to recognize how much we depend on one another. Alternatively, you could argue that the poem presents our responsibilities toward one another as exhausting, burdensome, and perhaps unfairly distributed. The direction you take will depend in large measure on your understanding and interpretation of the poem’s overall tone. The speaker is certainly weary; be sure to present evidence of his exhaustion. A case could certainly be made, though, that he heroically rouses himself to his duties at the

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4. Loneliness: Does it matter that the speaker calls attention to being unseen? So much of Frost’s poetry hinges on a speaker observing the world around him. What are the implications of this individual wishing to avoid detection in such a random and remote space? The speaker worries about being watched, perhaps because he knows his behavior is unusual and he does not want to be thought of as strange. Another explanation is that the speaker does not want anyone to interrupt his reverie. An essay investigating this aspect of the poem could study the relationships the speaker seems to have with the owner, the horse, the people to whom he has made promises, and even with himself. How do those relationships compare to or differ from whatever the speaker is drawn to in the woods?

History and Context One viable approach to the study of poetry is to examine the changes made by poets and editors in different published versions of a poem. One particularly controversial difference that pertains to Frost’s work appears in varying versions of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” In the version Frost published in his collection New Hampshire, line 13 reads, “The woods are lovely, dark and deep”; much later, an editor named Edward Connery Lathem introduced a second comma, changing the line to read, “The woods are lovely, dark, and deep.” While Frost most likely intended his readers to have the version he originally published, it is well worth studying the difference that second comma makes. While several contemporary critics have begun to view the poem as a meditation on suicide, or at least to be marked by a fascination with death, that interpretation has not always been part of the critical discussion surrounding the poem. It took more than thirty years before critics began to identify the poem’s expression of a death wish, and the public reaction to that interpretation was initially one of outrage (Armstrong 440). Frost denied that his poem hinted at suicide or a longing for death,

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but we must always be careful with what a poet says about his or her own poetry; just because they meant to do something does not mean they succeeded, and just because they didn’t intend something does not mean it is not present or significant nonetheless. The public perception of Frost as genial, kindly, calm, and pleasant seems at odds with a dark-toned, death-obsessed poetry. Frost was careful to cultivate his nonthreatening, avuncular, and homespun persona by never reading some of his darker poems at readings and public events.

Sample Topics: 1. The Lathem comma: What is the difference in meaning between “The woods are lovely, dark and deep” and “The woods are lovely, dark, and deep”? Does the addition of a single comma alter the intended or received meaning at all? If so, how? In the Frost version, “dark and deep” modify “lovely,” helping us to understand what is lovely about them. In the Lathem version, “lovely, dark, and deep” are three independent descriptors of the woods. An essay examining these differences would focus on explaining the different meanings that emerge. You would also want to focus on how the different versions provide varying insights into the speaker’s thinking by concentrating on the way Frost’s version helps us understand how the speaker defines “lovely.” The Lathem version does not encourage or engender such consideration. 2. Changing critical and public ideas: How have the public and critical reception of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” changed over time? This paper will require some historical research, but it will not be difficult to find criticism about the poem. You might start with a journal such as Explicator, which includes articles that focus on a small part of a poem and work to explain its meaning or significance. Tracing the development of interpretation over time as presented in Explicator would provide an interesting review of the ways critics think through interpretive problems. In addition, this approach will be illustrative of

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost the ways a poem can lend itself to many different, thoughtful, and evolving interpretations. What critical responses to the poem are consistent over time? How does an author’s critical reputation evolve over time, and how are the reception of canonical works affected by this change? What critical threads have remained consistent over time in the general response to “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”?

Philosophy and Ideas Frost’s poetry often grapples with spiritual questions, centering on humanity’s place and role in the universe and the quest to confront the forces, either controllable or uncontrollable, influencing and dictating human action. “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” can easily be read as a commentary on a fundamental need to grapple with questions of existence and purpose. Some critics contend that the owner of the woods Frost refers to is a deity or creator figure. If that is the case, then why is the speaker drawn there if he does not expect to meet anyone there? Frost is potentially suggesting that the speaker is trying to find meaning and trying to contextualize his life, all the while knowing that there is no higher source of wisdom that will explicate it for him. He grapples with questions of his own existence but with no expectation of an answer waiting for him or owed him. Frost’s speaker is also potentially attempting to resign himself to living in a world with an absent creator, an entity that does not involve itself in human strivings or in the workings of creation after setting everything initially in motion. The suggestion of death arguably looms in the poem, a presence you may wish to resolve in an essay. Many critics read the poem as a meditation on death, or even suicide, and there is some biographical support for the poem taking on such preoccupations as Frost may have tried to commit suicide once by trying to get lost in North Carolina’s Dismal Swamp. Frost does not seem to have taken the effort too seriously—he was apparently trying to punish Elinor, his future wife, for rejecting his proposal—but it is relevant to the explication of a potentially death-haunted poem and reveals that the idea of suicide was not foreign to the poet. Note that there is no mention, or even much of a hint, of suicide in this poem, though. Rather, the inclination toward self-annulment is more of a fascination with the abstract idea of death as rest, escape, or even an unknown mystery to explore. Critics have noted the death wish as a motive force in the poem, and Frost may be

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uttering a simple human fascination with mortality rather than explicitly rendering the ending of a life, whether at one’s own hand or not.

Sample Topics: 1. Deism in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”: How does it help us to understand the poem if we think of it in terms of deism? The poem can be viewed as an allegory for deistic thinking. That is, the various elements that make up the poem should be viewed not literally but metaphorically. The poem becomes an exploration of the nature of a deity who “owns” the surroundings the speaker finds himself in but is, in fact, absent. The poem becomes the speaker’s attempt to understand that only through the study of the natural world, through the Frostian mode of observation and contemplation, can an understanding of the nature and workings of life develop. This, unfortunately for the speaker, is not his primary responsibility and, in light of his various responsibilities to the human order around him, such introspection is a luxury to which he can never devote enough time. How does Frost complicate this vision by suggesting that such wisdom is part of a lifelong effort, with no promise of reward, and that a random moment of pause within that quest is ultimately meaningless? 2. The speaker’s death wish: How does the poem offer perspective on the common fear of and fascination with mortality? One possible thesis is that the poem shows us someone who is contemplating suicide, perhaps unexpectedly, but argues himself out of it by remembering his responsibilities. Another is that the speaker is simply made aware of his own mortality, hypnotized by the prospect and reality of death but not ready to surrender to it. Your thesis will need to argue ultimately for a positive reading (the speaker embraces life) or a negative interpretation (the speaker longs for death but cannot have it yet). Your evidence will be drawn from the introspective imagery of the poem.

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Form and Genre Critic James Cox has suggested that the speaker of the poem uses the poem itself as a way to break the mesmerizing hold the woods have over him. The rhyme is structured like links in a chain, with the third line breaking the rhyme of each stanza but then linking to the rhyme of the next stanza. Only the fourth stanza uses the same rhyme in all four lines and this (along with the repetition of the last lines) creates a sense of closure and finality.

Sample Topic: 1. The poem as counterspell: How does the poem’s structure help the speaker escape the woods’ enchantment? One way to discuss the poem’s structure is to argue that it has a relationship to the poem’s image of the speaker being lulled or “transfixed” (Cox 150) by the woods. Your thesis might borrow Cox’s idea that the woods cast a spell over the speaker, and the rhythm of the poem helps him break the spell. Another thesis might be that the rhythm and the rhyme create a hypnotic effect, mirroring and evoking the speaker’s sense that he cannot look away or move away from the woods. Your interpretation of the final lines may influence the direction of your argument: Has the speaker pulled himself away from the woods and moved on, or is he still sitting there, staring, even though he has recognized that he needs to move on?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery Frost’s best poems achieve their power from the ways they invite various interpretations, often at odds with one another. “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” is an ambiguous poem, and the testament to its brilliance is the way Frost makes it possible for us to know exactly what he is writing about while at the same time making it very obscure. Take for example the promises to which he alludes. After an initial reading, we all know what he means: He has obligations to other people and is determined to honor them. But the more closely you analyze Frost’s framing and treatment of the promises, the more vague and uncertain they become. What might they be? Why is the speaker so determined to keep the promises? Is it because he has promised specific important things that must be delivered, or does the speaker have a more abstract notion that it is important to keep promises no matter how small? The specific

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details of the promise are potentially irrelevant; it is rather the inherent nature of a promise, the notion of being responsible to and answering to one’s oaths and pledges, that is of central importance. With a better understanding of Frost’s conception of promises, consider then the poem’s weary tone. How does the speaker thinks of his promises: Does he want to keep them, or does he simply think he must keep them? The woods are a common setting for Frost’s poems, and they are often portrayed as dangerous, ominous, or foreboding. In this poem, the woods are all of these things, in addition to being mysterious and alluring. The speaker cannot see into the woods, but the dark secretiveness he locates there is compelling to him. Identifying why is key to understanding the poem; naturally, there is no critical agreement about what that reason might be. The speaker forces himself to leave the woods, to free himself of its pull and power over him, because of his ongoing obligations. This suggests that the escape the woods offer is somehow permanent, so the speaker cannot afford to indulge that option just yet. The speaker imagines that his horse is wondering why they have stopped and that he shakes his harness bells because he is trying to get the speaker’s attention. Here, the speaker is indulging in anthropomorphic thinking, projecting human qualities onto an animal or nonhuman entity. It is instructive to think about the specific thoughts he attributes to the horse. Notice that he does not imagine the horse to be thinking about itself—its own fatigue, for example—but instead the horse is portrayed as being concerned about the speaker. The final two lines are a celebrated example of the power of repetition. As much as the various images in the poem invite us to think metaphorically about the proceedings in this remote place, the final two lines elevate the poem to something epic in scope. Said once, “And miles to go before I sleep” is simply a statement of fact and the reality of the situation: The fatigued speaker has much ground to travel before he can rest. Said a second time, the line becomes something more. Despite being repeated verbatim, the second line expands and builds on the first, complicating and transforming its literal concerns and signaling the reader of its metaphoric content.

Sample Topics: 1. Evocative, ambiguous imagery: How do the ambiguous images of the poem unfold as we think about them? Is Frost’s ambiguity deliberate? What does it add? Is it essential to the poem?

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost The end of the poem is particularly ambiguous, giving us three ideas (promises, miles to go, and sleep) that retain their literal meaning while opening to a more metaphorical interpretation. How are each of these ideas presented and represented in the poem? How does the repetition found in the final two lines complicate and enlarge the literal content they convey—a weary traveler wishing he were home asleep? You may wish to integrate multiple, conflicting interpretations based on multiple readings of the metaphors.

2. The woods: What do the woods symbolize in the poem? Do the woods symbolize death? Or do they represent eternity? Or do they stand for a fantasized escape from adult responsibility the speaker knows is impossible? Examine and discuss each of the references to the woods. Through the accumulated imagery, does the symbolic presence of the woods change? By the end of the poem, how do they contribute to Frost’s ultimate vision? Do they suggest a permanent escape? 3. The horse: What do the speaker’s thoughts about the horse tell us about his frame of mind? Why is the horse referred to in the poem in the first place? What is its role and function in the poem? An essay about the horse in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” might build on the observation that the speaker projects his self-consciousness about stopping in or near the woods onto the horse. Why would he do so? You would want to consider other evidence in the poem about the speaker’s psychological state, and you would want to consider why he is worried about how odd his behavior might seem to an observer, both human and animal. 4. The repetition in the final lines: How do you interpret the final lines? Do they complicate or expand on everything that has come before? The repetition invites us to read the final line metaphorically, in which “miles to go” represent something more than a literal

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journey and “sleep” represents something more than actually physically resting. An unexpected thesis for an essay on this topic could contend that the repetition is not metaphoric but simply reinforces the speaker’s weariness. Use evidence from the rest of the poem to support and develop whatever position you take.

Compare and Contrast Frost said that he wrote this poem early one morning, after staying up all night working on another poem, “New Hampshire.” “New Hampshire” is long and one of Frost’s weaker efforts; one of the poem’s flaws is its relative lack of ambiguity. The poem offers little interpretive room, which is not the case with “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Comparing these two poems leads us to think about a number of connections we might not consider otherwise. Frost biographer Jeffrey Meyers notes that three of the lines in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” are adapted from other poems: “He gives his harness bells a shake” comes from Scott’s “The Rover” (in Palgrave): “He gave the bridle-reins a shake.” “The woods are lovely, dark and deep” comes from Thomas Lovell Beddoes’s “The Phantom Wooer”: “Our bed is lovely, dark, and sweet.” The concluding “And miles to go before I sleep” comes from Keats’s “Keen Fitful Gusts”: “And I have many miles on foot to fare” (180). Frost was well read, so it is not hard to imagine that he would have known these poems well enough to cite them from memory and adapt their lines for his own purposes. When poets quote or alter lines from other poems but leave them intact enough for us to recognize, they are inviting us to think of that other poem alongside their own. Scott’s poem, for example, is a poem of parting; the rover of the title shakes his horse’s reins as he turns to leave the woman who loves him. If you read Scott’s poem and find it to be melancholy, you will potentially transfer that reaction to your reading of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” That is the power of allusion; it invites a reader to integrate ideas, themes, and tones from one poem or work into their understanding of another. Another, albeit less obvious, allusion is to Dante’s Inferno. Dante wrote in terza rima, a rhyme that follows the pattern aba bcb cdc. Frost used a modified form of that interlocking pattern in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” He also borrowed an image from Dante’s opening

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lines, which read, “Midway upon the journey of our life / I found myself within a forest dark, / For the straightforward pathway had been lost.” Frost was most likely acquainted with these well-known opening lines to the Inferno. What we know about Dante’s poem—its scope and themes— then becomes available to us, potentially influencing our understanding of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Within the Frost canon, you might want to compare the speaker of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” to the speaker of “Acquainted with the Night.” Both actively avoid contact with other people, both find some form of comfort or solace in being reflective in darkness and solitude, and both seem to be searching for something to resolve or fill out their lives.

Sample Topics: 1. “New Hampshire” and “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”: How might these two poems be compared? Because these poems were written successively, they invite comparison in terms of their structure, tone, and thematic preoccupations. Any number of comparative approaches are available. You might argue that the rigid rhyme and meter of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” are more natural to Frost, using the evidence that he wrote the poem quickly after laboring over the blank verse of “New Hampshire.” You might review the thematic differences of the poems or the degree to which one is ambiguous and the other not. Consider the voice that the speaker of each poem presents. 2. Allusions to other poems: How do the allusions to Scott, Beddoes, and Keats affect our reading of Frost? Read each of the poems Frost alludes to; they are short, and the connections to Frost’s poem will be apparent. You might pay particular attention to Beddoes’s poem, which describes a lover’s bed as “lovely, dark, and sweet.” Be sure to note exactly where that bed is located, though. How is our reading of Frost enriched by greater familiarity with the three literary allu-

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sions? Your arguments will be about the specific effect of each allusion, how each helps to narrow interpretation or contribute to the poem’s overall mood and thematic development. 3. Dante’s Inferno: How does the allusion to Dante inform our reading of Frost? An essay on this topic might begin by noting that the speakers in each poem start out in a rough wood. Dante’s speaker is midway through life’s journey. Does this suggest that Frost is thinking in terms of a life journey in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”? How might Dante’s journey through Hell compare to the “miles to go” that face the speaker in Frost’s poem? 4. “Acquainted with the Night”: How are the speakers of “Acquainted with the Night” and “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” similar? How does understanding one help us to understand the other? The speakers of each poem are following the same introspective path to self-discovery. The speaker of “Acquainted with the Night” is merely further down that path. Establish an argument about the mental state of each speaker. How can the speaker of “Acquainted with the Night” be used as a potential indicator of where the speaker of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” may be headed psychologically? Bibliography and Online Resources for “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” Alighieri, Dante. Inferno. Trans. Allen Mandelbaum. New York: Bantam, 1980. Armstrong, James. “The Death Wish in ‘Stopping By Woods.’ ” College English 25.6 (March 1964): 440, 445. Beddoes, Thomas Lovell. “The Phantom-Wooer.” Phantom-Wooer: The Thomas Lovell Beddoes Website. 3 March 2009 Coursen, Herbert R. “The Ghost of Christmas Past: ‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.’ ” College English 24.3 (December 1962): 236–238.

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Cox, James M. “Robert Frost and the Edge of the Clearing.” Critical Essays on Robert Frost. Ed. Philip L. Gerber. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1982. 144–154. Cunningham, John. “Human Presence in Frost’s Universe.” The Cambridge Companion to Robert Frost. Ed. Robert Faggen. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2001. 261–272. French, Roberts W. “Robert Frost and the Darkness of Nature.” Critical Essays on Robert Frost. Ed. Philip L. Gerber. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1982. 155–162. Henry, Nat. “Frost’s Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Explicator 37.1 (1978): 37–38. Isaacs, Elizabeth. An Introduction to Robert Frost. Denver: Alan Swallow, 1962. Keats, John. “Keen, fitful gusts are whisp’ring here and there.” Bartleby.com: Great Books Online. 3 March 2009 Meyers, Jeffrey. Robert Frost: A Biography. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1996. Monteiro, George. Robert Frost & the New England Renaissance. Lexington, Ky.: The University Press of Kentucky, 1988. Monteiro, George. “To Point or Not to Point: Frost’s ‘Stopping By Woods.’” ANQ 16.1 (Winter 2003): 38–40. Scott, Sir Walter. “The Rover’s Adieu.” Bartleby.com: Great Books Online. 3 March 2009

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Reading to Write

cquainted With the Night” is a meditation on loneliness and isolation, centering on one man’s lonely nighttime wanderings and suggesting that his individual experiences represent the human condition. Critic Elizabeth Isaacs, for example, argues that the poem “strives to experience precisely the essence of man’s existence in his lonely human state.” In the poem, the speaker’s individual condition is represented as not just his own but is shared by all of us in our “lonely human state.” Despair and darkness inform the poem, and while critics tend to agree on the pervasive pessimistic tone, Frost strikes a balance between concrete images and abstract meaning that leaves considerable interpretive work to the reader. Apart from the imagery, the poem offers a variety of entry points for analysis. The poem is a sonnet, but an unusual one; it is a straightforward depiction of someone who is isolated, but it is never clear just how much the speaker has chosen or sought isolation. Even more unclear is the degree to which his social isolation is the result of his existentialist isolation. The poem portrays a lonely wanderer, but that wandering may be an allegory for poetic experimentation. Why is the speaker so unhappy? What exactly is the “luminary clock”? As with so much of Frost’s poetry, “Acquainted with the Night” seems readily understandable, but it reveals its complexities the more closely it is examined. When analyzing the poem, spend some time with the opening line, which is a simple, declarative statement: “I have been one acquainted with the night.” The speaker, Frost’s persona within the poem, tells us something about himself that he will spend the rest of the poem

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elaborating on. It could be tempting to overlook this line because it may, at first, seem to have a merely introductory function and to give us little to work with. But what it presents is significant. How in this line does the speaker describe himself, how does he establish the theme of the poem, and how does he set the tone? There are three significant parts to the sentence: “I have been,” “one,” and “acquainted with the night.” What does it mean to be acquainted with the night? Because the line is so tightly packed, “acquainted” here could be an adjective (describing the speaker as someone who is or was an acquaintance of the night) or “acquainted” could be a verb (describing the speaker as someone who has gone through the process of becoming an acquaintance of the night). The end result might be the same, but if “acquainted” is an adjective, we are asked to focus on the result, and if it is a verb, we are asked to focus on the process. Finally, then, what are the ramifications of such an acquaintance? What does the speaker know about the night that he did not know before, and how did he learn it? A majority of the poem attempts to answer these last two questions. Also in the opening line, the speaker identifies himself as “one,” which is almost “someone” but not quite. Both “one” and “someone” suggest that he is part of a group of people who are acquainted with the night, but what does it mean that the speaker emphasizes the “one” in “someone”? The final element to be scrutinized in the poem’s first line is the verb tense—“I have been.” The speaker does not say that “I was” acquainted with the night (simple past tense), or that “I am” acquainted with the night (present tense); rather, he says “I have been” acquainted with the night. This is present perfect tense, which indicates action that happened in the past at unspecified times. While the past tense would indicate that the speaker used to be acquainted with the night, and the present tense would indicate that he currently is, the present perfect tense emphasizes the action of the past, the action of becoming acquainted. This suggests, in turn, that we should read “acquainted” as a verb, not as an adjective. Through unpacking the poem’s opening statement and analyzing its constituent elements, it becomes clear that the poem will be about the speaker’s experiences that have developed his acquaintance with the night. As we read the rest of the poem, is this expectation fulfilled? What actions are conveyed that support this notion?

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Topics and Strategies The following topics are meant to serve as instigating questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes One of the themes of “Acquainted with the Night” is loneliness. Frost’s speakers are often alone, and solitude is necessary to the self-reflexive nature of Frost’s poetry. Solitude does not equate to loneliness, and it is important as you read Frost’s poetry that you not assume his speakers are lonely simply because they are isolated or alone. This poem, though, demonstrates to us perhaps what happens when you take the need for solitude too far. The speaker does not want to make eye contact, and he listens to other people calling but recognizes that they are not calling for him. In addition to loneliness, guilt, shame, and discomfort are present in his response to encountering the watchman. Note that the speaker seems sad that the cry is not for him, yet he avoids the person he meets. The watchman enters the poem and the speaker’s consciousness, even if in a limited way. With such an iconic name and function, is the watchman symbolic or representative of something else?

Sample Topics: 1. Loneliness: Is the speaker lonely or isolated? What is the difference between the two terms? Is solitude a state the speaker has sought out or one that has been imposed on him? The speaker hears a voice call out but not to him. Does he wish the voice was calling to him? In order to address this topic, you will most likely need to combine several ideas. Consider why the speaker is alone. Is he alone by choice or by individual temperament? Or does he represent all of humanity? Is Frost suggesting that we are all fundamentally alone and lonely? 2. Guilt: Why does the speaker avoid making eye contact with the only other person in the poem, the watchman?

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost The speaker seems ashamed of his loneliness. If he were to talk to the watchman, would the watchman discover something about the speaker that would lead ultimately to rejection? To develop this topic further, it is again necessary to argue whether the speaker is guilty, ashamed, or simply avoiding human contact. Concentrate on the fact that the only other person he encounters is someone on patrol, someone who is supposed to be out making sure calm and order prevail. The watchman is not out in search of another lonely soul. Even if the speaker was to talk to him, the watchman would need to continue with his rounds. Why does Frost include the intrusion of the guard? Is he a metaphoric presence?

Philosophy and Ideas Could this poem be a comment on humanity’s place in the universe? Four of the poem’s elements or figures lend themselves to both metaphorical and literal readings. They are the watchman, the luminary clock, and the notions of time and the night. The poem begins with the speaker already in isolation. How does the poem provide context and clarity about his situation? How does our understanding of him enrich and grow? Once we learn of his situation, it becomes easy to read it as a metaphor for existence. The literal setting is the outskirts of town at night, but can that context then be extrapolated to mean the edge of the world or the universe?

Sample Topic: 1. Humanity’s place in the universe: What is the speaker’s relationship to the universe? How does Frost establish this concern as a central preoccupation of his poem? To write an essay on this topic, consider all four of the poem’s key figures or elements in terms of their metaphorical possibilities. How do they complement one another as four parts of a whole? Consider the watchman first. In the Themes section, we considered the encounter with the watchman to be a literal encounter, but explore as well the metaphorical possibilities. If the watchman represents some more abstract figure or notion, who or what might it be? Notice the speaker’s response when he sees the watchman. Why does the speaker refuse to make

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eye contact? What is the speaker unwilling to explain about himself or his actions? What is he unwilling to admit? Next, explore the role of the luminary clock. It sits “at an unearthly height” and does not tell time, instead offering a comment on the nature of time in what is perhaps the most obscure, and most debated, line of the poem. If you read the clock as an actual clock, the poem indicts the speaker for being out at a time when everyone else has sense enough to be inside, sleeping. On a grander scale, the clock reminds us of the inevitable passage of time. If you read the clock as a metaphor for a guiding spiritual presence, then the speaker has been observed all along by something that he cannot interact with and that shows no response to him. Finally, night is certainly a recurring setting in many Frost poems. What are its metaphoric possibilities? You might want to consult other Frost poems that occur at night or nightfall, such as “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.”

Form and Genre “Acquainted with the Night” is a sonnet, if an unusual one. Frost often experimented with the traditional sonnet forms, and “Acquainted with the Night” is one of his more notable results, if only for the pattern of its rhymes. Notice that the sonnet’s lines are in groups of three; notice also that the first and third lines rhyme, while the second line rhymes with the first and third lines of the following stanza. This rhyme scheme, terza rima, is made up of a recurring pattern of rhyme—aba bcb cdc ded— and was invented by the Italian poet Dante for his Divine Comedy. Few English poets try to write terza rima, and critics often argue that their efforts are clunky and awkward. Why might Frost have chosen this difficult verse form to work with? Can you argue that he has been successful with it, or does he have to contort his syntax and use odd words in order to fit the rhyme? To address why Frost might have chosen to use terza rima, you should first consider how the rhymes among stanzas (line 2 rhymes with 4 and 6, line 5 rhymes with 7 and 9) serve as a connection. The stanzas are interlocked, sonically, by this pattern. How does this interweaving of sound affect our perception of the poem’s ideas? Study each of the images the poem presents, and then study how the rhyme works to connect certain

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key ideas as the poem progresses. Studying the way the rhyme ties images together will also help you to see the overall order of the ideas. How do they progress, if they in fact do? Do they become more abstract? More concrete? Do they represent increasingly complex ideas? Finally, recall that this is a sonnet. Traditional sonnets are usually made up of two parts: The first establishes and develops an idea, while the second part comments on or concludes that idea. In a Petrarchan sonnet, the first eight lines establish the idea, and the last six conclude. In a Shakespearian sonnet, the first twelve lines develop an idea (in three four-line segments), and the last two lines conclude. Frost has used neither of these specific lineation arrangements, yet by limiting his poem to fourteen lines, he asks us to consider his poem to be a sonnet. If so, what idea is established in the first part of the sonnet? What is the conclusion? Where does the first part stop and the second part begin?

Sample Topic: 1. A terza rima sonnet: How do the mechanics of this poem contribute to its mood and meaning? To write an essay on this topic, you will most likely want to examine a prototype (any of Shakespeare’s sonnets will work for this, but “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day,” Sonnet 18, is a good choice because it is so familiar). Study whichever sonnet you choose, and explain how it develops and concludes its main idea. Then compare that sonnet to Frost’s. What is his main idea? What images does he use to develop that idea? How does the repetition of the first line as the last line reinforce the idea or function as a conclusion? Do the images in between make it possible to interpret the first and last lines differently, even though they use identical words? Finally, you might consider studying some other verse forms—such as the rondeau, triolet, and villanelle—that also repeat lines. Offer a close reading of the relationship between the images and the poem’s line-by-line structure. Notice that the lines get more complex; the first four sentences are contained within single lines, but the fifth sentence extends over two lines while the following sentence progresses over two stanzas. What does this pacing contribute to the emotional intensity of the poem?

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Can you argue that the lines become more frantic because they get longer and longer, that the clear control of short sentences gives way to more loosely constructed lines?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery The narrative and action of “Acquainted with the Night” are generally readily understood. The images it evokes come readily to mind: someone walking out into the rain and deciding to go back in, someone walking past the city lights into the dark countryside. Frost then adds complexity to this easily followed narrative frame, his language adding ambiguity as the speaker’s emotions and attitudes are evoked during this nocturnal walk. Take for example line four: “I have looked down the saddest city lane.” Why is this city lane the saddest city lane, and if it is the saddest, does that mean other lanes are also sad, even if not as superlatively sad as this one? What could the speaker be seeing as he looks down these roads that makes him so sad? Is it possible that he does not even know? Could it be that he is not seeing anything specifically that makes him sad but is instead projecting his sadness on the landscape around him?

Sample Topic: 1. The imagery of the poem: How do the various images the poem presents contribute to its meaning? To delve into the subject of the poem’s imagery, first consider that the objects and people the speaker detects through his senses are somehow reflective of his internal state. The speaker filters these images for us. We see them as he sees them, influenced by his own emotional condition. Take each image in turn, working to make sense of its objective presence, then taking into account the speaker’s own subjective filtering. Why does he go out into the rain and then decide to turn back? How long is he in the rain, and what does he do? The only things he tells us he does are to walk out then walk back in. Anything else that happens, happens during the dash Frost includes. What is that dash hiding, or does the speaker perhaps turn around immediately after stepping out? With each image, concentrate on the words the speaker uses. What does it mean, for example, to have “outwalked the furthest city light”? Does that imply that the “furthest city light” is also in

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost motion, or that it seems to be? If so, is the choice of “outwalked” as a way to describe moving beyond the city’s radius of light a way of suggesting a struggle to escape or a desperation to do so? What makes him drop his eyes when the watchman approaches? What does he think he will have to explain if he makes eye contact? When he hears the “interrupted cry,” why does he describe his response as having “stood still and stopped the sound of feet,” as if he is having to make his feet be quiet? Finally, you will have to make sense of the “luminary clock” and the time it tells. Critics argue back and forth about the physical object described by the phrase “luminary clock.” Some say it is an actual clock, high in a clock tower; others say it is the moon. Staying within the poem itself, our only clues are the “unearthly height” of the clock, and the time we read on its face, which is “neither wrong nor right.” Actual clocks do not offer judgment about the time (neither wrong nor right), and while the moon is tied to and reflective of cycles of time, it does not tell it in the traditional sense. Why does Frost attach such ambiguity to his reference to the luminary clock? How is your understanding of the poem aided or complicated by viewing it as a humanmade device or a celestial body?

Bibliography for “Acquainted with the Night” Amano, Kyoko. “Frost’s Acquainted with the Night.” Explicator 65.1 (Fall 2006): 39–42. Edwards, C. Hines, Jr. “The Clock in Frost’s ‘Acquainted with the Night.’” Notes on Contemporary Literature. 15.3 (May 1985): 8–9. Fleissner, Robert F. “Frost’s Acquainted with the Night.” Explicator. 37.1 (Fall 1978): 13 Henry, Nat. “Frost’s ‘Acquainted with the Night.’ ” Explicator 35.3 (1977): 28–29. Isaacs, Elizabeth. An Introduction to Robert Frost. Denver: Alan Swallow, 1962. Maxson, H. A. On the Sonnets of Robert Frost: A Critical Examination of the 37 Poems. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 1997. Pack, Robert. “Frost’s Enigmatical Reserve: The Poet as Teacher and Preacher.” Ed. Harold Bloom. Robert Frost: Modern Critical Views. New York: Chelsea House, 1986. 9–21. Perrine, Laurence. “Frost’s ‘Acquainted with the Night.’” Explicator 37.1 (1978): 13–14.

“Departmental”

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Reading to Write

n “Departmental,” the speaker watches an ant crawl across a table, run into a dead moth, and go around it without concern. Seeing this, the speaker begins to think about what would have happened if the ant had stumbled across a dead ant, rather than a moth. In that case, the ant would still have been unmoved but would have started sending the information up the chain of command. It would not be this ant’s job to do anything about the body, but somewhere in the colony is an ant that would come to take care of the situation. To begin working with this poem, you will want to think about how this study of ants might relate to people. There would not seem to be much point to a poem that describes the way ants treat their dead unless we could identify some lessons that apply to the human realm. The fact that Frost gives his ants human traits—the name Jerry McCormic, for example—indicates that we should not take the poem at face value. Your interpretive task, then, is to identify the insights into human behavior that the poem offers by shifting its focus instead to ant behavior. You might start with the final two lines: “It couldn’t be called ungentle. / But how thoroughly departmental.” That conclusion identifies the poem’s central point, which is the idea that we tend to insist that we do not have to take care of something unless it is our specific job, task, or assignment to do so. This is not to say that we do not or cannot work with delicacy or decorum, for as the speaker notes, the ant’s attention to caring for the dead “couldn’t be called ungentle.” Still, the speaker feels there is something lamentable or unfortunate in the fact that the treatment of the corpse will be so mechanized or automated. A thoughtful essay could be written that explores that idea.

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You might also note that the poem’s tone and rhythm are relatively light. Take, for instance, the description of the ant’s feelers as “calmly atwiddle” or the clipped sound of the short lines, many of which are punctuated to give the poem a staccato rhythm, often used, as in a limerick, to create or inject a jokey tone. You might want to think about why Frost has presented us with a speaker who uses a comic tone to deliver a corrective message. Is tension created between the approach and the intended goal? Another question to consider is whether or not the poem is ironic, seeking a tone that is at odds with the material. Alternately, is there no ironic filtering, the tone being entirely appropriate to the material? Finally, you should consider the jobs that are described in the poem. They seem to be a mixture of functional and ornamental, and again we have to consider how compartmentalized these jobs are and whether or not the speaker thinks they should be. A strong essay in response to the poem could attempt to determine the degree to which the poem is critical of the state of affairs it presents. Do you agree or disagree with the poem’s position?

Topics and Strategies The following topics are meant to serve as questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes One of the prescribed aims of “Departmental” is to mock bureaucratic structures. All of the ants in the poem have a specific and narrow role to play. It might be helpful to you to identify each of those roles. Jerry McCormic is a forager, for instance, and there is a mortician, a janizary, and even members of a philosophical “enquiry squad.” The poem invites us to think about the implications of bureaucracy and, specifically, about the ways bureaucracy makes it difficult for us to see how ideas and events relate to one another and to our own lives. What does the forager think about death, for instance? And what are the mortician’s views on foraging? How much should either be thinking about the work the other is doing? Bureaucracy is often criticized for making individuals lose sight

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of another person’s value: People become tools that help us get our work done or impediments that prevent us from doing so. “Departmental” highlights the impersonality and dehumanizing effects of bureaucracy. Another angle that emerges from focusing on the impact of bureaucratic thinking is how much our own lives are impoverished by limiting ourselves to narrowly confined concerns. If we do not think about foraging unless we are a forager, we will not appreciate the work that foragers do; but we also will not think about how much we depend on them, and we will not be able to take care of ourselves in their absence. “Departmental” suggests that our lives are incomplete because we have limited scope and think only about a small range of things, when life is richly populated with unlimited concerns. These observations circle around the heart of the poem, which is a meditation on how people confront and accept death. The ants have nothing to do with the dead moth or another dead ant, except to send notice. There is a strong suggestion that we are quick to avoid thinking about death when it happens to others because we do not want to reference our own sense of mortality. Frost’s poem comically exaggerates our refusal to confront unpleasant realities, but the comic perspective only highlights all the more the seriousness of the truth Frost is attempting to convey.

Sample Topics: 1. The impersonality of bureaucracy: In what ways is “Departmental” cognizant and critical of the ways bureaucracy dehumanizes us? Frost seems to be arguing that bureaucracy is dangerous because it reduces us to instinctive, compartmentalized creatures no more sophisticated than ants. The speaker is somewhat amused by how rigidly structured the ant world appears to be, to the point that even finding another dead ant means nothing to an ant unless it is that ant’s job to care. To explore this topic in an essay, you will want to first describe the ways ants function within severely proscribed roles in their society. Is Frost arguing that we do or do not resemble ants in our professional and social lives? Have we stopped caring about

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost the person who does a job because all we see is the job that needs to be done and not the individual performing the task? Does this behavior extend to those who need our help, or do we remain blind to that individual expression of need?

2. The incompleteness of our lives: How does compartmentalizing impoverish our lives? How is this process formally and thematically conveyed in the poem? Bureaucracy and rigid social structures isolate the individual from other people. How is the poem also suggesting that bureaucratic specialization also limits our perspectives on and understanding of the world? How does sight play into Frost’s evolving notion, seeing but not seeing? How does the physicality of the ant relate to ideas of limited vision, specialization, and an increasingly narrowing focus that the poem presents? 3. Fear and rejection of death: Are we afraid to think about death? As the ant’s actions potentially illustrate when translated into the human realm, we refuse to think about the reality of death. To what evolving social consciousness in regard to death was Frost responding? This topic would require you to think outside the poem, discussing the ways we avoid talking about death or the ways we have pushed death into hospitals and nursing homes and no longer countenance the idea of death in our own homes. You could alternately come up with examples that refute the poem’s thesis. Either way, your job would include arguing for or against the perils of ignoring our own mortality. What role does mortality play in a poem that is equally preoccupied with establishing the dehumanizing effects of bureaucratic organizations?

History and Context Some critics read this poem as commentary on the stifling and anticreative bureaucracy of academic professions. This reading does not stray from the poem’s larger critique of compartmentalized living; rather, it applies that

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critique to a specific arena. Naturally the critics who propose this interpretation have attempted to view the poem as emerging from the biographical details of Frost’s life, the actual thoughts and attitudes he bore in regard to his professional life. Frost spent time teaching in various colleges and enjoyed being in the classroom but found academic culture to be frustrating. Moreover, Frost once said that Formic, “the acidic language of the ants, was in fact ‘the language of critics’ ” (Meyers 216). Academic specialties are narrowly proscribed, and critics and scholars can be defensive when others encroach on their area. Further, there is a critical argument to be made about specialists who lose sight of the scope and breadth of literature by digging too deeply in one small area. Can Frost’s poem be seen as making this argument or supporting this specific application of its concerns?

Sample Topic: 1. Frustration with narrow-minded academics and critics: How might “Departmental” be read as a critique of academics? An essay on this topic would need to successfully argue that the ants in “Departmental” stand for professors and the narrowness of each ant’s role in its society represents the often parochial concerns that professors have within their academic specialties. One argument that you could make about the dangers of specialization is that scale is skewed and perspective is lost. How could these notions be applied to the world and trade of literary critics? Whatever approach you take, you will want to learn a bit of Frost’s biography, specifically his career as a teacher and his relationship to critics and other artists, in order to put “Departmental” into a biographical perspective.

Philosophy and Ideas In the midst of this lighthearted poem, Frost identifies one group of ants whose work is philosophically profound: to “find out God / And the nature of time and space.” The poem’s speaker is thinking about what the ant that has just seen the dead moth will do. He will leave in pursuit of his own concerns, but if he happens to meet one of the philosopher ants, the ant will “put him onto the case.” Frost is offering an intriguing and subtle commentary here on the need to think about questions for which there are no answers. To “find out God” and to attempt to unlock the mysteries of time

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and space are to spend a lifetime in thought and potential isolation. The ant that the speaker is watching shows no curiosity about the moth, nor, by extension, the nature of the abstract issues that surround its death. Making sense of the unknown is the work of some other ant.

Sample Topic: 1. Finding out about God and the nature of time and space: What is the poem’s perspective on philosophical inquiry? “Departmental” comments on how we, like ants, divide the tasks and responsibilities of life among ourselves, each of us concentrating on a small subset and ignoring the larger whole. Much of the work that the poem describes is functional— foraging, ruling, tending to death—but the “enquiry squad” is something else entirely. One thesis on this topic could assert that the work of philosophers is altogether different in nature from other forms of work. Does this imply that those who fill nonphilosophical roles should not be responsible for addressing abstract questions involving human existence? Do we make a grand mistake if we ignore those questions and expect others to address them for us? Are we forced then to accept and abide by the interpretations of others?

Form and Genre The speaker of “Departmental” adopts a mildly amused tone to present his ruminations on topics as serious as death and “finding out God.” Critic Lawrance Thompson describes this technique as “burlesque,” by which he means the poem is lightly humorous while presenting a serious topic. Others have referred to the poem as a satire. Like burlesque, satire uses humor to present a serious topic, but satire has more of a corrective sensibility. The person producing a satire employs humor to call attention to a flaw in human behavior in the hope of compelling people to change that behavior once they have recognized and laughed at the apparent folly of such a flaw. On a purely formal level, the structure of “Departmental” is distinctive, with four beats per line and a pronounced rhyme. The poem is constructed of rhyming couplets, or pairs of lines. Reginald Cook has written

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that Frost would introduce “Departmental” at readings as “a lesson in rhyme,” suggesting that the rhyme is meant to be noticed and studied. A careful study of the rhythm and rhyming in the poem could investigate the degree to which the rhyme and rhythm seem forced or natural. To what degree does each element contribute to the lightness of the poem’s overall tone?

Sample Topics: 1. The purpose of humor in “Departmental”: Is the poem a satire, a burlesque, or a hybrid form? To explore this topic, you need to consider how seriously Frost wanted us to take his humor. If you want to argue that the poem treats its material like a burlesque, you are arguing that the poem uses humor to present a serious topic but little more than that. If you want to argue that the poem is a satire, you are suggesting that the poem attempts to compel us to corrective or restorative action, toward changing our behavior. Each interpretation addresses the same behaviors, so for either approach you will need to identify what the poem is making fun of. You could then argue that the poem is more or less critical of the behavior it describes. Your evidence will be largely the nature of the poem’s humor. What are the jokes, and do they encourage us to laugh and then think or just to be entertained and amused? 2. The poem as “a lesson in rhyme”: What lessons about rhyme does the poem teach? How does rhyme function in the poem? Does it contribute ultimately to what you believe Frost’s intentions were? For an essay exploring this particular formal element, identify and describe the lessons that the poem teaches about rhyme. Think about nursery rhymes, for example, and the way similar sounds function in them. The rhymes are usually obvious and often forced, which means they encourage a verbal mode that departs from the sound of natural, spoken speech. How natural does “Departmental” sound? How much do the rhymes call

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost attention to themselves? By highlighting their presence, do the rhymes make for an awkward poem that loses its message, or do the rhymes establish a whimsical tone that is part of the message and helps to reinforce it?

Bibliography for “Departmental” Cook, Reginald L. “Frost on Frost: The Making of Poems.” American Literature 28.1 (March 1956): 62–72. Isaacs, Elizabeth. An Introduction to Robert Frost. Denver: Alan Swallow, 1962. Lynen, John F. The Pastoral Art of Robert Frost. New Haven, Conn.: Yale UP, 1960. Meyers, Jeffrey. Robert Frost: A Biography. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1996. Monteiro, George. Robert Frost & the New England Renaissance. Lexington, Ky.: The University Press of Kentucky, 1988. Thompson, Lawrance. Fire and Ice: The Art and Thought of Robert Frost. New York: Russell & Russell, 1961.

“Desert Places”

“D

Reading to Write

esert Places” follows a basic structure that Frost employs for much of his poetry. He begins by placing an individual in a natural setting and telling us what that person sees. In this poem, the speaker is riding past a field at dusk and notices, without stopping, that snow is falling and beginning to obscure the details of a field. The speaker then begins to respond to the scene, observing first that the woods around the field seem to claim it for their own, keeping the speaker out, while any animals that live there are hibernating or dormant and out of sight. At this point, the speaker notes how the scene relates to him, exists as a function of him, observing that the loneliness of the scene includes him, but almost accidentally as his thoughts are apparently elsewhere and not fixated on his own isolation. Because the snow is falling and the darkness of night is settling in, the speaker comments that the loneliness of the scene will only increase. In the final stanza, the speaker’s focus abruptly shifts from the scene to himself. Unlike others, who might look to the stars and fear the vast emptiness between them, the speaker needs only look to his own life, even his own internal thoughts and moods, to detect a frightening emptiness. The poem raises a number of questions. It is undeniably bleak, but is the speaker in despair? He has his “own desert places” to fear, but are they permanently desolate? Is he running from something he can do nothing about, or is it possible that he can address the loneliness and isolation he feels and do something to alter the situation? There is no ready answer to these questions, but a careful and close reading will help you narrow your options as you discover, once again, that Frost has written a poem that seems simple and straightforward on the surface but that is richly ambiguous to the attentive reader.

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To write about this poem, begin by paying careful attention to the ambiguous lines. One example is “The loneliness includes me unawares.” The loneliness and the speaker (“me”) are both entities or objects in the sentence. Which is “unawares”? Does the loneliness incorporate the speaker without his realizing it? Or does the speaker get wrapped up in the loneliness without noticing it, since he is “too absent-spirited” to notice? If the speaker does not notice that he is included in the loneliness, why not? Is it because he is too busy worrying about his own internal well-being to pay attention to his external situation? What does his motion tell us about his state of mind? Is he too afraid to stop and think, or is he too at ease to fret? In short, are his “own desert places” a cause for concern or merely for attention?

Topics and Strategies The following topics are meant to serve as instigating questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

Themes Isolation is a theme common to Frost’s poetry and one that he often depicts pleasantly. Consider the reflective peace of being alone in “Birches,” for example, or even the relief from daily cares that isolation brings in “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Other times, isolation fades into loneliness, and the speaker is confronting his lack of companionship. In “Desert Places,” even nature has abandoned him as the animals are nowhere to be seen. Even the way he describes the relationship between the field and the woods, “the woods around it have it—it is theirs,” suggests that he feels he is outside looking in. At the same time, does the speaker seem distraught? He is moving quickly past the scene, and the external loneliness reminds him of his internal loneliness, but the poem is not at all clear about how much the speaker is anguished by his own individual isolation. He has his “own desert places” to worry about, but the language suggests that he does not always worry about this state of affairs. The final lines could be interpreted to mean that he could worry if he wants to but chooses not to. This could be a hopeful response, or it could be seen as a terrified refusal to think about it.

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Sample Topics: 1. Loneliness: Who or what is lonely in “Desert Places”? How does loneliness factor into the poem? Frost focuses our attention on the idea of loneliness by repeating the words loneliness and lonely in lines 8–10. How much is the speaker a part of that loneliness, though? Is it his loneliness, or is it the loneliness of inhuman, impersonal nature? The loneliness will continue to increase, presumably, as the snow keeps falling and the night gets darker. Is this true for the speaker’s loneliness also? 2. Hope or denial: Is there any hope for the speaker in “Desert Places”? Or is he refusing to confront his loneliness? The speaker looks on a desolate scene in nature and acknowledges that his own, interior landscape is also bleak. How much does this concern him? Examine the elements of the scene: the speaker is in motion, the loneliness that “includes [him] unawares,” and the final lines. If the exterior landscape reflects the speaker’s interior state, what does it mean that he rides by without stopping? Is he unconcerned? Is he too concerned to cope?

Philosophy and Ideas “Desert Places” is one of Frost’s more harrowing poems because it shows us someone who is existentially alone. The speaker fears that his entire existence is self-contained and meaningless. He is not part of some larger whole or part of a discernibly divine plan. People who look around them and note no other human presence or sign of life are alone but not necessarily lonely. People who look to space and imagine the enormous empty distances between stars may begin to feel small and insignificant, but they may also retain some sense that their lives still have meaning. The speaker of this poem, however, looks inside and finds emptiness, a discovery that emerges as a much more frightening and fatalistic view of the meaning of life. Two complex philosophical concerns seem to be at work in this poem. One is ontology, which is a philosophical examination of what it means to exist. Ontology asks what is real, how do objects and people relate to one

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another physically and spiritually, and what is the nature of existence? In “Desert Places,” Frost suggests that existence carries with it the risk of finding out that you are not just alone but that you have no purpose or reason to live. This way of thinking brings us to the other philosophical concern of the poem, nihilism. Nihilism is a branch of philosophical inquiry that begins with the assumption that life has no meaning. In “Desert Places,” the reader sees someone who is confronting the idea that his life has no purpose because existence itself is pointless. The speaker’s ontological thinking has led him to a nihilistic position, but it is not clear that this is the end—rather than the beginning or middle—of the speaker’s philosophical journey.

Sample Topic: 1. Ontology and nihilism: What does this poem say about our individual quest for meaning in life? It is not necessary to research philosophy to write a paper about this poem’s confrontation of nihilism. Begin by identifying the speaker’s “own desert places.” Your thesis should establish a definition of the speaker’s internal desolation, perhaps stating that the speaker worries that when he is self-reflexive, he cannot find any meaning to his life. What is the tone of the poem? Is the speaker always scared of his own desert places? Is he in denial, refusing to think about his essential loneliness, or is he only bothered by it on occasion and then not willing to take it too seriously? Does he seem convinced that life has no meaning, or is he just at times worried about such a possibility? Writing an essay that confronts these concerns requires a close and careful reading of the poem, line by line, as you work to establish the speaker’s perspective on his own life and the point of his existence.

Form and Genre The rhyme in “Desert Places” is strict, even conspicuous. The pattern— aaba ccdc eebe ffgf—and the meter make it difficult to read the poem in a natural, conversational manner, which is unusual for Frost. Frost is often dismissed as a serious poet because his language is so natural that his poetry seems, at first glance, to be too simple to contain complex or unresolved meanings. The language of “Desert Places” is typical Frost,

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but the rhyme calls attention to the poem as a poem. The lines also tend to be end-stopped, to have punctuation at the end, which creates a pause that also calls attention to the poem as a poem. It is not exactly a nursery rhyme, but there is a singsong quality to the poem that contrasts with the seriousness of its subject. At the same time, the tightness of the rhyme creates a sense of closure and self-containment that highlights the poem’s focus on isolation and loneliness.

Sample Topic: 1. The poem’s formal structure: How do the rhyme, meter, and construction of the lines contribute to the poem’s meaning? The poem’s concern with isolation is arguably emphasized by the rhyme, the cadences, and the way the lines are mostly endstopped. Looking at each element in turn, and explain how they contribute to the poem’s feeling. For example, each stanza repeats a rhyme in its first, second, and fourth lines, while the third line strays. You might argue that this imparts a feeling of containment, because every time a rhyme tries to escape its pattern in the third line of a stanza, the fourth line brings it back, stabilizing the stanza. The rhythm, on the other hand, is strictly followed, which is another example of containment. The rhythm and rhyme also serve to undercut or qualify the tone of brooding seriousness that dominates. Does this contrast harshly with the poem’s overall tone, or does it subtly suggest that things are not as bad as they seem?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery One of the poem’s central images is the snow-covered field with “nothing to express.” One potentially strong essay topic could study the nature imagery in the poem, specifically the way the field, snow, woods, and animals are described. What would the scene be like without the snow, and why would that be more comforting or uplifting? It is often productive to concentrate your focus on a single part of a poem. With “Desert Places,” the final stanza offers a conclusion that lends perspective to the rest of the poem. At the end, the speaker compares his internal emptiness to the vast emptiness of space. You could write about just this final stanza, examining this metaphor of space that

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Frost constructs around the factual reality of the enormous empty spaces of the universe.

Sample Topics: 1. Snow and nature imagery: What expression of nature is the snow silencing? Much of the imagery in this poem is dedicated to presenting a natural scene in which all of the activity and living elements are shrouded, silenced, and obscured. To write about this imagery, you might begin by recognizing that the poem invites the reader to imagine the contrast: What might the field look like during the summer or spring if it looks this way on a winter night? How does the contrast emphasize the bleakness of the scene depicted in the poem? You could then consider whether or not the bleakness of the setting makes the speaker realize his loneliness for the first time, or does it simply make him acknowledge his loneliness in a way that a summer scene would not? 2. Space as a metaphor: How does the poem use the metaphor of space to depict the speaker’s loneliness? This poem relies on two key metaphors: the blankness of snow and the emptiness of space. In the final stanza, the poem expands its scope to include the entire universe, noting that some people are overwhelmed by the unimaginably vast emptiness of space. But the speaker dismisses that concern for one more localized and easy to grasp: his own inner emptiness, which he says is enough to concern him without having to worry about the reaches of outer space as well. What are the speaker’s inner spaces? Why does their emptiness bother him? Why does he describe them as “desert spaces,” which suggests that they are not neutrally empty spaces but spaces that were once or should be filled?

Compare and Contrast Frost revisits several of his more common themes in “Desert Places,” in some cases expanding on them and in others making a radically different

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statement. In “Acquainted with the Night,” for example, Frost meditates on loneliness and isolation, depicting a nighttime wanderer who avoids human contact and is acquainted with the night if with no one else. “Desert Places” picks up these ideas and transforms them from a melancholy loneliness to something more desperate. While the isolation of the speaker in “Acquainted with the Night” seems to be self-imposed (note how the speaker sees the watchman but deliberately avoids speaking to him), in “Desert Places” the isolation seems to be more internal, more the result of some emptiness within the speaker’s character or personal makeup. In this regard, the despair of “Desert Places” becomes more universal. The speaker’s loneliness in “Acquainted with the Night” is his own doing, and the poem leaves open the possibility that his loneliness is not something the rest of humanity needs to share or experience if we choose not to. In “Desert Places,” though, the speaker’s despair comes out of recognizing that something is empty within him, and the poem suggests that this may be true for many or all of the rest of us. The speaker does not choose his loneliness, which results in a much more helpless situation. If “Desert Places” is an elaboration on “Acquainted with the Night,” it can also be viewed as a radical recasting of “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Frost invites comparison immediately, for anyone familiar with the snowy setting of “Stopping By Woods” will notice that “Desert Places” replicates the setting almost exactly. In “Stopping By Woods,” the speaker is traveling at nightfall and pauses to watch snow fall in the woods. In “Desert Places,” the speaker is again traveling at nightfall while the snow falls, only this time he does not stop as he passes a field ringed with woods. From there, though, the poems present divergent ideas. In “Desert Places,” the speaker takes no comfort in the serenity of the setting but instead keeps moving, armed with the knowledge that he would only become “more lonely” if he were to stop. In addition, while the speaker of “Stopping By Woods” has to pull himself away from staring into the woods, the speaker of “Desert Places” wants to stay away from them because they reinforce his sense that he is completely and perhaps eternally alone. In both poems, nature is distant, but in one it calls to the speaker; in the other it terrifies him. Finally, in “Desert Places” Frost uses the color white to generate uneasiness or even fear about our place in the universe, much as he did in his sonnet “Design.” In that poem, Frost questions the existence of God or of order in the universe; in “Desert Places,” he approaches the

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same idea from a slightly different angle: When he looks at the blank, white field, he sees no response from nature or from the universe to his existential despair. The tone of each poem is markedly different, though, for “Design” can be read as wryly humorous, while “Desert Places” is entirely anguished. An enterprising paper about the terror of whiteness might also compare “Desert Places” and “Design” to chapter 42 of Moby-Dick, titled “The Whiteness of the Whale.” In that chapter, Ishmael discusses how much more frightening the whale is because it is white.

Sample Topics: 1. Isolation and despair in “Acquainted with the Night” and “Desert Places”: How does “Desert Places” expand on the ideas of isolation and despair introduced in “Acquainted with the Night”? To write a paper comparing “Acquainted with the Night” and “Desert Places,” you may want to begin by examining both poems and constructing an argument for the way despair is presented in each. To what degree does the speaker in each poem consider his situation to be frightening because it is beyond his control? You might also want to consider whether or not the two poems present two parts of a larger comment on loneliness, or if they contradict each other somehow. Consider the fear and desperation in each poem and how much it is caused by, or the cause of, the speaker’s isolation. If the speaker’s isolation is his own doing in one poem but in the other poem it is an irremediable human condition, do the two poems disagree with each other? Or, if you combine the approaches and argument contained in each work, can you build a more complex idea of what it means to be isolated? 2. Response to nature in “Stopping By Woods On a Snowy Evening” and “Desert Places”: How does “Desert Places” depict the relationship between people and nature in comparison to “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening”?

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Nature looms over Frost’s poetry, most often as an indifferent, neutral space that provides a backdrop for Frost’s observations about the human condition. To compare these two poems, you might begin by noting the blankness of the snow in each poem and discussing how that bleakness gives Frost a blank canvas, as it were, for meditation and contemplation. What, then, does that canvas invite each speaker to imagine? How are the speakers’ responses different? Can these two poems be read as complementary parts of a larger whole, or are they too incompatible? A rich essay could be generated that studies the similarities between the poem’s rhyme, meter, stanzas, and overall construction, then discusses the different reactions of the speakers to similar scenes. Finally offer an argument about the commentary each poem provides about the role of nature in helping us to understand ourselves. 3. W hiteness in “Design” and “Desert Places”: Why is white so terrifying to the speaker of each poem? An essay about the terror of whiteness could start with a discussion of Moby-Dick, focusing particularly on chapter 42. How do Melville’s ideas about whiteness find expression in Frost’s poems, and does Frost expand on those ideas or contradict them? Consider the prominence of whiteness in each of Frost’s poems, analyzing the speaker’s response to whiteness in each and then discussing how well the poems complement each other. Bibliography for “Desert Places” Bieganowski, Ronald. “Frost’s ‘Desert Places.’” Explicator 38.1 (1979): 20–21. Cunningham, John. “Human Presence in Frost’s Universe.” The Cambridge Companion to Robert Frost. Ed. Robert Faggen. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2001. 261–272. Frank, Albert J. von. “ ‘Nothing That Is’: A Study of Frost’s ‘Desert Places’.” Frost: Centennial Essays. Compiled by the Committee on the Frost Centennial of the University of Southern Mississippi. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1974. 121–132.

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Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick; or, The Whale. Miller, Lewis H. Jr. “Two Poems of Winter.” College English 28.4 (January 1967): 314–317. Orlov, Paul A. “The World’s Disorder and the Word’s Design in Two Poems by Frost.” Journal of the Midwest Modern Language Association 19.2 (Fall 1986): 30–38. Oster, Judith. Toward Robert Frost: The Reader and the Poet. Athens, Ga.: The University of Georgia Press, 1991.

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Reading to Write

esign” is yet another example of Frost’s ability to pack ambiguity into poetry that is, on the surface, deceptively easy to read. A ready way to approach the poem is to recognize that it is a sonnet, specifically a Petrarchan (or Italian) sonnet. Petrarchan sonnets follow a specific rhyme pattern: The first eight lines follow the structure abbaabba; the final six lines most often conclude the sonnet with the pattern cdecde. More important to understanding and analyzing the poem, though, is the way Petrarchan sonnets always divide into two parts: an eight-line opening and a six-line conclusion. The first eight lines introduce an idea or set a scene, and the final six lines comment on the first eight in some way. Frost deviates from the traditional Petrarchan form by ending with a rhyming couplet—a pair of lines that work together as a unit. He is not the first poet to have tinkered with the form in that way; doing so allows him to use the last two lines as a comment on the entire poem. Understanding the structure of a Petrarchan sonnet and recognizing that “Design” follows that form potentially poses two immediate questions you may attempt to answer: What is the scene in the first eight lines, and how do the final six lines comment on that scene? Frost establishes the entire scene in the first three lines: “I found a dimpled spider, fat and white, / On a white heal-all, holding up a moth / Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth.” A white spider on a white flower holds a white moth that it has killed and will, presumably, eat. There is no action in the first eight lines. We do not see the spider catch the fly, we do not watch the spider eating the fly, and we do not witness the spider carry the moth away. Nothing happens. We have only the narrator observing the scene and telling us about one quick moment of it. From here, the

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narrator makes a series of comparisons, introducing a number of metaphors that offer us some insight into how he is interpreting the scene he sees. Already in line 3, the moth has been compared to satin; in line 8 the moth becomes “dead wings carried like a paper kite.” In line 7 the spider is a “snow-drop” while the flower is “like a froth.” All three of these presences (spider, moth, flower) are described as “assorted characters of death and blight” that have been “mixed .  .  . like the ingredients of a witches’ broth.” One of your tasks in making sense of the poem and preparing to write about it, then, is to identify the scene the first eight lines describe and to analyze the imagery that fuels Frost’s metaphors. Why is the spider holding the moth up, making the narrator think first of satin and then of a paper kite? Why is the spider compared to snow and the flower to a frothy foam? The spider arguably emerges as an emblem of death and the moth of blight (line 4), but does that leave the flower out, especially since the flower is a “heal-all,” important in folklore as a cure for anything and everything? Finally, why are all these elements (death, blight, and possibly healing) the ingredients in a witches’ broth that somehow “begin[s] the morning right”? In standard sonnet form, the concluding six lines shift the focus away from the scene and attempt to address what the poem means. Lines 9 and 10 ask a question that cuts to the heart of the narrator’s concern: “What had that flower to do with being white, / The wayside blue and innocent heal-all?” Did the flower have anything to do with its color, particularly this flower, since the heal-all is usually a shade of blue or violet? Is its color random or somehow intentional, better somehow to hide the spider from the moth? In considering the matter, Frost wonders whether anyone or anything is responsible for the flower’s color. The flower is incapable of choosing or controlling the hue of its petals, so who or what is responsible? And what was its reason for making the flower white? Was there any intention to help the spider hide from the moth? The next two lines suggest that some force is at work on the spider’s behalf: “What brought the kindred spider to that height, / Then steered the white moth thither in the night?” Whatever made the petal white, did that same creator or force then send the spider climbing up the flower and likewise the moth flying toward the spider? The narrator is asking if the conditions and the sequence of events are accidental or the work of some invisible motive presence.

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The second-to-last line answers the question with a question: What caused all of this to happen? Could anything other than a shockingly sinister designer have made all of this happen? The flower, which the narrator describes as innocent in line 9, has been forced into the role of aiding the spider in its capture and killing of the moth. Has the spider done a horrible thing by killing the moth? The speaker asserts that only some dread and unfeeling designer could have set such a plan in motion. As it draws to its conclusion, the poem seems to have resolved the situation with a satisfactory, if ominous, understanding of the cruel forces behind nature, life, and death. But Frost’s final line only serves to throw everything back into confusion. Consider the last two lines as a unit, answering the question, what put all of this in motion? “What but design of darkness to appall?— / If design govern in a thing so small.” The final line questions whether or not a designer concerns itself with things as small and inconsequential as spiders, moths, and flowers. The ambiguity, though, emerges from knowing that we can now interpret the poem’s final lines—and the poem itself—in at least three ways. The first way is to argue that the final two lines suggest that the designer is frightening and malicious if it concerns itself with sending a moth to be eaten by a spider. The second interpretation could contend that the designer may be cruel but would not concern itself with such insignificant organisms as the ones Frost discusses. The third analysis mocks the very idea of a designer at all. These interpretations—and they are not limited to three—are incompatible. One useful approach to writing about this poem, then, is to study the poem carefully for clues that might help you decide which meaning best fits the poem overall. The rest of the poem might not definitively support any of these meanings; instead, the poem might be deliberately ambiguous, presenting us with incompatible philosophies that will only be resolved, if they even are, through our personal experience with life. Frost’s designer either does not exist, is concerned with every aspect of life no matter how small, or ignores our inconsequential existence in favor of weightier concerns.

Topics and Strategies The following topics are meant to serve as questions that will guide your thinking as you work to analyze and write about the poem. They will all need further refinement and tighter focus as you work to develop a thesis that you can argue and support.

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Themes The themes in “Design” are common to Frost’s poetry. As discussed in the Reading to Write section, one of Frost’s priorities in “Design” is to ponder the degree to which his designer or god figure is involved in the day-to-day workings of life on Earth. Another of Frost’s recurring concerns is to study the morality of nature itself. Is nature benevolent and loving, cruel and vicious, or simply neutral? The central concern of this poem is whether or not events are guided by a controlling, supreme designer. Is there a motive force responsible for creation and existence? And does that entity bother to shape events by directing the individuals who are involved? If the designer directs human action to make sure certain results will occur, does that level of control extend to the seemingly trivial level of spiders and moths? Is there a point at which the actors or their actions are too insignificant for the creator figure to worry about? If so, what is that point? If design does not govern a thing so small, what precisely warrants the guidance or interference of Frost’s designer? Frost often examines nature, identifies some source of insight or truth in the scene, then suggests that we consider that truth as applying to us. The speaker of the poem wonders what kind of force is directing a white spider to hide in a white flower in order to catch and kill an unsuspecting moth, and his answer is to imagine that it must be “design of darkness to appall” (13). What, exactly, is appalling about this series of events? You can certainly argue that the spider needs to eat, so there is nothing particularly terrifying about nature and its various functions. Is the appalling realization the speaker has, then, that the designer did not just lead the moth to the spider but designed the moth to be a victim in the first place? Frost also likes to examine the role and function of the art, in particular the practice of poetry, in his poems. See “The Oven Bird” for an example of a poem that can be read as a commentary on the poet, symbolized by a bird, in an imperfect world. In “Design” it is conceivable and valid to think of the poet as a designer. How much control does this poem suggest a poet has over his or her creation? How much meaning emerges according to the poet’s design, and how much is the result of mere accident? Is there anything appalling about the work of the poet/ designer?

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Sample Topics: 1. Chance and fate: Is there a designer or god figure who is responsible for creation and existence? Is this what the poem is essentially asking? To write an essay about chance and fate in “Design,” you will need to address the events that cause the narrator to think about creation in the first place: the spider catching the moth. The conditions of this capture are unique enough to make the narrator wonder if some supernatural intelligence is at work to bring the organisms together in the first place or if there is nothing governing the scene beyond chance, coincidence, and accident. Does the narrator assign the spider, moth, and flower any responsibility for their roles in the scene? An additional concern is the degree to which the designer is involved in the activities of the creatures that have been created. A thesis for a paper about chance and fate might argue that the poem privileges the notion of accident over specific intent or a governing intelligence. Another thesis might address whether or not fate or chance are cruel. However the moth made its way to the spider—either by pure accident or by the unseen hand of fate—we can express shock, approbation, or indifference at what occurs. Your position and your argument depend on the clues you gather from the poem. Look to the descriptions of the events, the structure of the telling (what we are told and when we are told it), and the attitudes the narrator assumes other people will have when seeing a spider carry a dead moth, and cite them to support what you believe the poem is ultimately asserting about the nature and role of chance and fate. 2. Nature: What is appalling about the events of the poem? How does Frost register the speaker’s attitude about this issue? One way to write about nature as it is described in “Design” is to examine the degree to which nature is presented as benevolent, malevolent, or neutral. You will need to examine the descriptions of each element in the scene. How is the spider presented

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost as compared to the moth or the flower? What metaphors are used? Why is the spider called “kindred” to the flower? Are they kindred because they share desires and attitudes or because they have no volition and are mutually and equally controlled by the designer? Ultimately, the speaker of the poem seems to feel nothing but horror at the prospect of a moth being lured to a cruel death, but is this his response or a reaction that he imagines most people would have and with which he wishes to appear in accordance? If so, what is his response? What does he seem to think about people who might be shocked or emotional at the prospect of a spider killing a moth?

3. The poet as designer: How much is a poet like the designer suggested by “Design”? The sonnet is a strict poetic form, one that requires obvious design and careful planning from the poet. When we study poetry, we study every nuance: Why, for example, is the heal-all described as “innocent”? We also look for meaning and purpose in the elements that make up the poem: word choice, formal construction, and rhyme, for example. How does the poet’s attention to the details and minutiae of a poem compare to the idea of the designer/creator being more or less concerned with the acute details of creation? How much of poetry, and this poem in particular, depends on the poet’s careful consideration of every fine point? Consider, for example, the dash at the end of line 13. It is a single bit of punctuation, but it serves a purpose: It helps to tie lines 13 and 14 together. What difference does that make? And can we assume the poet put that dash there deliberately? Or should we argue that design does not really govern in a thing so small? Are some of the poem’s inclusions haphazard, random, or not specifically thought out?

Language, Symbols, and Imagery Writing about the symbolism and imagery in “Design” requires that you read the poem carefully to be sure that you understand its core concerns and argument. Then you can identify an aspect of the language that you

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want to write about, identifying the ways its various modes support or construct the poem’s argument. The moth and the spider are both white, as is the heal-all, which is unusual because heal-alls are usually blue or violet. What is the significance of the color white in this poem? A brown spider on a dried-up brown flower catching a brown moth would make for a very different poem, so what does white symbolize in the poem? This question asks you to think about the cultural connotations of the color. It is traditionally associated with purity and innocence, and the heal-all in the poem is described as “innocent” in line 10. Does the whiteness of the moth, spider, and flower suggest that each is innocent in the roles they play and that the spider killing the moth is not horrible at all but merely a necessary act the spider must perform in order to survive? In Moby-Dick, the narrator of the novel, Ishmael, tells us, “It was the whiteness of the whale that above all things appalled me.” We use the word appall to mean “to make afraid,” but originally it meant “to make pale”—to make white. The whiteness of the whale appalls Ishmael, and in “Design” we are told that the designer works to appall us (13). How, then, is Frost using this color to evoke certain ideas or emotions that will reinforce his point? An essay exploring the metaphors in “Design” could potentially pursue two goals. First, it could identify and unpack each metaphor, explaining the image it invokes and describing the emotional and intellectual impact of that image. What, for example, do you picture when you read that the spider holds the moth up “Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth”? To unpack that metaphor, you could start by discussing the physical similarity between satin and a moth, and you could then explain what we use satin for and why we value it, discussing why it does or does not matter to our understanding of the poem to think of the moth as satin. You will need to apply the same thoroughness to analyzing each of the metaphors in the poem. In addition, you could demonstrate how the metaphors contribute to the overall tone and message of the poem. This will require you to identify a theme or central concern coursing through the poem. The speaker says the combination of spider, moth, and flower makes them “Like the ingredients of a witches’ broth.” How does this metaphor suggest the speaker is thinking about the spider, moth, and flower? What do the witches do with their broth, and what connection might it have to the theme of chance and fate? You might find it productive to track down

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the allusion of the witches’ broth in Macbeth; once you know the role of the witches in Macbeth, you can discuss how Frost is using an allusion to that play to enrich the imagery of his own poem. What role does “Design” attribute to magical or supernatural forces? Remember that it is not enough for you to elucidate the potential meaning of Frost’s metaphors if you do not also explain how understanding them then aids your reading of the overall poem.

Sample Topics: 1. W hiteness: What does white symbolize in this poem? A thesis for this paper could argue that the purity of white provides its own commentary on the action. Is Frost signaling his attitude about the predation the poem depicts by choosing to feature the color so prominently? Does the use of white suggest there is an innate purity or moral correctness in the actions the poem describes? You may want to discuss cultural connotations of the color, or consider the ironic import of the terror the color provokes or the ways Frost aligns innocence and death in the poem. 2. Metaphors: What are the primary metaphors, and what do they mean? How do they contribute to the philosophical issues the poem grapples with? The speaker of the poem makes a number of comparisons to describe the spider, the moth, and the flower in different ways and to provide the reader with varying images. The flower is compared to a froth; the moth is compared to a sail. Frost packs several metaphors into his poem, any or all of which you could work with in greater depth. Each metaphor was integrated for a specific reason, contributing a certain tone to the poem or fitting into the poem’s argument in a certain way. Explain the image you are scrutinizing and discuss what the comparison contributes to our emotional and intellectual response to the poem.

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Compare and Contrast Because “Design” is a meditation on themes that are common to Frost’s poetry, you may find it enlightening to compare this poem to other Frost works that address similar issues. A strong essay could be written exploring the use of form in Frost’s poetry, comparing “Design” to other sonnets by Frost and building an argument that considers why Frost uses the sonnet structure in certain poems but not in others. Is there a similarity that unites the themes or issues found in Frost’s sonnets? In any essay comparing or contrasting poems, you will need to demonstrate that you understand each poem’s core idea, issue, argument, or point, in addition to identifying the elements of the poem that you have chosen to compare. Look for ways that your comparison can help to illuminate something obscure in one poem by comparing it to something similar and more readily understood in another poem. You might also consider comparing this poem to another Frost sonnet. The sonnet is the only traditional poetic form that Frost experimented with, and it might be productive to look to other sonnets to compare the rhymes, structures, images, and themes. You might find that Frost gravitates to this particular form when exploring certain themes or issues. Whatever course you choose to follow, remember that your goal is to help your readers understand the meaning of the sonnets with greater clarity. You should avoid simply pointing out the similarities and differences but strive to explain how those similarities and differences enlighten Frost’s poetry.

Sample Topics: 1. Characterizing nature in “Design” and “ ‘Out, Out—’ ”: How is nature characterized in each of these poems, and how can our understanding of one poem help us to understand the other? Frost often writes about tragic, horrible, fatal events; in “ ‘Out, Out—’ ” the tragedy is the gruesome death of the boy, while in “Design” the horror is contained in the triumphant spider holding up the moth it has killed and is about to eat. Our common reaction to such events is to wonder what the moth or the boy did to deserve death or, if they did not deserve such

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Bloom’s How to Write about Robert Frost treatment, how can nature be so cruel? How do these poems address that question? Argue that nature has a role in these deaths, but what exactly is that role? Where do these poems attribute blame, if there is any blame to be assigned? One way to approach this topic would be to focus on the death in one of the poems, then argue how tone, imagery, and diction or word choice formulate an attitude about that loss. What is the relationship of the particular death to the larger natural order, as suggested by the poem? Then adopt the same approach for another of Frost’s death-themed works, drawing a conclusion about the way Frost characterizes the relationship between death and nature in his poems.

2. Sonnets: How does this sonnet compare to other Frost sonnets? You can adopt any number of approaches in comparing Frost’s sonnets, ultimately showing how the companion pieces illuminate one another. For example, “Design” follows a fairly standard structure of eight introductory lines followed by a six-line conclusion, while “Acquainted with the Night” seems to offer no turn between these two distinct sections. On closer examination, the transitional point of “Acquainted with the Night” is less easily discernible but arguably occurs when the poem shifts from a local, earthly focus to a broader focus that now includes what some critics say must be the moon. This shift places the speaker in a broader context. A similar movement occurs in “Design” when the speaker moves from simply studying nature to contemplating the role of a creator. An essay could explore how those turning or transitional points highlight a common thematic concern (our place in the universe), a common theme in Frost’s poetry, yet one he approaches and unearths in numerous and various ways. Bibliography for “Design” Carter, Everett. “Frost’s Design.” Explicator 47.1 (Fall 1988): 23. Cordery, Gareth. “Frost’s Design.” Explicator 41.3 (Spring 1983): 45.

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Ingebretsen, Edward J., SJ. “ ‘Design of Darkness to Appall’: Religious Terror in the Poetry of Robert Frost.” Robert Frost Review (Fall 1993): 50–57. Isaacs, Elizabeth. An Introduction to Robert Frost. Denver: Alan Swallow, 1962. Kemp, John C. Robert Frost and New England: The Poet as Regionalist. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1979. Maxson, H. A. On the Sonnets of Robert Frost: A Critical Examination of the 37 Poems. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 1997. Perrine, Laurence. “Frost’s Design.” Explicator 42.2 (Winter 1984): 16. Prunty, Wyatt. “Horseradish and Roast.” Southern Review 36.2 (Spring 2000): 395–405.

Index

“Acquainted with the Night” 203–210 close reading of 203–204 complexity added to narrative 209 form/genre of 207–209 language/symbols/imagery of 209–210 meditation loneliness 203, 205 metaphorical and literal readings of 206 opening line and 203–204 philosophy/ideas of 206–207 sonnet form of 207–209 themes of 205–206 topics/strategies for 205–210 watchman and 205 “Acquainted with the Night” (sample topics) guilt 205–206 humanity’s place in universe 206–207 imagery of poem 210–211 loneliness 205 terza rima sonnet 208–209 “After Apple-Picking” 114–123 classic Frost poem 114 close reading of 114–115 compare/contrast and 121–122 critical acclaim for 114 essence of poem 114–115 as existentialist exploration 118 history/context of 117–118 labor as central image 115–116 language/symbols/imagery 119–121 philosophy/ideas of 118–119

themes 115–117 topics/strategies for 115–122 “After Apple-Picking” (sample topics) apples 120 biblical imagery 119, 120 compromised world 118–119 dreams 117 Frost’s biography as influence 117–118 kinds of sleep 119, 120–121 labor 116 labor of writing poetry 116 Longfellow’s “Sleep” 121–122 “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” and 122 Amy (”Home Burial”) 102, 103, 107–108 Auden, W. H. 172 “Birches” 151–160 appeal of 152 blank verse and 156–157 close reading of 151–152 compare/contrast of 159–160 facts versus imagination and 152 form/genre of 156–157 imagery in 157–158 interpretation of 151 language/symbols/imagery of 157–159 multiple themes of 153 optimism in 159 philosophy/ideas of 155–156 themes of 153–155

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Index topics/strategies of 152–160 trust and 157 truth confronted in 155 “Birches” (sample topics) blank verse 157 fact and imagination 155–156 fate 155 heaven and earth 155 inner dome of heaven 158–159 isolation 154 life as a forest 158 love 154 nature in conscience 160 trees as girls 158 truth 156, 159–160 work and play 154 Bloom, Harold vi–viii Boy’s Will, A, publication of 49 character overview for Frost 54–55 “Death of the Hired Man” and 93–94 essay writing and 2–4 “Home Burial” and 105 “Mending Wall” and 83–84 “‘Out, Out—’” and 167–168 citations/formatting accuracy of quotations 34–35 integrating quotations 32–34 parenthetical citations 38 plagiarism 39–41 primary sources 32, 36–37 punctuation 35–36 secondary sources 37 works cited pages 37, 39 close reading of “Acquainted with the Night” 203–204 of “After Apple-Picking” 114–115 of “Birches” 151–152 of “The Death of the Hired Man” 89–90 of “Departmental” 211–212 of “Desert Places” 219–220 of “Design” 229–231 of “Fire and Ice” 175 of “Home Burial” 102 of “Mending Wall” 80–82

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of “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 180–181 of “‘Out, Out—’” 161–164 of “The Oven Bird” 143–144 of “The Road Not Taken” 132–133 of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 188–189 of “The Wood-Pile” 124–125 coherent paragraphs 23–26 common sample topics. See writing about Frost (sample topics) compare/contrast overview for Frost 63–64 of “After Apple-Picking” 121–122 of “Birches” 159–160 of “The Death of the Hired Man” 100–101 of “Desert Places” 224–227 of “Design” 237–238 of “Directive” 77–78 essay writing and 8–9 of “Fire and Ice” 178–179 of “Home Burial” 112–113 of “Mending Wall” 86–87 of “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 186–187 of “‘Out, Out—’“ 172–173 of “The Oven Bird” 149–150 of “The Road Not Taken” 140–141 of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 199–201 of “The Wood-Pile” 129–131 conclusions 29–32 contrast. See compare/contrast Crane, Hart vi “Death of the Hired Man, The” 89–101 character and 93–94 close reading of 89–90 compare/contrast 100–101 form/genre 96–98 home as central theme 90–91 “Home Burial” and 89–90, 100 language/symbols/imagery 98–99 marriage and 90, 91 philosophy/ideas 94–96 short story in verse form 96–97 themes of 90–93 topics/strategies of 90–101

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“Death of the Hired Man, The” (sample topics) death and life we live 91, 92–93 education 90, 92 form of poem 97 grace concept 94–95 “harplike morning-glory strings” 98, 99 home and family 90–91, 92 “Home Burial” and “The Death of the Hired Man” 89–90, 100 justice and mercy 96 marriage 90, 91 mechanics of imagery 99 moon 98, 99 personal dignity 95–96 poem as parable 96, 97–98 Silas 94 Warren and Mary 93–94 Wordsworth’s “Michael” and “The Death of the Hired Man” 100, 101 work 91–92 “Departmental” 211–218 ants related to people and 211 bureaucratic structures mocked by 212–215 burlesque technique of 216 close reading of 211–212 compartmentalization of jobs and 212 “finding out God” and 215–216 form/genre of 216–218 history/context of 214–215 incompleteness of our lives and 213, 214 lightness of tone and rhythm in 212 philosophy/ideas of 215–216 structure of 216–17 themes of 212–214 topics/strategies for 212–218 “Departmental” (sample topics) fear and rejection of death 214 frustration with academics/critics 215 God and nature 216 humor in 217 impersonality of bureaucracy 213–214

incompleteness of our lives 214 rhyme lesson in 217–218 “Desert Places” 219–228 ambiguity of 219–220 close reading of 219–220 common themes in 224–226 compare/contrast of 224–227 formal structure of 222–223 form/genre of 222–223 isolation/loneliness and 220 language/symbols/imagery of 223–224 nature imagery of 223–224 ontology and nihilism 221–222 philosophy/ideas of 221–222 structure of 219 terror of whiteness and 226 themes of 220–221 topics/strategies for 220–228 “Desert Places” (sample topics) “Acquainted with the Night” and 226 formal structure of 223 hope or denial 221 loneliness 221 ontology and nihilism 222 snow and nature imagery 224 space as metaphor 224 “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” and 226–227 whiteness in “Design” and 227 “Design” 229–239 analysis of last two lines 231 close reading of 229–231 common themes in 232 compare/contrast of 237–238 comparisons to other poems 237–238 language/symbols/imagery of 234–236 Macbeth alluded to 235–236 making sense of 229–230 as Petrarchan sonnet 229, 238 poet as designer 232, 234 themes of 232–234 topics/strategies for 231–239 whiteness in 235–236 “Design” (sample topics) 237–238 chance and fate 233 metaphors 236

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Index nature 233–234 nature in “‘Out, Out—’” and 237– 238 poet as designer 234 sonnets compared 238 whiteness 236 “Directive” 70–79 ambiguities in 75 Christian imagery in 72, 74, 75 close reading of 70–71 compare/contrast of 77–78 language/symbols/imagery of 75–77 as last great poem 70 nature and 72, 73–74, 75 power of 71 quest motif of 71–72, 73 as quest narrative 70–71 themes of 71–72 topics/strategies 71–79 “Directive” (sample topics) ambiguity 76–77 childhood simplicity 73 Christian imagery 76 compare Wordsworth with Frost 77, 78–79 destiny 73 “I stole the goblet from the children’s playhouse” 75–76, 77 nature 73–74, 76 poem as parable 73 the quest 73 Thoreau’s Walden and Frost 78, 79 “Dust of Snow” coherent paragraphs for 26 outlines for 14–16, 19–21 thesis statements and 12–13 Eliot, T. S. vi, 50, 140 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, Frost and vi, viii essay, sample 41–46 essays, how to write 1–46. See also citations/formatting overview 1–2 character 2–4 compare/contrast essays 8–9 conclusions 29–32 form/genre 4–5

history/context 7–8 introductions 26–29 language/symbols/imagery 5–6 paragraphs 21–26 philosophy/ideas 8 preparation for writing 9–10 sample essay 41–46 themes 2 thesis statements 10–13 “Fire and Ice” 175–179 close reading of 175 compare/contrast 178–179 complexity of 175 Dante’s Inferno and 178 desire as more destructive in 176 language/symbols/imagery 177–178 metaphors of desire and hate and 175 themes of 176–177 tone of 177 topics/strategies 176–179 “Fire and Ice” (sample topics) Dante’s Inferno 178 desire and hate 176 Eliot’s “The Hollow Men” 178, 179 emotion and reason 177 tone 177–178 first person, avoidance of 12 form/genre overview for Frost 60–61 of “Acquainted with the Night” 207–209 of “Birches” 156–157 of “The Death of the Hired Man” 96–98 of “Departmental” 216–218 of “Desert Places” 222–223 essay writing and 4–5 of “Home Burial” 109–110 of “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 184–185 of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 196 Frost, Elinor (wife) 102, 106 Frost, Elliott (son) 102, 106 Frost, Robert. See also writing about Frost death of son 102, 106 double nature of vi, 48, 193 as farmer 117

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honors awarded to 47 iconic status of 47 move to England by 48–49 natural language and 49–50 possible suicide attempt of 194 Pound and 49–50 public persona of 47–48 as “spiritual drifter” 136 style of vi–vii as teacher 215 as “terrifying poet” 48, 52 Yeats and 50 history/context overview for Frost 56 “After Apple-Picking” of 117–118 of “Departmental” 214–215 essay writing and 7–8 of “Home Burial” 105–107 of “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 183 of “‘Out, Out—’” 169 of “The Oven Bird” 145–146 of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 192–194 “Home Burial” 102–113 central narrative of 102 character and 105 close reading of 102 compare/contrast of 112–113 “The Death of the Hired Man” and 89–90 form/genre in 109–110 history/context of 105–107 language/symbols/imagery of 110–112 North of Boston and 89, 102 philosophy/ideas of 107–109 themes of 103 topics/strategies 103–113 “Home Burial” (sample topics) 104–105 blank verse and lyric narrative 109–110 characters in 105 death 104, 107 death of Elliott Frost 106–107 “The Death of the Hired Man” compared to 112

existential isolation 108 forms of grief 104 key imagery of poem 111 King David, “‘Out, Out—’” and 112–113 marriage 104 repetition of don’t 111–112 world is evil 108–109 how to write about Robert Frost. See writing about Frost imagery. See language/symbols/imagery integrating quotations 32–34 introductions 26–29 Isabel Archer (Portrait of a Lady) 140 James, Henry 140 language/symbols/imagery overview for Frost 62 of “Acquainted with the Night” 209–210 of “After Apple-Picking” and 119–121 of “Birches” and 157–159 of “The Death of the Hired Man” 98–99 of “Desert Places” 223–224 of “Design” 234–236 of “Directive” 75–77 essay writing and 5–6 of “Fire and Ice” 177–178 of “Home Burial” 110–112 of “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 185–186 of “‘Out, Out—’” 169 of “The Oven Bird” 147–149 of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 196–199 of “The Wood-Pile” 128–129 Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth vi, 121–122 “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” (Eliot) 140–141 “Mending Wall” 80–101 apparent simplicity of 80–81 character 83–84 close reading of 80–82

Index compare/contrast of 86–87 fate and accident 86, 87 first person perspective in 83–84 “Good fences make good neighbors” and 80, 81 imagery and characters of 81–82 imagery in 81–82 philosophy/ideas of 84–85 themes of 82–83 topics/strategies of 82–87 uncommon ideas in 82 wall symbolism and 81–82, 84–85 “Mending Wall” (sample topics) character of speaker 84 ethics of barriers 85 fate and accident 87 isolation and community 86–87 privacy versus community 85 property ownership 82–83 tradition/change 83 Meyers, Jeffrey 114, 133, 135, 199 mortality rates 106 “Mowing” coherent paragraphs for 23–26 outlines for 16–17 thesis statements for 11–12 “Musée des Beaux Arts” (Auden) 172 North of Boston 49, 89, 102, 114, 124 “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 180–187 ambiguity of tone and 181 close reading of 180–181 compare/contrast 186–187 elements of poem’s form in 184 entropy and 181–182 form/genre of 184–185 Garden of Eden and 183–184 history/context of 183 imagery in 181–182 language/symbols/imagery of 185–186 line-by-line analysis of 180–181 as meditation on aging 185 “The Oven Bird” and 186–187 philosophy/ideas of 183–184 spring and 183 teasing meaning from 180 themes of 181–183

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topics/strategies for 181–187 weighty ideas versus nursery rhyme cadence 184–185 “Nothing Gold Can Stay” (sample topics) aging and maturity 185–186 comparison with “Oven Bird” 186–187 cycles 182–183 entropy 182 fall from grace 184 form and tone 185 natural world as context 183 poem as metaphor for poetry 186 “‘Out, Out—’” 161–174 Auden compared to 172 character and 167–168 close reading of 161–164 compare/contrast and 172–173 critics in agreement on 161 cruelty in 165 deceptive simplicity of 164, 169–170 first person and 167–168 history/context of 169 “Home Burial” and 112–113 language/symbols/imagery of 169 life equated with work in 166, 169 Macbeth and 161–162 mountains and 170–171 nature’s indifference 165–167 opening lines of poem 162–163 speaker as character 163 themes of 165–167 topics/strategies of 164–174 tragedy of boy and 163–164 “‘Out, Out—’” (sample topics) the characters 168 comparison to other Frost poems 172–173 comparisons to Auden’s “Musée des Beaux Arts” 173 cruelty 166 death and life 167 literary/biblical allusions 171–172 mountains 171 nature’s indifference 166–167

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rural living in New England in 19th/20th centuries 169 who is “I”? 168 outlines 13–21 “Oven Bird, The” 143–150 change as central idea 144–145 close reading of 143–144 compare/contrast of 149–150 diminished thing and 148 form/genre and 146–147 highway dust and 147 history/context of 145–146 impermanence and 143–144 language/symbols/imagery and 147–149 lends itself to comparisons 149 poet as bird 147 questions raised by 144 as quintessential Frost poem 143 as sonnet 146–147 themes of 144–145 topics/strategies for 143–150 why oven bird? 145–146 Wordsworth’s Prelude and 170 “Oven Bird, The” (sample topics) diminished thing 148–149 entropy 145 experimental sonnet 147 highway dust 148 impermanence 148–149 poet as bird 148, 149–150 transience 145 why oven bird? 146 paragraphs 21–26 parenthetical citations 38 philosophy/ideas overview for Frost 58–59 of “Acquainted with the Night” 206–207 of “After Apple-Picking” and 118–119 of “Birches” 155–156 of “The Death of the Hired Man” 94–96 of “Departmental” 215–216 of “Desert Places” 221–222 essay writing and 8 of “Home Burial” 107–109

of “Mending Wall” 84–85 of “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 183–184 of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 194–195 of “The Wood-Pile” 127–128 plagiarism 39–41 Portrait of a Lady, The (James) 140 Pound, Ezra 49–50 Prelude, The (Wordsworth) 170 preparation for writing 9–10 primary sources 32, 36–37 punctuation 35–36 quotations 32–35 “Road Not Taken, The” 132–142 ambiguity of 133–134 choice at center of 133 close reading of 132–133 compare/contrast and 140–141 criticisms of 136 doppelgängers and 133, 135 Frost on 135–136, 138–139 misunderstanding of 132 nonconformity and 134 satiric quality of 139 themes of 133–139 topics/strategies 133–142 as “tricky” 135–136 “Road Not Taken, The” (sample topics) choice 134 conformity and individualism 135 doppelgängers 137 Frost as spiritual drifter 138–139 “It is a tricky poem” 138 “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” 141 parody or satire? 139 Portrait of a Lady 141 regret 134–135 road of life 140 yellow wood 140 “Robert Frost: or, the Spiritual Drifter as Poet” (Winters) 136 sample essay 41–46 sample topics. See writing about Frost (sample topics); specific title of work followed by (sample topics)

Index “Second Coming, The” (Yeats) 50 secondary sources 37 sources 32, 36–37 “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 188–202 ambiguity of 196–198 close reading of 188–189 comma inserted by Lathem and 192, 193 compare/contrast of 199–201 Dante’s Inferno and 199–200, 201 death wish and 48 fascination with mortality and 194–195 form/genre of 196 Frost’s avuncular persona and 193 Frost’s denial of death wish in 192–193 history/context of 192–194 interpretations of 188 language/symbols/imagery of 196–199 lines adapted from other poems 199 nature and 189–190 “New Hampshire” and 199, 200 philosophy/ideas of 194–195 popularity of 188 promises and responsibilities loom 190 repetition in 197 “The Road Not Taken” and 189 speaker’s destination and 190 spiritual questions and 194 structure of 196 suicide and 189, 192, 194 themes of 189–192 topics/strategies for 189–201 woods and 197 “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” (sample topics) “Acquainted with the Night” and 201 allusions to other poems 200–201 ambiguous imagery of 197–198 changing ideas on 193–194 counterspell and 196 Dante’s Inferno and 201 death wish of speaker 195 deism in poem 195

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home 191 the horse 198 the “Lathem comma” 193 loneliness 192 nature and 191 “New Hampshire” and 200 obligation and responsibility 191–192 repetition of final lines 198–199 the woods 198 strategies. See topics/strategies symbolism. See language/symbols/ imagery themes overview for Frost 52–54 of “Acquainted with the Night” 205–206 of “After Apple-Picking” 115–117 of “Birches” 153–155 of “The Death of the Hired Man” 90–93 of “Departmental” 212–214 of “Desert Places” 220–221 of “Design” 232–234 of “Directive” 71–72 of “Fire and Ice” 176–177 of “Home Burial” 103 of “Mending Wall” 82–83 of “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 181–183 of “‘Out, Out—’” 165–167 of “The Oven Bird” 144–145 of “The Road Not Taken” 133–139 of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 189–192 of “The Wood-Pile” 125–127 themes, writing about 2 thesis statements 10–13 topics/strategies overview for Frost 52–66 for “Acquainted with the Night” 205–210 for “After Apple-Picking” 115–122 for “Birches” 152–160 for “The Death of the Hired Man” 90–101 for “Departmental” 212–218

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for “Desert Places” 220–228 for “Design” 231–239 for “Directive” 71–79 for “Fire and Ice” 176–179 for “Home Burial” 103–113 for “Mending Wall” 82–87 for “Nothing Gold Can Stay” 181–187 for “‘Out, Out—’” 164–174 for “The Oven Bird” 144–150 for “The Road Not Taken” 133–142 for “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” 189–201 for “The Wood-Pile,” 125–131 “Tuft of Flowers, The” outlines for 17–19 thesis statements for 11–12 Winters, Yvor 136 “Wood-Pile, The” 124–131 close reading of 124–125 compare/contrast and 129–131 complexity of 125 conclusions of speaker 125–126 “Directive” compared to 129–130 futility as theme of 126, 127 language of confinement in 128 language/symbols/imagery and 128–129 as meditation on poetry 127 philosophy/ideas of 127–128 as representative poem 124 speaker is lost 125 structure of 124–125 themes of 125–127 topics/strategies 125–131 waste and 129 “Wood-Pile, The” (sample topics) being lost 126 the bird 129 confinement 129 denial 126–127 “Directive” and getting lost 130 “Directive” and nature 130–131

futility and purpose 127 woodpile as symbol 127–128 woodsman as deity 128 Wordsworth, William 50–51, 170 works cited pages 37, 39 writing about Frost 47–69. See also Frost, Robert; writing about Frost (sample topics) character and 54–56 close reading of 47–52 compare/contrast 63–66 form/genre and 60–61 history/context and 56–58 language/symbols/imagery and 62–63 philosophy/ideas and 58–60 themes and 52–54 topics/strategies and 52–67 writing about Frost (sample topics) biography 57 criticism 57 death 54 different modes of poetry 61 dualistic pairs 59 existential isolation 59 formal poetic structures 61 Frost as New England poet 57–58 Frost himself 66 Frost’s characters 55 Frost’s contemporaries 65–66 Frost’s persona 55–56 Frost’s precursors 64–65 home 54 individual and society 54 irony 63 language 62–63 modernism 56 nature 53 post lapsarian world 59–60 rustic simplicity 60 synecdoche 63 world wars 56 Yeats, William Butler 50