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Paper # 2 EnglisAnalysis of " The Road Not Taken" By Robert Frost " Do not follow where the path may lead? Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail. " (Robert Frost) &# 9; In life, each and every one of us is on a journey to our own destination. Every-where that we go we will have to make decisions that will lead us to many different choices, and ultimately will determine our fate. There are many paths that can be taken in the road of life, and it is up to us to make sure we take the right one. No matter what Robert Frost intended to convey to the reader in " The Road Not Taken" , this poem had many different meanings. It all depends on how we interpret it, but no matter what you get from reading this poem, the main concept that this poem demonstrates is that it is the road that one chooses that makes them who they are. &# 9; Throughout " The Road Not Taken" , Robert Frost brings together many different literary techniques to express the theme or themes of his poem.
The two themes that I got from the poem were, 1) the dilemma of making a choice, and the danger of not knowing where that decision will take you, and 2) a tale telling the reader to be different, and to take the road " less traveled" . " And sorry I could not travel both? " It is always hard to make important decisions because you are always going to wonder what might have happened if you had chosen the other path. The speaker has no way of knowing what awaits him at either of his destinations, but he still must choose between the two paths. &# 9; The most common literary technique in " The Road Not Taken" is symbolism. The whole poem is very symbolic because the speaker reflects on the decision that he has to make, and the consequences of that decision. The choice that he has to make is not just which road should he walk down, because that would be insignificant. The choice he has to make will affect the rest of his life and determine his own fate. It shows us how each and every choice we make effects our lives in ways that we will never know.
Once you make a decision to do something, there is no turning back and you will never know what might have happened if? In the first stanza of the poem the speaker must choose between two paths that diverge into a yellow dark wood. " In Frost? s poems, woods often symbolize the world in which we live. The dark woods represent the privacy of the self, the sacred domain where poetry is made. " (Contemporary Literary Criticism) The first of the two paths is the more common route compared to the other path which was " less traveled" .
Frost presents us with a challenge that we all face in our daily lives-taking the easy way out. If you choose the easy, more traveled route, the out come is more predictable than if you take the more challenging way. Many of us tend to choose the more traveled path because we know exactly what is going to come of it. People, in general like to stay in their comfort zone, and that is doing what you know, and taking the more challenging way is too threatening or difficult for the average person to do. " Doubted if I should ever come back" . This is the author thinking about how he will never be able to come back knowing that what he chooses now will effect every other choice he makes from now on. &# 9; Imagery is another characteristic of Robert Frost? s poem. " In several of Frost?
s poems, the imagery of woods, trees, and leaves is so intimately and persistently identified with certain psychological states as to assume a symbolic significance. " (Contemporary Literary Criticism) " And both that morning equally lay in leaves no step had trodden black. " The leaves were all covering the ground, and since the time that they fell no person had walked on that road. This means that each time a person has to make a choice it is new to them, and they tend to feel that no one else has been there either. In this poem imagery suggests that the speaker must choose between the unknown, two paths that have unfamiliar destinations. &# 9; " Then took the other, just as fair, and having perhaps the better claim. " What made it have the better claim is that it was grassy and didn? t have many tracks of people walking on it. The path with fewer tracks was not meant for everyone because most of the other people took the easier path. The fact that the speaker took the road " less traveled" over the more popular route shows what type of person he is.
The one who chooses this path is more inclined to make a difference in the world. They are more daring, adventurous, and proud, and they don? t need to follow the crowd. This person knows what they want in life, and they know that following the crowd will get them no- where. People need to believe in themselves and stand up for what they believe in.
We are all individual and unique in our own special ways, and we all have the power to make good decisions and be in control of our lives and our fate. At the end of the poem, the speaker realizes that at the end of his life, " somewhere ages and ages hence" , he will have regrets about not going back and traveling the road he did not take. Although he has these feelings, he stays proud of the decisions that he made and the path that he took, because it made him the person that he is today. " I took the road less traveled by and that made the difference. " This shows that to him the most important thing was that he did what he felt was right, which was taking the " road less traveled" . And even if he had taken a different path, he would still be the man he is today. There are many ways to interpret this poem and find equal and significant meanings.
Robert Frost may have wanted readers to understand it differently, but come up with the same conclusions, or he may have just wanted every one to have a common understanding. No matter how you understood this poem, I hope you were able to realize that the choices one makes in life will effect them for the rest of their lives, and there is no way to know which road you should take. My advice is to follow your heart, make wise decisions, and after you have done so, reflect on those memories and sigh, discovering that those experiences have made " all the difference" . Robert Lee Frost, the author of " The Road Not Taken" , was born in San Francisco on March 26, 1874. He was one of America? s most popular poets, and also a four-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize.
When Frost was 11, his family moved to Massachusetts where he went to school and eventually where he became a teacher. Over the next ten years Frost made a living by writing and selling his poems, and by teaching at Derry? s Pinkerton Academy. In 1895 he married, and in 1912 he moved his family England where he devoted most of his time to his writing.
Three years later Frost was able to afford a nice farm in New Hampshire where he continued writing and trying to establish a reputation. Throughout Frost? s life he earned countless literary, academic, and public honors which he had worked so hard to achieve. On January 29, 1963, after 89 years of writing poetry, teaching and lecturing, Robert Frost died at his home in Boston. 32 a
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Research essay sample on Contemporary Literary Criticism Road Less Traveled
