Example research essay topic: First Two Lines Open The Door - 897 words

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Robert Frost s House Fear In the Poem House Fear Robert Frost portrays the anxiety of a couple coming home to something residing in their home. The poem carries a dark, frightful tone as the suspense and curiosity builds throughout the reading. The author uses imagery, ambiguity, and sound to emphasize the feelings theses people have every night as they open the door and allow whatever it is that is in the house to be off in flight. Robert Frost opens the poem by painting an ominous picture of this poem s setting. The words are packed into the first two lines each playing a vital role in creating the tone for the poem. For example the lines, Always at night when they returned to the lonely house from far away, are filled with imagery that allows the reader to assume and visualize a number of things.

The residents of a country home return always at night because of the distance they must travel. The word night is placed in such a position as to instantly create a dark almost evil ambiance throughout the entire poem. To lamps unlit and fire gone grey, are two lines that add to this dark imagery creating an intense, silent picture in the reader s mind. This imagery, combined with alliteration, assonance and meter, help control the tone in the poem. Many of the words used in this poem are left ambiguous.

The words far away, for example, poses the question in the reader s mind of whether the house is a country-house far away from the city, or whether the people live in the city and work far out in the country? This question is cleared with the word lonely, which not only puts the house in a country setting, but also personifies the structure. The house now has feelings and emotions, and yearns for company. A reader may even picture a face on the front of the home with windows for eyes, a door for the nose, and slightly rounded, descending stairs for a frown.

There is ambiguity in the question of who the owners of the home are. Frost never says how many or who these people were, but indicates that the number is plural as he uses the word they. The narrator helps the reader get a better idea of who these people were by the way the poem is read. In the first line, the narrator says, I tell you this they learned.

By the way this line reads it sounds as though the narrator is a father figure to a newly wed couple, or a nosy onlooker who can t stay out of their business. The narrator speaks as if this couple had a hard time getting things right, as if they just couldn t learn how to live in the real world but at least learned to rattle the key before entering their home Frost leaves the reader curious by never telling them what it is that is present when they come home. The only word that gives us a clue as to what it may be is the word flight. It could be a bat, or maybe a raven, or an evil spirit. Many things can take flight, what it is that flies out of the house when the door is opened and before the lamp is lit is a mystery.

The ambiguity in this word allows the reader to read the poem in a few different ways according to what exactly the reader s mind can conjure up. Frost immediately creates madness to the tone of the poem. He does this by stressing the word always as it is used twice in the first two lines of the poem. He writes, Always I tell you this they learned always at night when they returned. Beginning both lines with the word always allows the reader to empathize with the residents of the house. Whatever was happening happened always.

Every time these people came home, something fearful would occur. This redundancy creates a feeling of instability, as if this daily occurrence was driving them mad. Frost uses assonance and alliteration to control the flow and feeling of the poem. An eerie silence accompanies the first four lines and adds to the intensity of the tormenting anticipation. The silence is broken when Frost has the residents rattle the lock and key. For example, the line just above that line reads, To lamps unlighted and fire gone gray.

The l, u, a, f, and both g sounds, that are respectively the beginning letters to each word of that sentence, flow smoothly and quietly off the readers tongue creating again an eerie silence just before they open the door to their home. The word rattle, the ck sound in lock and key interrupts that silence and sends shivers down the readers spine as they are to finally find out why House Fear is titled such. These sounds are especially effective when used in monosyllabic words. In this poem Robert Frost used imagery, ambiguity, and sound to portray the emotions of this couple coming home every night to something in their home.

The tone is controlled by the use of assonance and alliteration. By doing these things, Frost allows the reader to visualize the setting and empathize with couple as they are driven mad by this horrific occurrence.

Research essay sample on First Two Lines Open The Door