Robert frost

ROBERT FROST

Masterpieces:

The Road Not Taken

Fire and Ice

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy

Evening

Born in San Francisco in 1874,

he returned with his family to

New England.

After briefly attending

Dartmouth and Harvard colleges

and working as a journalist and a

schoolteacher, he purchased a

farm in New Hampshire, where

he started his career as a poet.

BIOGRAPHY

BIOGRAPHY

Frost wrote about the

natural world, and also about

his struggle to raise a family

in depression times.

In 1912, he took his family to

England, where he published

A Boy’s Will (1913), North of

Boston. He got famous in

Europe.

He was familiar with the

ideas of William James and

other modern psychologists,

but also he was equally

familiar with the works of

William Cullen Bryant, Ralph

Waldo Emerson, and other 19th

century masters, coupled with

a modern sense of irony.

BIOGRAPHY

We find in Frost’s poems some

of Thoreau’s love of isolation,

Hawthorne’s dark vision,

Longfellow’s traditional

craftsmanship, Dickinson’s dry

humor, and Robinson’s realistic

characterization.

He speaks in a common speech,

unaffected, a modern Plain Style.

POEM ANALISYS

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I

could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

5

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN

1. What diverged in the yellow wood?a) Two rivers.b) Two roads

2. About what was the speaker sorry in the first stanza?a) For not taking both

roads.b) For being in the

wood.

Then took the other, as just

as fair

And having perhaps the

better claim,

Because it was grassy and

wanted wear;

Though as for that, the

passing there

Had worn them really

about the same, 10

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN

3. According to line 7, why did the second road had better claim?a) Because it was

secure.b) Because no one had

passed by it.

And both that morning

equally lay

In leaves no step had

trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for

another day!

Yet knowing how way leads

on to way,

I doubted if I should ever

come back. 15

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN

4. For what did the speaker “keep” the first road?a) For another

opportunity.b) For nothing.

I shall be telling this with a

sigh

Somewhere ages and ages

hence:

Two roads diverged in a

wood and I—

I took the one less traveled

by,

And that has made all the

difference. 20

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN

5. How does the speaker think he will be telling the story “ages and ages hence”?a) With a sigh.b) With tears in his

eyes.6. What has “made all the

difference”?a) Taking the most

travelled by.b) Taking the less

travelled by.

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN

Interpreting:• What might the roads represent?

The choices we have to take in the different stages of our lives.

• Does the speaker think he made the wrong choice? Why or why not?

At the moment he doesn’t think like that, but he knows that in the future he will regret not having taken the other choice, or at least, imaging how things would be if he had taken the other opportunity .

Some say the world will end in

fire,

Some say in ice.

From what I’ve tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice, 5

I think I know enough of hate

To say that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice. 9

FIRE AND ICE1. What are the two things

“some say” the world will end in, according to the speaker?a. Wind and fireb. Fire and Ice

2. What emotion does the poet suggest that the two emotions have in common?

a) Fire/ pain – ice/indifference

b) Fire/desire – Ice/hate

FIRE AND ICE

Interpreting:• What does the poem suggest that the two emotions

have in common?

The poem suggests that both desire and hate are strong emotions that could bring destruction, sadness, devastation to the world.

• What other kinds of destruction besides destruction of the world might the poem be about?

Destruction of human lives, destruction of human relationship within others, destruction of the nature.

Whose woods these are I think

I know.

His house is in the village,

though;

He will not see me stopping

here

To watch his woods fill up with

snow.

My little horse must think it

queer 5

To stop without a farmhouse

near

Between the woods and frozen

lake

The darkest evening of the

year.

STOPPING BY WOODS ON A SNOWY EVENING

He gives his harness bells a shake

To ask if there is some mistake. 10

The only other sounds the sweep

Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,

But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep, 15

And miles to go before I sleep.


Interpreting:• What causes the speaker to stop?

The panorama of the woods fill up with snow

• What do the owner and the horse have in common?

Both the owner and the horse think that taking a time for observing and admiring the nature is rare.

• How do they differ from the speaker?The speaker gets fascinated with the panorama,

while the others think it is quite normal.


• Why does the speaker leave the woods?Because he has to keep his way. He cannot

stay all the time there since life goes on.

• Does he regret leaving?No, because he knows he has “promises to

keep”, important things to do.

• What might sleep mean?It might mean the death, while the “miles to

go” is the journey of life.