Reflection of Robert Frost's Life in His Poems - Research Paper Example

 Robert Frost: A Critical Research Study Considered as ‘America’s poet’, Robert Frost (1874-1963) is certainly one of the world’s most infamous of all poets. Frost first published his books in Great Britain in the 1910s, but he soon became in his own the country the most read and constantly anthologized poet, whose work was made familiar in classrooms and lecture platforms. Robert Frost was born in 1874 in San Francisco to his father William Frost, a journalist and an ardent Democrat, and his Scottish mother, the former Isabelle Moody, who resumed her career as a schoolteacher to support her family after Robert was born. Robert lived with his family in Lawrence, Massachusetts, with Frost’s paternal grandfather, William Prescott Frost, who “gave his grandson a good schooling.” (Books and Writers, 2000). After the death of his father, Frost moved with his mother and sister to eastern Massachusetts, where he began writing his first poems while attending Lawrence High School. Frost met his future wife during his years in high school – Elinor Miriam White. He entered Dartmouth College in the fall of 1892 but “stayed for less than a term, returning home to teach school and to work at various jobs, including factory-hand and newspaperman.” (Pritchard, n.d.). It was during the same year in which Frost sold his first poem that he and Elinor were married, in December 1895. In order to come to a clearer and more knowledgeable viewpoint on Robert Frost, we must thoroughly discuss all of the key elements including his history, his life and times; by doing this we can come to a much more intellectual and critical understanding of Robert Frost as the poet, Robert Frost the human being. The aim of this paper is to discuss all of this; through discussing eight of Frost’s poems, and the noted similarities and differences in these poems. By doing this, we can use his writing to more thoroughly understand the man and his work. The eight chosen poems are as follows: 1. Revelation 2. My November Guest 3. October 4. Stars 5. After apple-picking 6. Blueberries 7. The Freedom of the Moon 8. Devotion This is what will be dissertated in the following. Revelation This poem is one which speaks directly about one’s revelation, about speaking up and being true to ourselves, as well as having understanding for others. This poem relates highly to in fact all of the rest, not only through its poetic form, but in its sense of meaning as well. This is shown to be especially true when compared to the poem Stars. Frost’s sensitivity to the theme of entropy, doom, and extinction is displayed prominently in both of these poems, as well as the limitations and isolation of the individual in either a social or natural environment, plus the related theme of how difficult it is for the self to understand existence. Frost uses metaphors quite frequently in his poems, although often times rather subtlety. In Stars we see a metaphor “Minerva’s snow-white marble eyes”, as we do in Revelation “Behind light words that tease and flout”. My November Guest This poem speaks about his sorrow, and how it comes when the winter comes, and “the birds are gone away”. It truly evokes a sense of emotion and presents a strong feeling of the darkness and seriousness of winter weather “The desolate, deserted trees, the faded earth, the heavy sky”. When we compare My November Guest to a poem such as The Freedom of the Moon, we see examples of personification, as in My November Guest, the guest is Sorrow, personified as a woman dearly loved who walks with him; in The Freedom of the Moon, ““Above a hazy tree-and-farmhouse cluster / As you might try a jewel in your hair”. My November Guest also shows a strong presentation of understatement, a device which Frost uses extensively, often as a means of irony; such as in this poem, where the speaker appreciates the November landscape, but leaves it to his ‘guest’ to praise. October This poem speaks about the coming of winter and how different the weather is becoming from the summer, “Retard the sun with gentle mist”. We get both seasons – fall and winter – appropriately when he speaks that “Thy leaves have ripened to the fall”, and how winter is approaching, “Whose leaves are already burnt with frost”. When we compare this poem to one such as My November Guest, we see more examples of similes, such as in October “Retard the sun with gentle mist / Enchant the land with amethyst”, and in My November Guest “The desolate, deserted trees / The faded earth, the heavy sky”. We also see the same sort of form of sorrow in this poem as in My November Guest, when he writes in October “Slow, slow! / For the grapes’ sake, if they were all”, and in My November Guest, where we see sorrow spread throughout the entire poem, such as “Her pleasure will not let me stay / She talks and I am fain to list”. Stars This is a poem which begins, quite obviously, with the speaking of how beautiful the stars are. It speaks of a feeling in winter, seeing the stars up in the night sky, however they are “Invisible at dawn”, and “Those stars like some snow-white, Minerva’s snow-white marble eyes”. Irony is also used in this poem, as Minerva, who is in fact the goddess of wisdom and yet her eyes are without the gift of sight. When we compare this poem to ones such as After Apple-Picking, Blueberries, and October, we see several examples of descriptive literature, such as in Blueberries “Blueberries as big as the end of your thumb / Real sky-blue, and heavy, and ready to drum.” After apple-picking This poem is one of great intricacy, describing the act of apple-picking. It is obvious from the words that the person described (whether it be Frost himself or not) thoroughly cherishes and revives in apple-picking, although after a hard day’s work the overall can apparently sometimes seem almost not worth it: “For all that struck the earth, No matter if not bruised or spiked with stubble, Went surely to the cider-apple heap As of no worth. One can see what will trouble This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is.” This poem and the poem ‘Blueberries’ are incredibly similar in both context and layout. Both are lengthy, descriptive poems which tell of a story of a person who is clearly and obviously incredibly intent in the situation. While Blueberries speaks as in the form of a dialogue, After Apple-Picking is individualized; however both have a strong sense of similarity which goes beyond the relative titles. In this poem, Frost takes an ordinary experience and transforms it into a meditative moment, a philosophical musing. Apple-picking seems to slide gradually away from the act of merely harvesting fruit to intellectually considering how life has been experienced fully but with some regrets and mistakes. When comparing this poem to the others, such as Blueberries especially, we see staggering similarities, such as the fact that both are rather simple stories, which have been taken and transformed into instead seriously meaningful tales which contain significant life meanings and morale, and therefore both hold an entirely more dramatic layer under the basically subtle exterior. Blueberries This poem was written in the form of a dialogue between two country neighbors; it talks about Loren, who has several children and is so thrifty that, “He has brought them all up on wild berries, they say, Like birds. They store a great many away. They eat them the year round, and those they don’t eat They sell in the store and buy shoes for their feet.” In this poem the characters are portrayed as ‘practical naturalists’ who accept whatever nature gives to them – good or bad. This poem actually includes a harsh message that man people realize in their lives. For example, a man asks his friend Loren if he can pick some of his beautiful blueberries growing in his orchard, and Loren agrees; then the man picks the berries, recalling what he knows about his friend’s life. As Frost wrote, “and after all, they’re really ebony skinned; the blue’s but a mist from the breath of the wind.” What this meant was that on the outside everything in Loren’s life looks good, but it is all just an act put on to please everyone around him. We can see this form of symbolism as well as personification in such poems as The Freedom of the Moon and Revelation. The Freedom of the Moon This poem speaks of many things, perhaps one of the most important being that of hope. The moon seems to symbolize hope, and it seems that the speaker uses the moon when he wants to feel better about himself. This poem uses more descriptive wording and personification in place of too many similes or metaphors, such as “And brought it over glossy water, greater / And dropped it in, and seen the image wallow / The color run, all sorts of wonder follow.” We can also see similarities between this poem and one such as Devotion, where even the specifics are staggeringly similar, such as in Devotion “Greater than being shore to the ocean / Holding the curve of one position / Counting an endless repetition.” Devotion This poem is brief, especially when compared to his others, and yet still has the same straight forward, emotional impact as all the rest. We can see from this poem that the author (Frost) adores the ocean, and he is describing the waves of the ocean. “Holding the curve of one position, counting an endless repetition.” We can see similarities in this poem and one such as Stars, in that both tell a basically brief tale of beauty and longing in regards to nature, while still emitting a feeling of sweet emotion and hope. Such as in Stars “As if with keenness for our fate / Our faltering few steps on / To white rest, and a place of rest / Invisible at dawn.” There are numerous similarities as well as differences in these eight of Robert Frost’s many poems. After reading and reviewing each one, we can easily see that Frost has a great love for the winter time; he finds superior beauty and emotion during this season, and shows it overtly through his writings. He truly portrays his views and loves, and uses his poetry to allow readers to understand these favored qualities of his. Such as in the poem ‘After apple-picking’, which is certainly one of the lengthiest out of the eight chosen here; where he describes the joys and excitement he got out of apple-picking. There is much described in this poem, not only the love for the act of apple-picking, but also of the hard work and dedication that it takes to do so. When we compare the poems: After apple-picking and blueberries, we can see the obvious similarities upfront – both poems are about fruit. Blueberries, however, is certainly the lengthiest out of all the poems, and shows more than any other characteristics of excitement and joy: “You ought to have seen what I saw on my way To the village, through Mortenson's pasture to-day: Blueberries as big as the end of your thumb, Real sky-blue, and heavy, and ready to drum In the cavernous pail of the first one to come! And all ripe together, not some of them green And some of them ripe! You ought to have seen!" When we compare the poems ‘My November Guest’ and ‘October’, we are shown clearly of his love for the seasons of fall and especially winter. The way he describes the snow as so beautiful and mesmerizing: “Retard the sun with gentle mist; Enchant the land with amethyst.” Different poems appeal in different ways and some are not really comparable. By sizing and realizing the similarities and differences between poems, however, we can gain a more knowledgeable and critical understanding at what means the writer is trying to get across to us, the reader. Poems are always about something, even if the purpose is not always made the most obvious. Often times poems have hidden meanings behind the images used within them, and the best way to understand exactly what the writer was thinking is to ask yourself what you think made the poet write that particular poem. In this case, we can see that Robert Frost is an extremely subtlety intricate, and yet straightforward poet. Although the titles of most of his poems are simple and overt, the poems themselves take on a whole other meaning; the detailed describing of such seemingly simple things put into terms which make us realize how beautiful the small things in life actually are. His writings are personal, thoughtful, and provoking, and speak of gratitude, experience, and – perhaps most importantly – love. From this review, we have seen that many of Frost’s poems reflect the same feelings and emotions, while often times using different images and means to describe them. Frost chooses his words carefully, using each word for a separate but equally important purpose. Frost has an incredible skill in synthesizing specific traditional formal devices with vernacular speech patterns and language, as well as a great ability to develop metaphors. He was also relatively ‘unmodern’ or traditional in relation to some of his contemporaries. The subject matter used in his poems describes great emotion and personality, and one can easily assume that Robert Frost led a filled life. References Frost, Robert. (1979). The Complete Poems of Robert Frost. New York: Henry Holt & Company. Read More