Robert Frost: Life and Poetry

One of America's most popular poets, Robert Frost, achieved major recognition and reached the widest possible audience. His direct and easy to read poems make him one of the most recognized poets in the country. Robert Frost has the ability to make his poems accessible to anyone reading them. His use of everyday vernacular and traditional form of poetry makes it easy for readers, but understanding them is a different story. Robert Frost's poems are very connotative in nature, making them very profound to read. One reason for this is his nomadic behavior. Frost lived in various places throughout his life. The majority of his poetry is about travel and the experiences he had.

Robert Frost was born in San Francisco on March 26th, 1874 first child of Isabelle Moodie and William Prescott Frost, Jr. and was named after the confederate general Robert E. Lee. In 1885, after his father's death, and at the age of 11 his family (with $8 in their possession) left California and settled in Lawrence, Massachusetts (Richardson, 1). There he attended and graduated high school. He was accepted and attended Dartmouth College, but stayed for less than a semester (Winnick, 1). He taught, worked at a mill and as a reporter right after that. In 1894, at just 20 years old, he sold "My Butterfly: An Elegy" to The Independent, a New York literary journal. A year later he married Elinor White after three years of courtship. Frost then attended Harvard College, from 1897 to 1899 as a special student but he never graduated and left without a degree. For the next ten years he wrote poems and worked at Derry's Pinkerton Academy (Winnick, 1).

After being settled for many years, he sold the farm in 1912. He used the money from the house and moved to England where he could concentrate solely on his writing. On that note he wrote "A Boy's Will" and it was accepted by a publisher. It was released in 1913 to favorable reviews that resulted in the American release of the book. Frost now had a transatlantic reputation (Winnick, 2).

In February of 1915, Frost and his family moved back to New York City. Frost's book, the "North of Boston", was released two days after his arrival in New York. With sales of "A Boy's Will" and "North of Boston", Frost was able to buy a farm in Franconia, NH. There he wrote "Mountain Interval", published in 1916. In New Hampshire, Frost also embarked on a long career of writing, teaching, and lecturing. In 1924, he received a Pulitzer Prize in poetry for "New Hampshire". In 1925 Frost's daughter Marjorie was hospitalized with pneumonia, a peri-cardiac infection, chronic appendicitis and nervous exhaustion. Over the next few years, Marjorie became more ill and was put in and out of hospitals. Amidst all this, Frost still received critical acclaim and various accolades for his work "Collected Poems". In 1934 Marjorie died of perpetual fever, and soon after Frost and his wife moved to Key West, FL (Richardson, 5). Over the next years he received an unprecedented number and range of literary, academic, and public honors (Winnick, 2). Robert Frost died in January 29th, 1963 leaving behind a great line of literary works that have become well-known and beloved pieces of American literature.

The reoccurring theme of Robert Frost poems is one of travel; one can tell that he was a nomadic being. Through out his life he moved a lot. He lived in various places including Cambridge, Miami, Coconut Grove, Key West, New Hampshire, Gainesville, New York City and London. His poems are reflected by his life greatly.

Robert Frost's most famous poem to date is probably "The Road Not Taken". It depicts Frost standing at a fork in a road, undecided about which path to take. He decides to take the path that is less traveled on, and he imagined this choice to be very important. He will someday tell himself the he took the road less frequented, and gain satisfaction not conforming to the same path in life that everyone else has. This poem relies heavily on imagery, considering the readers must imagine two roads and then a person at the fork, pondering his next move. He describes one of the roads as "grassy and wanted wear". The tone of the poem is set mainly at the end:

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.

The tone of this poem is one of wonderment and content. The traveler in the poem is content with his choice, a choice of risk and uncertainty. But nonetheless, the theme then becomes that even one as an individual cannot be identical to all others around them, and so can't the paths we choose in life.

"Nothing Gold Can Stay" is a remarkable poem that in one short verse describes a common lesson in life, "change is inevitable". Nature in this poem seems to take on a destructive personification, "her early leaf's a flower/ but only so an hour". The poem relies heavily on imagery of nature to emphasize the theme of change or destruction; however, the reader sees fit to interpret it. But the tone of the poem is one of diminution. It starts off uplifting describing, "Nature's first green is gold..." then a fall is stressed. Yet the uses of the verbs "subside" and "sank" include the loss of color and beauty in the poem.

Another poem that takes on the same theme is "Spring Pools". The poet uses flowers to say that they will be taken over "by roots to bring dark foliage on". Nature is personified by being "consuming" by "drink[ing] up and sweep[ing] away". Once again, Frost uses nature to inform the readers that like nature itself, our lives are consumed by it, and nothing beautiful can stay.

"The Fear", a narrative poem, is one of Frost's most dramatic poems. This poem has actually been transferred from the written page to the theatre as one-act plays. The poem achieves suspense, action and tension, drawing the reader in. "The Fear" is about a man and woman coming back from what seems to be a long trip. The lady in the poem says, "I have always felt strange when we came home to the dark house after so long an absence." The woman worries even more considering her house is not on a traveled road. The tone of the poem is gripping. The reader immediately imagines the faces of the character in the poem, especially the female