The Road Not Taken

One of Frost's commonest subjects is the choice the poet is faced with

two roads, two ideas, two possibilities of action. "The Road Not Taken"

deals with the choice between two roads, and with the results of the choice

which the poet makes. It raises the evident question of whether it is better to

choose a road in which many travel, or to choose the road less traveled and

explore it yourself. In "The Road Not Taken," the speakers' tone and setting

help illustrate the struggle a person goes through in their lives to pick the right

road to travel.

It is possible to read this poem as a statement of some self-pity on the

poet's part, a feeling, perhaps, that he has been cheated and misunderstood

because he took an unpopular path. To support this tone, one might point to

the last stanza: The speaker will some day, sighing, tell others that he took

the unknown road when faced with a choice. The reading, however, misses

much of the significance of the second and third stanzas. At the end of the

second, the speaker states that there was really not much difference in the two

roads; neither had really been worn by traffic, though one had been given

more wear than the other. It becomes obvious that the speaker's tone begins

to change. It becomes a little more confident, not much, but definitely less

confused and scared than he was earlier. The first glimpse of this change in

tone is in the eighth verse where he says, "because is [the second road] was

grassy and wanted wear." It also shows that the speaker may not want to be

like everybody else, a follower, but instead, chose a different road and be

himself, a leader. This verse also says that the road wanted wear, like he was

drawn to the path, not just out of his own desire to be different, but maybe out

of some pity. That pity being that the road is traveled less not because it is

not appealing, but that people are too afraid to be different. Verse 12 is

interesting when the speaker says that, "In leaves no step had trodden black,"

which the reader could interpret meaning that few people who did choose to

take the road less traveled did not come across any difficulties or obstacles.

He then goes on to say that, "Oh, I kept the first for another day," as to say

that it took him a long time to make his decision. Actually, it may have been

months or even years before the speaker chose a road. He knew that the

decision he made would determine the outcome of his life, and that he would

have to be devoted to the road he chose. Once he made this decision, he

would probably never be able to turn back.

In the third stanza, he says that both roads lay in leaves that no one had

trampled down. In other words, both roads were in about the same condition;

it is what the man does with his choice that makes the difference. The tone of

the last stanza, then, is simply matter-of-fact rather than self-pitying. One

cannot know, when he makes a choice, what the results of his decision will

be. Rather than being sorry that he took the untravelled road, the poet seems

to be saying that he would probably do the same thing again. The speakers

tone seemed to have changed with confidence. This confidence, shown in

verse eighteen, when the speaker repeats the first verse, except he leaves out

the word yellow. Purposely leaving out the word yellow is an example of

imagery. In the first stanza, yellow meant the color of the trees and foliage,

and in the third stanza, they are no longer yellow. Also in the third stanza he

says, "I shall be telling this with a sigh somewhere ages and ages hence."

This isn't stated in a negative way, just as a way to portray the fact that he

chose the right road. The sigh was to show that the road had not been easy.

The setting in "The Road Not Taken," is very important. In the first

verse of the first stanza, Frost says, "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,"

which is seemingly a very important part of the poem. This line is a metaphor

in which Frost uses woods to represent life. Using this as an image helps to

have a better understanding of the complexity of the problem that the speaker

is facing. If someone was standing at the edge of some woods you would not