Blessed Literature

This process of sharing our thesis socially has been interesting.  I shared my five different thesis claims with my neighbor and was happy with the great comments he provided.  When I included him in the next step, he mentioned that Robert Frost’s poem, "The Road Not Taken" had kept him up at night.  Not intending for him to lose sleep over my homework, I was hoping he and his wife still liked me.   

I was pleasantly surprised on Sunday morning in our Gospel Doctrine class when my neighbor who is the instructor, passed a copy of Frost’s poem to each class member to read and analyze in the context of our pre-mortal and earthly life.   

Robert Frost in Church

He was able to incorporate the metaphor of choosing a path into our lesson very effectively.  In fact, one woman raised her hand to tell him that he had taught a really great lesson, which made him feel good.   I was pleased as well.  I was happy he shared the poem I am writing about with our Ward members. 

 

Maybe Dr. Burton is right that what we find interesting and good in literature we should share with others who will most likely be grateful for the enrichment.

Been on this Road Awhile

Working so closely with Robert Frost's poem The Road Not Taken the past weeks, I have decided to memorize it for one of my personal learning outcomes (#4).  

This way I will be able to share it with family and friends while providing some information and analysis I have been working on. 

It Happened on the Road

Getting my  thesis draft to this point has been challenging.  

At the same time I have had questions answered about the text I decided to write on.  Researching BYU's library provided some sound analysis to help me fulfill my claim about Frost's ability to make us think one way while  he moves us on in a different direction.  

This is only a draft.  I still have much to do.  I appreciate and invite your comments to help guide me along this road.

Frost’s Style of Poetry

It has been debated which poetry sub-genre Robert Frost identifies with.  The Oxford English Dictionary gives us examples that illustrate how Frost is a blend of at least three sub-genres of poetry.  Having been compared to Romantic poets such as Wordsworth, who said in 1800, “Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings; it takes its origins from emotion recollected in tranquility.”   And Keats who in 1817 stated: “The poetry of earth is never dead…a voice will run… about the new-mown mead; That is the Grasshoppers.”  Frost is said to have been influenced by Emily Dickenson, who crafted her poetry with a tool box of poetic devices according to BYU’s Emily Dickinson Lexicon.

 

Frost was influenced by whom?

Frost is also thought to have leaned towards transcendentalism, which means to pass over or go beyond (a physical obstacle or limit); to climb or get over the top (of a wall, mountain).  The religio-philoshical teaching of the New England school of thought represented by Emerson and others that exalted character, thought, or language; also that which is extravagant, vague, or visionary in philosophy or language; idealism. 

In 1842 Emerson said: “What is popularly called Transcendentalism among us, is idealism.”

Modernism has been noted as stylistic of Frost’s poetry.  This is the tendency or movement toward modifying traditional beliefs and doctrines in accordance with modern ideas and scholarship.  A usage, mode of expression, peculiarity of style, etc., characteristic of modern times.  Later more generally, an innovative or distinctively modern feature.

It could be that Frost was influenced by all three sub-genres of poets to bring us his memorable poetry.  Knowing this information will help me understand more about Frost's style of writing and the tools he used to help when I write my thesis paper.

Quotations

Here are some of the poems I intend to quote from in my paper on love poetry:

Petrarch Sonnets 3, 6, 101, 106, 151, 144, 132

Sonnet 116, William Shakespeare (1609)

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle’s compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.


I would want to compare Sonnet 116 to:

A Leading Path of Quotations

As I curate a set of quotations from Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken,” there are three familiar quotations that when read in sequence, begin In medias res and take readers down a thought-provoking path of plot.

Frost begins the poem with “Two roads diverged” to immediately seize our attention and create enough suspense to inspire further reading.  We wonder what two roads he is speaking of  and where each road will lead.  We can see the traveler (protagonist) must make a decision and we wonder how he will handle that situation.  

So Why Do I Care?

 

What has persuaded me to believe it actually matters that I write a paper about the effects of Frost’s poem, "The Road Not Taken?"  Since I first heard this poem long ago, it has given me greater appreciation for caring about the choices I make in my life. 

Ambiguous and Contrary Road

A casual reading has the effect to inspire readers to take the “road less traveled” which has generally been interpreted as the more difficult road.  Frost supports the traveler’s decision with a seemingly positive outcome by telling us that his choice has made all the difference.   Even though we have no idea what that difference might be, we are left to believe we will somehow benefit from taking the less traveled road. 

A closer reading reveals some contradictions that somehow lie dormant until we take time to analyze the effects of Frost’s inconsistencies.  I am intrigued enough to want to try to determine what message Frost is sending to readers that at first seems so clear but then turns out obscure.  It just might be that it is the contradictions and ambiguity of the poem that makes it so well loved by many people. 

This is the reason I am analyzing and writing a paper on the poem.

Identifying Dimensions of the Road

As I build my thesis from a combination of my evaluation and the cause/effect claims, along with the comments from scholarly friends, I will explore the effects of the contradictions and ambiguity in Robert Frost’s poem, “The Road Not Taken” for my final paper.

 What was Frost intending for us to feel as we read how a certain conflicted traveler chooses one equally worn road over another and then contradicts himself by stating one road seems better suited, “because it was grassy and wanted wear.”  This leaves the reader to wonder what could have enticed the traveler to choose one road over the other.   Was it just a hunch or whim he has or is there some visible reason such as the intriguing way the sunlight filters through the underbrush that prompted his decision?  We do not know, because Frost doesn’t tell us.  He does tell us he kept the first road for another day, only to say the traveler doubts he will ever again find himself at that particular cross road.

And why is he telling this way off in the future. . .and with a sigh?  Does this mean he is feeling regret for not having taken the first road or is it regret that because he is just one traveler he is unable to travel both roads simultaneously?  We do not know the answer to this because again, Frost does not tell us, or does he?  What he does tell us is that the road he took has made “all the difference.”  The ambiguity intensifies here as we wonder what that difference might be.  Each reader is left to speculate and fill in the blank to resolve the meaning of the poem.  Which is the reason the poem has such wide appeal.

Which Road To Claim?

After several hours of looking back on topics I have posted, as well as classmates posts for ideas to use as a thesis for my English 251 class, I have made a decision.   

Using different types of claims for my critical analysis of Robert Frost’s poem, "The Road Not Taken," I have composed five thesis statements.  

Robert Frost

 I would appreciate your comments and  feedback you may have to strengthen and improve my thesis.

 

I have always loved Robert Frost’s poetry because of its beautiful imagery and deep meanings.  Frost had the ability to observe little noted details of nature and describe them in an appealing way. 

Frost mixed philosophy into his poetry that causes the reader deep reflection with his forthright and uncomplicated style.

The Road Not Taken