Prepared by the researcher – Dr. Yahya Saleh Hasan Dahami – Associate Professor, English Department, Faculty of Science and Arts Al Mandaq – Al Baha University – KSA – Previously at – Sana’a University – Yemen
Democratic Arab Center
Journal of Social Sciences : Issue XV – September 2020
A Periodical International Journal published by the “Democratic Arab Center” Germany – Berlin
ABSTRACT
Robert Frost’sThe Road Not Taken is an eminent poem about the trip of life. It is an ambiguous piece of poetry that might allow critics to ponder about various choices in life deeply. The ambiguity launches from the interrogation of free will against determination, whether the narrator of the poem chooses to take the route that is off trodden track or merely does so since he does not imagine the route with the curve in it.
The study aims to probe the depth of some important themes of The Road Not Taken. The paper starts with a concise introduction to the poet Robert Frost then the researcher moves to analytically and critically explore the scope of three important points. They are the choice, the decision, and the individuality, then to close with critical judgment. In this research, the researcher applies the critical-analytical approach.
INTRODUCTION
Robert Frost (1874-1963) was born in San Francisco; his father died when he was eleven years then his family transferred to Lawrence, Massachusetts, the place in which his grandparents lived. After graduation in 1892, Frost experienced some works and finally served as a reporter in a newspaper. He published a small book of poems on his own payment and clearly contributed to the verse The Birds Do Thus which was published in the New York magazine called Independent. In 1897, Frost entered Harvard University but left before finishing the requirements of the degree owing to an attack with tuberculosis as well as the birth of a second child that increased burden on him.
Literature, according to several literary figures, is the profession of an author, either a novelist, a playwright, or a poet. It is a written or recorded work of culture, language, philosophy, or time. Various critics and essayists have diverse thoughts about literature. It is outlined as an imaginative, creative, and inspirational script of standard resourceful value and merit. It is also an original, inspired, or ingenious writing, mainly of documented innovative worth. The Road Not Taken is, so to speak, aninnovative appeal. Frost is a great literary figure in literature in general and poetry in particular. Robert Frost has his opinion on literature in general. “Robert Frost, for instance, imagines that literature is ‘performance in words’” (Dahami, 2017a, p. 1).
Frost, in 1912, moved with his family to a smallholding in Buckinghamshire, in which he wrote productively, attempting to perfect his distinctive poetic voice. During this period, he met several literary pioneers such as the poet of innovative literary methods, Ezra Pound, and the young English poet allied with the Georgian poetry movement and prevalent in Britain, Edward Thomas. Frost soon issued his first volume of poetry, A Boy’s Will, in 1913 that received beholden reviews. Following the triumph of the volume, Frost moved to Gloucestershire and concentrated on publication of his second book titled North of Boston that saw the light in 1914. North of Boston contains a number of his most regularly anthologized parts, including The Death of the Hired Man, After Apple-Picking, and Mending Wall.
The American versions of Frost’s first two books won acute praise upon publication in America, and in 1917 he started his association with some American universities as a lecturer of nonfiction and poetry. It can be stated that “Poetry uses an elevated and preeminent literary language over everyday language; it is not the speech of the tongue only, but it is the language of the heart, mind, feeling, and the sentiment” (Dahami, 2018). Consequently, he continued writing prolifically for years and received many literary honors along with tributes from the government of the United States and American universities. Frost recited his poems in 1961 at the appointment of President Kennedy as a representative of the United States on some official tasks. His critical status waned for the duration of the latter amount of his career, although he received pronounced popular approbation and praise. The last three collections received fewer passionate reviews but contained numerous pieces recognized as among his paramount accomplishments.
The poem, which was first published in 1916, is one of the most eminent poems ofRobert Frost, in which its final three lines could be his most prominent. The Road Not Taken, like various of Frost’s verses,is set in a pastoral nature and environment that encourages the narrator and also the reader toward contemplation.
Although Frost said that he wrote the poem as a satirical response to his friend Edward Thomas’s inability to make a decision, readers interpreted it in a more metaphysical sense – the poet’s describing an incident in the physical world which turned into thoughts that transcended to the world of emotion and of the spirit (Caravantes, 2006, p. 82).
The poem depends on a metaphor where an expedition through life is paralleled to a trip or a ride on the road. Such an “ostensibly simple metaphor is only saying that the traveler came to a place where two roads figuratively diverged and he had to choose one or the other” (Tyagi, 2015). The readers of this poem need to realize that the narrator is obliged to choose a route instead of another.
In the first line of The Road Not Taken,“Two roadsdivergedin a yellow wood,”[1] Frost introduces the basics of his principal metaphor, the deviating and swerving roads. The road is a guide of life in which it is separated like the fork. The roads are in a wood in which the season is the fall where the leaves of trees are yellow. A “road is worn and tended and it is evident it is the road most travelled. The other – overgrown, shaded, and magical” (Bialosky, 2017, p. 4).
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black. (p. 21)
From the above lines, we might realize that although the poet interrupts the stanza after the tenth line, the dominant idea remains connected with the third stanza which creates a structural association between the portions of the poem. At this point, the narrator states that the routes can be ‘really about the same.’ Neither route has been traveled recently. Although the narrator’s searching for a perfect and strong logical motive to opt for one route over another, the motive is still unapproachable.
- Choice and Decision
The path that is split into two branches does not have equal directions; it constantly presents a selection to be prepared in poetry and life. The narrator of The Road Not Taken is not satisfied with having to make such a selection and tells that he may prefer to use both paths.
At different times in our lives, come to a crossroad. We might try to look down each path as far as we can, but eventually we have to make a decision; and that decision, whether for good or bad, can make all the difference” (Bayles, 2008, p. 92).
If the narrator will be ‘one traveler,’ in this case, the situation will be naturally difficult. Such a case raises a logical question of identity. What does the poem imply? The answer is stated even indirectly, the most significant factor to ponder when making a decision is that the path of action preferred should assimilate with the choices that one has made in his past. Readers/critics might understand that the narrator is troubled about being confronted with two routes that lead in dissimilar directions since the wrong decision will lead to privation of reliability. If there were no such thing as free will, the difficulty would not be about which decision to make: the choice would create itself. From the perspective of another reader/critic, that is precisely what would take place.
Another reader/critic, confronted with the identical two paths, would recognize without a second thought that one to follow. The narrator of the poem is conscious of the implications of selecting badly and does not see enough changes between the two paths to make one obvious as the obvious decision. However, it is the nature of life that selecting cannot be evaded. The process of choice is similar to Eliot’s The Cocktail Party in which “the main theme can be easily realized as the significance of choice. The characters of the play are faced with the importance of making a positive choice” (Dahami, 2017b, p. 94).
Though the routes look similarly attractive, the narrator distinguishes that his adoption or selection at the moment could have an important influence on tomorrow. He makes a choice, hoping that he might be able to go to see his place again, yet appreciating that such a chance is unlikely. The Road Not Taken “is a poem about the necessity of choosing that somehow, like its author, never makes a choice itself – that instead repeatedly returns to us to the same enigmatic, leaf-shadowed crossroads” (Orr, 2016, p. 12); “many would view the poem as reflecting Frost’s own life journey” (Wooten, 2006, p. 71). The poet envisages himself in the future, informing the account of his life and demanding that his choice to take the route ‘less traveled by’ – the road limited to other individuals who have used ‘has made all the difference.’ “It is as if Frost managed, remarkably, to create a poem that endlessly enforces one’s own relentless intuition of sameness and difference” (Wilcox, & Barron, 2000, p. 37).
The narrator in the following two lines
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood (p. 21)
wants to walk through both roads, but he cannot. He articulates his repentance because of human weaknesses, limitations and imperfections that he/she is obliged to make just one adoption or choice. “When people say they are sorry about not being able to do something, that is a feeling of regret” (Harvey et al. 2010, p. 77). Yet, the adoption is not effortless, since ‘long I stood’ before reaching a choice. A decision should be taken.
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth; (p. 21)
Featuring in the above lines, the poet thinks hard about what to choose. He scrutinizes the route as best as he can; however, his idea is limited for the reason that the route is bent but sheltered and protected. Such lines specify that although the narrator would like to obtain more material, he is disallowed from doing so on account of the nature of his milieu. The narrator is not on a real road but a split in the path of his life. He can only realize part of the path; subsequently, he cannot actually forecast the future.
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear; (p. 21)
In the lines mentioned above, the narrator appears to designate that the second route is a more appealing choice for the reason that no one has taken it recently. The narrator tries to choose between two futures in which they seem to be different but possibly equally good. Nevertheless, he gives the impression to feel indecisive, since he also defines the route equally ‘just as fair’ as the first rather than more reasonable. However, the narrator appears to be uncertain when he explains that it is ‘perhaps’; “and still the fact that he took the road less travelled” (Bode, & Dietrich, 2013, p. 24). In addition to that, the road is untrodden because it is ‘grassy.’
The narrator in these lines
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back. (p. 21)
makes his choice, trying to encourage and convince himself that he is going to satisfy his wish at the end to travel both routes, but simultaneously confessing that such a wish is unrealistic. “The speaker is doubtful he will ever return to the same spot because … one cannot turn away from the way of truth without losing knowledge of the truth in a morass of false opinion” (Altman, 2014, p. 45). Perceives the exclamation mark after the thirteenth line, the reader/critic realizes that such a punctuation mark expresses delight and exhilaration. Still, that exhilaration is quickly weakened by his declaration in the next lines.
In the following lines of the last fourth stanza,
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. (p. 21)
the tone noticeably changes. It is the only stanza that starts with a new statement that indicates a stronger pause from the preceding ideas. The narrator envisages himself in the coming tomorrow, debating and arguing on his life. What he proposes in such a situation appears to oppose what he has mentioned previously. “We may well focus on the last two lines almost to the exclusion of the rest: The speaker has chosen an individual, uncommon way of life. But this reading leaves us with some troublesome questions about internal consistency” (Potter, 1980, p. 52).
The poet tells his readers and critics in the eminent final lines that he selected ‘the road less traveled by,’ accordingly indicating that he tracked an unconnected, adventurous method of life, possibly at some hazard or charge to himself. “The traveler choosing the road less traveled suggests his quest and adventurous spirit. The ‘wood’ is a symbol of this world in which each task has two alternatives. The traveler, the man, is confused about what he should choose” (Chauhan, 2012, p. 137)? Repeatedly the last three lines are used to designate the life of Frost and more normally, to illustrate anyone who has shattered with tradition and move off on a lonely autonomous course of action. For acute readers, such final lines are principally striking because they give the impression to be a succinct and eloquent outline of the meaning of the poem.
In the last stanza, as the perceiving “I” makes the choice, Frost divides the speaker’s yearning ego into two distinct parts. The “I” at the end of the line and the “I” at the beginning of the next line represent the two conceptual options that the poet longs to unify (Hass, 2002, p. 14).
In the future, as it seems at the end of the poem, the narrator claims that the routes were dissimilar from each other and that he audaciously did not select the traditional path. Possibly he believes this in the future; possibly, he only desires that he may choose ‘the one less traveled by.’
The only mode to move toward such a problem, the poem suggests, is to examine all of the minutiae until something makes one route more significant than the other. The alteration may be slight, nearly imperceptible, but it longs for being there. In this circumstance, the narrator of the poem contemplates both sides cautiously and is released to whatever which can make a change. For the most portion, the two paths are found to be identical as we see in the sixth line ‘just as fair,’ and in the tenth line, we compare with ‘really about the same’; the case is similar in the eleventh line; where we find ‘both … equally, lay’.
The only alteration is that someone has been overgrown with meadow from not being used, and, on such a foundation, the narrator follows it. There is no suggestion that this minor discrepancy is the indication that the narrator was in search of or that he feels that the right decision has been made. Quite the reverse, the narrator believes that his decision may appear the wrong choice ‘ages and ages hence.’ It is mistaken to say that selecting such a particular path was the most significant thing, but it might be the point that a decision has been made at all ‘that has made all the difference.’
- Individuality
The poet “chooses the “Road less travelled by” as an assertion of his having an independent mind” (Chandra, 2013). On the superficial indication, the poem appears to be encouraging critics as well as the readers to go along the path ‘less travelled by’ in life, a not-very-subtle image for existing life as a singular and selecting independence for its own sake at the time every other contemplation comes up equivalent. There is proof that makes this clarification rational. The dominant situation is that a person has to decide on one route or the other without concession—an absolutist state that is similar to the way that ethical problems are often expressed. The tone of The Road Not Taken is another pointer that a significant decision is being prepared with careful, cautious concentration. It is rational for the learner to assume that this is what the meaning is intended to be since so much is actually devoted to the choice and the less travelled path is the selected one.
Our poet lived the majority of his life in smallholdings and escaped city life. Though it is not social in content, The Road Not Taken raises inquiries about freedom, uniqueness and individuality. The narrator of The Road Not Taken is not sure that individuality is the correct route to choose. The less travelled path is said to have a better privilege possibly. The narrator anticipates that when he checks on such adoption with the profit of increased experience, he will sigh. If this is a testament to individuality, it is a moderately flimsy one. The narrator of the poem does not rejoice individualism but agrees to it. “The poem both is and isn’t about individualism, and it both is and isn’t about rationalization” (Orr, 2016, p. 12).
The Road Not Taken has ingratiated itself to generations of readers/critics as a witness of an independent inspiration and belief to inspire the individual who absconds the protection of the gathering and strikes out into the unidentified since its preliminary publication in 1916. Frost’s dominant subject of the individual, indicating the particular course in the nonexistence of physical or rational evidence, is too adjacent to the backbone of spiritual belief for most learners to suspect Frost’s betrayal.
- Critical Judgement
The poem seems to reinforce the approach which many readers bring to poetry, contemplating that poetry is just convoluted language unreasonably masking plain account or declaration. Poetry, for Frost in particular, and generally “has acquired new receptivity and developed new metrical forms” (Dahami, 2015). The imagery of the two paths in The Road Not Taken is applied to any amount of situations in life. Consequently, the researchers might not identify a specific meaning as that one which the poet had in mind and heart.
It is stimulating to observe that in 1916, when it was composed, alterations of great significance were taking place, both in the social demand of the whole world as well as in the life of the author himself. There are numerous ways where the sort of decision offered in the poem would have had connotation for the poet and his readers and listeners.The manufacturing uprising in the late 1800s brought about developments and progress in travel and transportation, which led to spreads in intercontinental trade. Such uprising or revolution became difficult for any nation, particularly growing commercial powers like America to stay aloof.
The VictorianpoetRobertFrost lived in England accompanied by his family early in his career from 1912 until 1915. When they went back home, England was by this time involved in conflicts. The principal query of the poem mirrors the positions taken by the two nations the poet had lived in. England joined other nations in war, while America struggled to continue isolated. Every side had an upright case to achieve for its particular position. England had been involved in numerous conflicts on the continent for long epochs, and several conflicts in North America, Africa, Australia and other countries in defense of the English colonies. By the passage of time, various agreements and alliances assisted to end wars with its strange modern name (cold), but as a result of them, England had to contribute in a new fight, even ones that did not openly threaten the land of Britain.
The Road Not Taken is centered on the relationship between the person and society. It raises queries about whether a person ought to do things to follow thegrassy untraveled route or to be part of the majority. In 1916, particularly this query was exposed to an argument, due to the increasing impersonal control of commercial progress. Such progress was the leading social power in the nineteenth century, especially its last half. The Civil War, for instance, fought from 1861 to 1865, is normally evoked as a fight for civil liberties. Still, most historians have faith that the motive the two sides had for such diverse opinions of bondage was a consequence of every area’s different financial base.
The South was essentially agricultural, with huge plantations where cash crops are increased on a large measure that was tended by slave labor. As factories mount, families traveled to cities to find jobs, and immigrants traveled from other states for the same motive. The modern city residents were not self-reliant but were estimated as cogs in the wheels of an enormous machine. By the year 1916, poets, artists, thinkers, and philosophers were enquiring about the depersonalizing consequences of urbanism as well as they showed in their writings their worries which urbanism, in their opinion, had changed the nature of human attention and thinking.
Critics are less reliable in evaluating The Road Not Taken success though they tend to approve the thematic concerns of it. Some critics suggest that the path is a metaphorical image for the life of the poet and that the decision the narrator makes here ‘leads deeper into the wood’ that though the woods hold beneficial privacy, enforce stern segregation, segregation endured not without charge. Frost “has been transferring vice-versa from England to America. Figuratively speaking, Frost uses metaphor as a representation of his life in both countries. He compared these countries into roads which primarily determine his fate of living” (Candilas, 2017). Some others agree that The Road Not Taken illustrates a tendency of Robert Frost to write about pure moments of direct realization that can be private. The narrator can attain insight only due to solitude and segregation from others.
Other critics suggest that the poet in this poem recognizes that life is not free but has restrictions; he involves himself in an emotional notion that the reader possibly will be dissimilar from what he has been. The public reader could be attracted to the poem for the reason that its notions and designs are at present so acquainted and since a lot of people desire romantic notions than realistic ideas.
The Road Not Taken encompasses some positive characteristics; Frost has been a more gifted man and might have perceived that the dilemma of the mystical drifter was avoidable. He might have estimated it in the light of a more wide-ranging perception and also, he might have composed a grander poem. This poem is great to the extent that it goes; the misfortune is that the poem does not succeed in a big way or get to the top enough. The poem is unfinished and it puts the burden of critical aptitude on the learner or listener who is supposed to put up with the poet.
Robert Frost as a poet, is so at ease with expressions, so masterful in generating an undoubted reality, as well as too expert at presenting situations which normally went unobserved that he was unproductive at creating his idea ironically when he attempted in the poem. Critics and learners might tend to accept anything Frost writes as being produced from genuine inspiration which directed a great part of his production. In this poem, Frost attempted his hand at wearing weak and abortive thought in the dress of nobility; he stressed on a source of inspiration.
Robert Frost’s standing for aptly interpreting the common man and his general ability and talent in employing language has promoted misreading of the ironic nature of The Road Not Taken. Several critics “see the irony in that the narrator cannot possibly know how one of the roads was the least travelled by” (Bjelland, 2016, p. 27). Irony is regularly employed in poetry to create a point indirectly via donating a seeming meaning, which can be the opposite of the real intended meaning in a poem. Poets and literary pioneers find such a method most creative in activating researchers and scholars to think. Irony is also defined as the distinction between an actual situation and the means it is shown in expressions that reveal more certainties than a direct, simple description; that is, the researchers are invited for a preview behind the scenes of the mind.
Biographical interpretations make it obvious that the poet did not mean the message of his poem to be taken at face assessment and significance that the poet engraved the poem under study as a satire of a friend of him. The incompetence of the narrator of the poem to settle contentedly upon a sequence of action then to follow it just looking ahead ‘with a sigh’ could be a clear pointer that The Road Not Taken states to thoughts and notions that are more appropriate to the poet. The satire was not so apparent when he sent a print of the verse to his friend, though. Frost had to clarify to his friend that he himself was the theme of the poem. The simple end and unsuitably complicated thought process that directs to it, which Frost supposed would make the comicality of his piece clear, are controlled by such gentle delicacy and grace that the concluding product rings more of certainty than of jest.
The power of The Road Not Taken would come from the reality that it tells, irrespective of the situations from which it grew. In pondering the poem, we have to query whether researchers who are uninformed of Frost’s personality or intentions can be anticipated to identify irony autonomously from work alone. The two paths are pronounced as standing ‘just as fair,’ but the actual following line articulates that one owns ‘a better claim.’ The voice of the narrator pronounces that he ‘kept the first for another day,’ and instantly states that he would possibly never rush back to it. However, the inconsistencies of the world are the occupation of solemn poetry and not essentially pointers that the poet who points them out is being dishonest about his philosophies and dogmas.
The presentation of this verse does not donate a heroic status on the less toured path. The narrator of the poem articulates only that he has unwillingly made a choice. As a deficiency or lack of any evidence about the outcome, the difference basically specifies that the poet feels his decision to go precise or go vague was monumental.
In endeavoring to depict a comic nature in which its sentiments are improperly hesitant and then unexpectedly triumphant, the poet’s weakness seemingly was when he was excessively a good poet. The utility of language in The Road Not Taken is too dexterous, very glowing with deep melancholy. Frost’s humanity was renowned, not by critics only but by threatening judges. The Road Not Taken is more sophisticated and more intricate than the popular considerate of it might designate; the poem is perceptive, analytical, subtle, and deeply apprehensive with human inspiration.
Frost has made a decision, one path in preference to another, and that the selection will have a noteworthy bearing on the progression of his life. “Frost’s teaching at Amherst should likewise be seen as a move to the outside, to some road not taken by the academics around him” (Pritchard, 1993, p. 128). A symbol is likely approximately definite as something which means further than what it is. The definite fact that a symbol could be too rich in connotations requires that critics use the utmost tact in its explanation. “The poem The Road Not Taken is a symbolic poem” (Jatav, 2016, p. 136).
Robert Frost’s poem, for example, concerns a choice constructed between two ways by a person hiking in the forests. He would like to discover both ways. He informs perhaps himself that he will discover one way then return and search for the other; however, he discerns that he almost certainly is unable to do his task. By the last stanza, nevertheless, critics/readers might realize that the poem deals with something more than the selection of tracks in a wood. For the selection would be comparatively unimportant, whereas this selection the poet believes, is one that creates a great change in the life; also, is one that he recalls with a lament ‘ages and ages hence’. Critics/readers then might understand his selection of a way as a symbol for any selection in life between options, which seem almost equally beautiful but results by the passage of years in a large change in the type of knowledge somebody knows.
Metaphors, Images, and symbols are sometimes not easy to distinguish, but they are shades for each other. In general, however, the figurative expression in a metaphor refers to something other than what it is; an image refers only to what it is, and a symbol refers to what it is and more. A symbol operates literally and figuratively simultaneously. If you might say, ‘a strong cat stole the box at the garden,’ you are not talking about a cat of any kind and hence using a metaphor. If you might tell us that a hairy white cat was chafing its back against a grey garden fence, you are talking just about a cat and a fence of the garden, and consequently presenting an image.
However, if you might say, ‘a teacher can never teach a young cat a new trick,’ in such a way you are not talking only about cats but about existing beings of any type. Therefore, you are talking symbolically and figuratively. Images, when they are merged in metaphors or symbols, they do not cease to be called images. When the readers discuss the splendid qualities of the poem The Road Not Taken, they might refer to the two leaf-strewn ways or tracks in the yellow forest as an image; When they discuss the importance of the poem, critics/readers might talk about the tracks as symbols.
Symbols are the richest and all together with the most problematic of poetic figures. Symbols’ richness and trouble arise from its imprecision. While the poet may identify the connotation of a symbol to something properly definite and specific, more frequently, the symbol is thus general in its sense that it can propose a great diversity of specific meanings. The concept of choice in the poem concerns a choice in life, but it is not clear what kind of choice is. Was it a choice of residence? A choice of a comrade? A choice of vocation? It can be all, some of them, or none.
Ordinary readers might not determine what precise choice the poet possesses in his thought. It is somehow enough if the readers perceive in the poem an expression of remorse that the potentials of life knowledge are so extremely limited. The narrator in The Road Not Taken would have enjoyed discovering the two roads, but he could discover just one. The person with a desire and passion for life constantly desires the realms of knowledge, which he had to forego, whether content or discontent with the choices he has produced or chose. The poem The Road Not Taken proposes some more meanings for the reason that the symbol is an opulent one. It confirms a belief in the likelihood of choice.
It states something on the nature of choice and how every choice tightens the assortment of possible impending choices, so that critics/readers make their lives as they go, both without restrictions choosing and without being determined by previous choices. However, not a philosophical poem, The Road Not Taken implicitly comments on the problem of free will and determination and designates the poet’s private position. The poem is able to do all such things, concretely and efficiently, by its implication of an operative symbol.
It is worth mentioning that symbols vary in the degree of connection and meaning specified and mentioned by their poets. In this poem, the poet Frost forces his readers and listeners to explain the choice of the two routes symbolically by the degree of significance he provides it in the final stanza. On occasion, many poets are greatly specific in classifying and recognizing symbols in their poems. And on some other occasions, they do not recognize them at all.
CONCLUSION
Looking at the piece mentioned above of poetry of Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken, it can be plainly reasserting that the poem is flooded with logical philosophy. The Road Not Taken now and again shows Frost’s philosophy on the concepts of choice as well as individuality. Robert Frost was engraved in the heart of modern criticism owing to his erudition in addition to his sensible philosophy, as reflected in his poetry, especially The Road Not Taken.
The paper has discussed some observations of Frost’s The Road Not Taken in which the poet lets his ideal and ideas fall to promote his belief. The poem reveals an assessment of concepts such as selection and verdict, individuality and appreciation. The poet argues with themes having a social insinuation that is related to the social perception around him. To close, Frost in The Road Not Taken has mostly pictured real presentation of choice in life. He has truthfully explored the issues of selection, verdict, and individuality.
REFERENCES:
-Altman, J. (2014). Behind his father’s saying: Robert Frost’s wisdom tradition (Order No. 3631682). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (1566477590). Retrieved on September 1, 2018, from https://search-proquest com.sdl.idm.oclc.org/docview/1566477590?accountid=142908
-Bayles, S. (2008). The Greatest Commands. USA: Xulon Press.
-Bialosky, J. (2017). Poetry Will Save Your Life: A Memoir. New York and other cities: ATRIA Books.
-Bjelland, A. W. (2016). The Road Not Taken: Poetry and Personal Insight in the EFL Classroom and Beyond, Master Thesis. University of Agder, Norway.
-Bode, C. & Dietrich, R. (2013). Future Narratives: Theory, Poetics and Media-Historical Moment. Berlin/Boston: Walter de Gruyter GmbH.
-Candilas, K. S. (2017). Indecisiveness in “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost: An Expressive Critical Analysis. Asia Pacific Journal of Education, Arts and Sciences, Vol. 4 No. 4, 82-85.
-Caravantes, P. (2006). Deep Woods: the story of Robert Frost. North Carolina: Morgan Reynolds Publishing.
-Chandra, A. (2013). Dynamics of human relationships in selected poems of Robert Frost. Ph.D. Thesis. The IIS University, Jaipur India. Retrieved on September 3, 2018 from http://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/20160/8/08_chapter%203.pdf
-Chauhan, S. (2012). Symbolism in the poetry of Robert Frost. Ph.D. Thesis. V. B. S. Purvanchal University. India.
-Dahami, Y. S. H. (2018). Poetry and the Acquisition of Terminology in English as a Foreign Language, International Journal of English Research, 4(5); pp. 04-09.
-Dahami, Y. S. H. (2017a). Introduction to English Literature, Germany: Noor Publishers.
-Dahami, Y. S. H. (2017b). Revival of Poetic Drama: T. S. Eliot’s Contribution to the Genre, Germany: Noor Publishing.
-Dahami, Y. S. H. (2015). The Contribution of Arab Muslims to the Provencal Lyrical Poetry: The Troubadours in the Twelfth Century, Journal of Arts, King Saud Univ., Riyadh: Vol. 27(1); pp. 1-19.
-Frost, R. (1994). Poetry for Young People, edited by Gary D. Schmidt. New York: Sterling Publishing Company, Inc.
-Harvey, F. S., Morris, S. C., & Klein, V. (2010). Reading for Meaning. Virginia: ASCD Publications.
-Hass, R. B. )2002(. Going by Contraries: Robert Frost’s Conflict with Science. Charlottesville and London: University Press of Virginia.
-Jatav, G. S. (2016). Robert Frost’s Response to Pragmatic Philosophy: A Study of His Poetry. Ph.D. Thesis. Jiwaji University Gwalior. India.
-Orr, D. (2016). The Road Not Taken: Finding America in the Poem Everyone Loves and Almost Everyone Gets Wrong, New York: Penguin Books.
-Potter, J. L. (1980). Robert Frost Handbook. USA: The Pennsylvania State University Press.
-Pritchard, W. H. (1993). Frost: A Literary Life Reconsidered. (2nd Ed.) Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press.
-Tyagi, A. (2015). An Analysis of Robert Frost’s Poem: The Road Not Taken. Veda’s Journal of English Language and Literature- JOELL, 2(4), 66-68.
-Wilcox, E. J. & Barron, J. N. (2000). Roads Not Taken: Rereading Robert Frost, University of Missouri Press, retrieved on 2018-09-01 from http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/bahahuniv-ebooks/detail.action?docID=3570671
-Wooten, S. M. (2006). Robert Frost: The Life of America’s Poet. NJ: Enslow Publishers, Inc.
[1] Frost, Robert. (1994). Poetry for Young People, edited by Gary D. Schmidt. New York: Sterling Publishing Company, Inc. p. 21. [All lines on the poemThe Road Not Taken are quoted from this source; number of the page will be added to the end of the quotation within parentheses.]
