Robert Frost's life reflected in his works. A criticism of Forst's personal life reflected in his public writing.
Robert Frost and His Life
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| Robert Frost |
Poets often choose subjects of poetry from their real life experience. As WilliamWordsworth confess in his preface that “poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility” (258). Robert Frost is highly regarded for his realistic depiction of rural life in his poems. John F. Lynen says that “Frost has so often written about the rural landscape and wildlife that one can hardly avoid thinking of him as a nature poet” (The Pastoral Art of Robert Frost, Chapter 5, 38). Robert Frost spends good time in rural area and perhaps it was like harbor for him, because Frost was primarily a city boy who spent nearly all of his time in an urban environment. It is possibly because of Frost’s late introduction to the rural side of New England that Frost became so intrigued by the natural world. He suffered from serious bouts of depression and anxiety throughout his life. Frost experiences various working class job and it helped him intimate familiarity with the lower-class people and problems of working class people.
Frost was not a happy man, he was deeply familiar with the darker side of human experience and suffered from serious bouts of depression and anxiety throughout his life, because his life goes through the untimely deaths of his father, mother, and sister, as well as four of his six children and his beloved wife, all of which contributed to the melancholic mentality that appears in much of Frost’s work (Gradesaver). The death of his first son influenced his relation with his wife, probably that despair reflected in the poem “Home Burial”, his son committed suicide and his own suicide attempt for love depression reflected in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”. Some of frost’s most beautiful work displays this stark reality of life. In all of Frost’s works, the reader sees encapsulated in verse a depth and level of human emotion that is not easily discerned by the eye.
Robert Frost attended Harvard for a short time but did not get a degree for he started working for his life and his family at very young age. He published a few poems in the local newspaper but could not support himself and his growing family with his poetry. His grandfather was wealthy and helped Frost and his family, but he was wary of Frost’s inability to find a vocation. He established Frost and his family on a farm, where Frost raised poultry and sold eggs, where he experiences hard labor and difficulties. He worked as reporter and perhaps thus he knows well about different class of people life and the problem of labor class people. As he depict the character Silas as a labor in his poem “TheDeath of The Hired Man”. The poem is based on a farm in New England and its family. As we know Frost himself has lived, worked, and owned a farm in New England. He experiences this life and perhaps he uttered his thought through the poem. The poem deals with the contemporary labor problem of England. Frost experiences working in farm and he know well about the problem of labor class people of that time in New England. Some owners keep the servant all years for farming but pay very little and provide lodging, the other way of work provide cash but they do not keep the workers after farming season.
In Robert Frost’s Poem, “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” Frost meant several idea by the word “Stopping”. As we know that one of frost’s child committed suicide, and Frost himself also attempted suicide. Perhaps later on realized that as human being we all have some responsibility, and if we understand our duty, we will move on and the idea of escapism will leave us. Perhaps Frost once feel doubt about his belief in God, and think or imagine that he is near to God but as we cannot see god we feel doubt inside us and we destruct from our way, we become frustrated and sometimes commit suicide. Sometimes people commit suicide for very tribal things as Frost attempts to commit suicide because his unrequited love. The poem is considered as one of Frost’s most famous works, it is often advertised as an example of his life work. The poem also can explain as Frost’s unsuccessful trip as we know he is a unsuccessful farmer. Probably Frost was returning home after an unsuccessful trip at the market in a particularly difficult winter in New Hampshire, at that time he was inspired and created the poem (Gradesaver). Perhaps depressed people like Frost feels death can be the only comfort for them but it is possibly Frost finally realized that it is also something evil, it is dark. Overall responsibility is principal in our life whether we believe in God or not our confusion clear or not because it’s a great mystery but we all have our duty and Frost realizes that. In this connection we can say nature was not only harbor for Frost it could be temptation for him, it allure him to commit suicide.
In “Home Burial” Robert Frost has described about two tragedies, first the death of a young child, and second, the death of a marriage. The theme of “Home Burial” by Robert Frost is the misapprehension between a husband and a wife. The death of the child is the substance of the couple’s problems. The larger clash that destroys the marriage is the couple’s inability to interconnect with each other. Frost shows how such a traumatic event strains a marriage. Their positions on the staircase emphasize the separation, he at the bottom and she at the top, and later these positions are reversed. At the top of the staircase is a view of the source of the problem, at the bottom of the staircase is the door, a possible resolution, escape. Frost creates a delicate balance in his treatment of the two parents. The woman is in obvious pain; the man wants desperately to help her move on. When Robert Frost and his wife ElinorFrost lose their first child they also suffered relationship crisis. In that time as we know Industrial revolution vigorously flourishing in Europe. People become too much materialistic and the isolation between individual growing. Perhaps Frost experiences these modern tendencies among the people and that influences him.
Robert Frost’s life was highly affected by First World War though he had not tried to be troubled by the war as he wrote to his friend Thomas. Writing from England as the war got under way, Frost was more worried about his personal finance than the threat of war. Some critique thinks that in “The Road Not Taken” Frost actually shows the dilemma of his life, or perhaps Frost wrote this poem for his friend Thomas who always suffered with indecision (history by zim). Frost and Thomas would often go for walk while exchanging literary and personal thoughts and they became fast friends When World War I broke out. Frost returned to the United States with his family while Thomas, born and raised in London, debated his place in the war. Should he go into the military even though he was an anti-Nationalist? that was dilemma of Thomas. The poem is believed to be a reflection of his friend’s angst about the choices that we have to make in life. In conversations Frost had about this poem well after the fact of writing it, he suggests that he was thinking of this friend, Edward Thomas, and the critical choices facing that friend that could mean life or death (Edelman, Cover Story). In this poem Robert Frost perhaps tried to say he had fooled himself but perhaps it was successful.
We are able to gather many things from reading both Frost's poems and criticism about his poems and We are able to infer that his poems relay his love of nature and science, that his life spent farming probably influenced his poetry, and that he used many poetic devices to relay his themes. We are aware that the values he presented in his poems were derived from a type of community or society that was very different from their own: one that was rural and perhaps fearful of the new modernism that was emerging. We can say Robert Frost’s life highly reflected on his writings. His personal emotions, his personal experiences about society and its people, his depression trauma, all reflected in his writing. As a farmer Frost was failure, perhaps he choose to take writing as professional was a dilemma, but he took the one less traveled path and gain success. Perhaps for that Frost uses the word ‘sigh’ as relief for his success, for his Cavour decision. The greater part of his life’s experience reflected in his writing as we can see the trauma of his life, his doubts, his frustration in love and his rural life experience as farm owner all these experiences helped him to write poetry.
Works Cited
Gradesaver: About Robert Frost Poems. 01. Dec.2016. http://www.gradesaver.com/ the-poetry-of-robert-frost
“Robert Frost Biography” Enotes: Robert Frost. 01. Dec.20116. https://www.enotes.com/topics/robert-frost
“English Literary Essay” UKESSAYS: 06. Dec.2016. https://www.ukessays.com/essays/ english-literature/analyzing-the-death-of-the-hired-man-english-literature-essay.php
“Stooping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Onlineeducare: 06. Dec.2016. http://onlineeducare.com/critical-analysis-of-stopping-by-woods-on-a-snowy-evening- by-robert-frost/
Cover Story. Veteransadvantage: Frost’s ‘The Road Not Taken and The World War I Connection by Bernard Edelman. 7. Dec.2016. https://www.veteransadvantage.com/va/ coverstory/frosts-road-not-taken-world-war-i-connection/
Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” & WWI. Historybyzim: 7. Dec.2016. http://www.historybyzim.com/2014/08/robert-frosts-the-road-not-taken-wwi/
