Little Bits of Natural Order
Little Bits of Natural Order “The aim in Frost’s poetry is to develop a human act which has meaning in terms of the world man really lives in.” (Baym 722) Robert Lee Frost was an American poet that everyone admired and loved. Frost’s poetry is known for its conventional and plain language. He is a straightforward writer but he also uses figurative language, metaphors, symbols and effective poetic diction. Robert Frost enjoyed capturing natural settings in his poems using imagery of nature and symbolism to convey the deeper meaning within his poetry. Frost is held in high regards for his command of familiar speech through his recognizable poetic voice and his realistic depictions of rural life, which made him a nature poet. Frost’s poetic voice comes through his descriptions and poetic arrangements: Poet Richard Wilbur notes “He’s a lyric poet for whom the experience of writing is or seems passive.” Poems flow out of Frost with ease to the point that he can sit in one evening and write a masterpiece poem that speaks the beautiful truth about surroundings, nature and man. Frost preferred traditional poetic forms with rhyme and possessed complete knowledge of these traditional forms. The poems came easily and naturally to Frost: “He doesn’t go to the poem. The Poem comes to him. What Frost calls the transition from delight to wisdom” (Wilbur). When first starting out as a poet, the poems do not come easily and seem to be forcefully written. When poets gains their poetic voice they naturally flow from everyday thoughts. Poetic voice can be thought of as the special techniques a poet uses in most of the poems written and is what makes a poet’s writing recognizable. Reading from one Frost poem to another, readers can simply tell they are Frost poems. This experience may . . . start with a happy perception; the thoughts then come and the images then come. There are discoveries and surprises and finally there is a statement and one has arrived at wisdom. (Wilbur)
Frost takes everyday things and turns them into poetic accomplishment. Frost creates extraordinary thoughts out of ordinary things. Poet and scholar Seamus Heaney says: “It seemed to be here was a poet who touched things as they are somehow.” Frost’s poetry demonstrates that and he uses many of his own life experiences in his poetry as well as the simple things in life that some can overlook. Frost says: “We rise out of disorder into order and the poems I make are little bits of order” (Robert Frost). Frost used his poetry to get through the life challenges that came his way. Death had not been shy in the Frost family. He lost children and his wife early in life. The poems Frost wrote helped put order back into his life and helped him get through his life tragedies. Frost was very much a family man, noting that he was: “Stuck to only two things, poetry and family” (Luckingbill). Frost’s poetry revolves around people and how their natural settings affect them; secreting a deeper symbolic meaning. Frost commands the use of imagery of nature and symbolism to convey the deeper meaning of his poetry. The natural settings bring the poems to life and draw readers into more of an everyday style. His technique of writing and descriptiveness make his poetry intriguing. Some readers see at the world differently after reading Frost’s imaginative and natural poetry. Frost’s poem “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” is a great example of imagining the scene he sets with descriptive words and a natural setting. Frost effectively uses imagery when he describes the woods setting to get the reader to imagine the woods. “To watch his woods fill up with snow,” gives the poem a heavy but peaceful feeling. By the fourth line, Frost has readers envisioning the natural setting. In line six: “Between the woods and frozen lake,” gives the reader a complete idea of the setting and feeling in the woods. Nature surrounds the narrator on his horse while he takes the time to stop and admire the woods. Similarly, Frost has readers experiencing the surrounding nature in the poem “The Road Not Taken.” This poem is also a metaphor for life with the narrator choosing a path less traveled with hopes of no regret. At the end of the poem Frost writes: “I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.” The narrator is using the paths and woods as a metaphor for the choices people have to make in life. Line ten reads, “Had worn them really about the same.” Both paths are used about the same amount, so the decision could go either way with the choices being about equal. The narrator follows his own choice and does not follow the crowd. The two roads symbolize two choices and how people face life-affecting choices everyday. This poem also uses figurative language with the idea of a fundamental meaning within. Frost uses nature as his background with observations of something in nature and moves toward a connection to human situations or concerns. Frost uses nature as a metaphor to say something is like something else but it is natural and not forced on the reader. He likes to use symbolism, often referring to nature because it is something relatable and imaginative for readers. Structurally, . . . Frost’s poems typically move in a smooth, uninterrupted flow from an event or an object, through a metaphor, to an idea. Within this pattern, he usually describes a complete event rather than a single vision. The heart of the process is image or metaphor. Frost’s metaphors are sparse and careful; they are brought sharply into focus and skillfully interwoven within each poem. Frost himself saw metaphors as the beginning of the process. (Roberts and Zweig)
The use of metaphors is why Frost’s poems always make sense and are easily readable. Frost kept his poems easily understood and fluid when he came up with the phrase “the sound of sense” (Robert Frost) to emphasize the poetic diction used throughout his poetry. The sound of sense should be positive, proactive and resemble everyday speech. To achieve this, Frost chooses words for tone and sound in addition to considering the words meaning. Frost wanted to prefect his sound of sense. The words, the form of the words and the sounds they encode are as much the subject of the poem as the actual subject. Even while Frost works within form, he also works the form itself, shaping it by his choice of language and his use of variation. Frost even creates forms to fit a poem that needs it. Scholar Carol Frost writes: To put the matter simply, Robert Frost’s poetry is intimately involved with the colloquial. Frost spoke with much acuity about his interest in what he called “sentence tones.”
Frost says that poetry is meant to be recited orally rather than read and he pays attention to the sound of his poems recited out loud. Frost’s poetry usually includes a moment of interaction between the human speaker and a natural subject making him a nature poet. Frost says, however, that he is not a nature poet: “I guess I’m not a nature poet, I’ve only written two poems without a human being in it.” (Robert Frost) However, Frost is seen as a nature poet by most readers because he surrounds people with natural elements and with their reactions and struggles with nature. He does not write about nature against nature, but Frost continuously tries to conquer nature and its mysterious allure with his poetry. Frost’s views on nature are quite complex, more than what is usually seen however he is also plain and conventional, which makes his poetry easy to relate to and appropriate for anytime and anywhere. His poems typically move in a smooth, uninterrupted flow from an event, through a metaphor, to an idea and the usual basis of everyday life and rural settings. Frost’s poetry is very natural for most, but some think differently, as Writer William H. Pritchard says: “Poetry is organized violence with language,” as Frost once noted. However, Frost can tear things from their natural order and reorganize them according to his own criteria such as balance and meaning. Pritchard discussed with Frost: “His poetry way of making one feel easier about life is an escape from life, would you say? And Frost said, no it’s a way of taking life by the throat.” Frost is brave with his poetry and puts it all out there as his way of taking life by the throat. Frosts poetic structure moves from natural, everyday life toward implications of life and death, survival and responsibility and nature and humanity. Knowledge and growth come from actively engaging with nature. Readers learn about themselves because nature requires people to reach for new insights but nature itself does not provide any answers. As reflective of his personal life, Frost saw nature as beautiful and full of hope, yet also chaotic and random. Carol Frost states: “For Frost the work of the poet was to collect, like a botanist in the bogs and fields, then to imagine what would suffice for a poem that would be his.” Frost collected his poetic ideas from the nature and events that surrounded him during his everyday life. Poetry can be regarded as an escape from everyday life, but Frost wrote about everyday life in a distinct and usual way. Frost’s poems are easily understood and most can relate to them. The contradictions Frost found in the world did not bother him and he never set out to resolve them but rather to expose the contradictions in his poetry. Carol Frost writes: “Frost’s permanent popularity may involve misunderstandings about art – a desire, at least, on the part of the common reader for the poem to be inspired and free from influence.” This is true, but most readers find Frost’s poetry moving and inspiring. Frost surfaces the details within things that nature has to offer with his poems. His poems contain nature in one way or another and nature is the main theme he uses. Frost lived the rural life for which his poetry is so highly regarded, and his poetic voice is certainly recognizable; therefore, he is one of the most admired American nature poets.
Works Cited
Baym, Nina. “An Approach to Robert Frost’s Nature Poetry.” American Quarterly Vol. 17, No. 4 (Winter, 1965): 713-723. JSTOR. Web. 3 July 2012.
Frost, Carol. “Frost’s Way of Speaking.” New England Review Vol. 23, No. 1 (Winter 2002): 119-133. JSTOR. Web. 3 July 2012.
- - - . “Sincerity and Inventions: On Robert Frost.” Academy of American Poets, 2012. Web. 3 July 2012.
Frost, Robert. Interview. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
- - - . “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Ed. Edger V. Roberts and Robert Zweig. 10th ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2012. 655. Print.
- - - . “The Road Not Taken.” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Ed. Edger V. Roberts and Robert Zweig. 10th ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2012. 1096. Print.
Heaney, Seamus. Interview. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
Luckingbill, Laurence. Interview. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
Pritchard, William H. Interview. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
Roberts, Ed. Edgar V. and Zweig, Robert. “Robert Frost’s Life and Work.” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Ed. Edger V. Roberts and Robert Zweig. 10th ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2012. 1087-1091. Print.
Wilbur, Richard. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
Cited: Frost, Carol. “Frost’s Way of Speaking.” New England Review Vol. 23, No. 1 (Winter 2002): 119-133 - - - . “Sincerity and Inventions: On Robert Frost.” Academy of American Poets, 2012 Longman, 2012. 1096. Print.
Frost takes everyday things and turns them into poetic accomplishment. Frost creates extraordinary thoughts out of ordinary things. Poet and scholar Seamus Heaney says: “It seemed to be here was a poet who touched things as they are somehow.” Frost’s poetry demonstrates that and he uses many of his own life experiences in his poetry as well as the simple things in life that some can overlook. Frost says: “We rise out of disorder into order and the poems I make are little bits of order” (Robert Frost). Frost used his poetry to get through the life challenges that came his way. Death had not been shy in the Frost family. He lost children and his wife early in life. The poems Frost wrote helped put order back into his life and helped him get through his life tragedies. Frost was very much a family man, noting that he was: “Stuck to only two things, poetry and family” (Luckingbill). Frost’s poetry revolves around people and how their natural settings affect them; secreting a deeper symbolic meaning. Frost commands the use of imagery of nature and symbolism to convey the deeper meaning of his poetry. The natural settings bring the poems to life and draw readers into more of an everyday style. His technique of writing and descriptiveness make his poetry intriguing. Some readers see at the world differently after reading Frost’s imaginative and natural poetry. Frost’s poem “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” is a great example of imagining the scene he sets with descriptive words and a natural setting. Frost effectively uses imagery when he describes the woods setting to get the reader to imagine the woods. “To watch his woods fill up with snow,” gives the poem a heavy but peaceful feeling. By the fourth line, Frost has readers envisioning the natural setting. In line six: “Between the woods and frozen lake,” gives the reader a complete idea of the setting and feeling in the woods. Nature surrounds the narrator on his horse while he takes the time to stop and admire the woods. Similarly, Frost has readers experiencing the surrounding nature in the poem “The Road Not Taken.” This poem is also a metaphor for life with the narrator choosing a path less traveled with hopes of no regret. At the end of the poem Frost writes: “I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.” The narrator is using the paths and woods as a metaphor for the choices people have to make in life. Line ten reads, “Had worn them really about the same.” Both paths are used about the same amount, so the decision could go either way with the choices being about equal. The narrator follows his own choice and does not follow the crowd. The two roads symbolize two choices and how people face life-affecting choices everyday. This poem also uses figurative language with the idea of a fundamental meaning within. Frost uses nature as his background with observations of something in nature and moves toward a connection to human situations or concerns. Frost uses nature as a metaphor to say something is like something else but it is natural and not forced on the reader. He likes to use symbolism, often referring to nature because it is something relatable and imaginative for readers. Structurally, . . . Frost’s poems typically move in a smooth, uninterrupted flow from an event or an object, through a metaphor, to an idea. Within this pattern, he usually describes a complete event rather than a single vision. The heart of the process is image or metaphor. Frost’s metaphors are sparse and careful; they are brought sharply into focus and skillfully interwoven within each poem. Frost himself saw metaphors as the beginning of the process. (Roberts and Zweig)
The use of metaphors is why Frost’s poems always make sense and are easily readable. Frost kept his poems easily understood and fluid when he came up with the phrase “the sound of sense” (Robert Frost) to emphasize the poetic diction used throughout his poetry. The sound of sense should be positive, proactive and resemble everyday speech. To achieve this, Frost chooses words for tone and sound in addition to considering the words meaning. Frost wanted to prefect his sound of sense. The words, the form of the words and the sounds they encode are as much the subject of the poem as the actual subject. Even while Frost works within form, he also works the form itself, shaping it by his choice of language and his use of variation. Frost even creates forms to fit a poem that needs it. Scholar Carol Frost writes: To put the matter simply, Robert Frost’s poetry is intimately involved with the colloquial. Frost spoke with much acuity about his interest in what he called “sentence tones.”
Frost says that poetry is meant to be recited orally rather than read and he pays attention to the sound of his poems recited out loud. Frost’s poetry usually includes a moment of interaction between the human speaker and a natural subject making him a nature poet. Frost says, however, that he is not a nature poet: “I guess I’m not a nature poet, I’ve only written two poems without a human being in it.” (Robert Frost) However, Frost is seen as a nature poet by most readers because he surrounds people with natural elements and with their reactions and struggles with nature. He does not write about nature against nature, but Frost continuously tries to conquer nature and its mysterious allure with his poetry. Frost’s views on nature are quite complex, more than what is usually seen however he is also plain and conventional, which makes his poetry easy to relate to and appropriate for anytime and anywhere. His poems typically move in a smooth, uninterrupted flow from an event, through a metaphor, to an idea and the usual basis of everyday life and rural settings. Frost’s poetry is very natural for most, but some think differently, as Writer William H. Pritchard says: “Poetry is organized violence with language,” as Frost once noted. However, Frost can tear things from their natural order and reorganize them according to his own criteria such as balance and meaning. Pritchard discussed with Frost: “His poetry way of making one feel easier about life is an escape from life, would you say? And Frost said, no it’s a way of taking life by the throat.” Frost is brave with his poetry and puts it all out there as his way of taking life by the throat. Frosts poetic structure moves from natural, everyday life toward implications of life and death, survival and responsibility and nature and humanity. Knowledge and growth come from actively engaging with nature. Readers learn about themselves because nature requires people to reach for new insights but nature itself does not provide any answers. As reflective of his personal life, Frost saw nature as beautiful and full of hope, yet also chaotic and random. Carol Frost states: “For Frost the work of the poet was to collect, like a botanist in the bogs and fields, then to imagine what would suffice for a poem that would be his.” Frost collected his poetic ideas from the nature and events that surrounded him during his everyday life. Poetry can be regarded as an escape from everyday life, but Frost wrote about everyday life in a distinct and usual way. Frost’s poems are easily understood and most can relate to them. The contradictions Frost found in the world did not bother him and he never set out to resolve them but rather to expose the contradictions in his poetry. Carol Frost writes: “Frost’s permanent popularity may involve misunderstandings about art – a desire, at least, on the part of the common reader for the poem to be inspired and free from influence.” This is true, but most readers find Frost’s poetry moving and inspiring. Frost surfaces the details within things that nature has to offer with his poems. His poems contain nature in one way or another and nature is the main theme he uses. Frost lived the rural life for which his poetry is so highly regarded, and his poetic voice is certainly recognizable; therefore, he is one of the most admired American nature poets.
Works Cited
Baym, Nina. “An Approach to Robert Frost’s Nature Poetry.” American Quarterly Vol. 17, No. 4 (Winter, 1965): 713-723. JSTOR. Web. 3 July 2012.
Frost, Carol. “Frost’s Way of Speaking.” New England Review Vol. 23, No. 1 (Winter 2002): 119-133. JSTOR. Web. 3 July 2012.
- - - . “Sincerity and Inventions: On Robert Frost.” Academy of American Poets, 2012. Web. 3 July 2012.
Frost, Robert. Interview. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
- - - . “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Ed. Edger V. Roberts and Robert Zweig. 10th ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2012. 655. Print.
- - - . “The Road Not Taken.” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Ed. Edger V. Roberts and Robert Zweig. 10th ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2012. 1096. Print.
Heaney, Seamus. Interview. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
Luckingbill, Laurence. Interview. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
Pritchard, William H. Interview. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
Roberts, Ed. Edgar V. and Zweig, Robert. “Robert Frost’s Life and Work.” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Ed. Edger V. Roberts and Robert Zweig. 10th ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2012. 1087-1091. Print.
Wilbur, Richard. Robert Frost. Dir. Peter Hammer. New York Center for Visual History, Inc. 1988. Video.
Cited: Frost, Carol. “Frost’s Way of Speaking.” New England Review Vol. 23, No. 1 (Winter 2002): 119-133 - - - . “Sincerity and Inventions: On Robert Frost.” Academy of American Poets, 2012 Longman, 2012. 1096. Print.