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The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
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.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
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.

This poem has a lot of deep, meaningful points to it. When Frost states that the “roads diverged” he’s referring to the paths of life, there’s a path for followers & all who travel this road end up either bad or done wrong. But a leader, which Frost is claiming to be, chooses the path less chosen and makes something of his life. The path may look lonely and cold, but that shouldn’t stop you from going. He says that by going down this path it “has made all the difference”. He’s grateful he followed his heart and went down less chosen path, because it has changed his life for the best.

Critic: Larry Finger
It seems clear that Frost wrote "The Road Not Taken" with Edward Thomas in mind. As Potter says, Frost was mocking Thomas's regretfulness. He played a game in writing the poem and continued the game for a number of years, holding out for a reading of the poem that was too much to ask of any reader. But by the time he wrote Ms. Yates in 1925, he was growing tired of the game and willing for her to read the poem as a statement about himself. When he read "The Road Not Taken" to Russian audiences a few months before his death, he read it as a statement about his own decision to give his life to poetry. The touch was even more personal when he read the poem to the Boston audience a few weeks before his death. With that reading, he was saying goodbye.
Source Citation (MLA 7th Edition)
Finger, Larry. "Frost's Reading of 'The Road Not Taken.'." Robert Frost Review (Fall 1997): 73-76. Rpt. in Poetry Criticism. Ed. Michelle Lee. Vol. 71. Detroit: Gale, 2006. Literature Resource Center. Web. 29 Oct. 2012

I have disagreement towards Finger’s critique. It seems as if he went too in depth with the outline of “The Road Not Taken”. He described the past of Frost and Thomas and how the poem became in Frost’s possession. I do not believe Frost published & wrote letters to publicize himself as a poet, but rather that he was proud of the work. It more than likely didn’t cross his mind to include the credit to Thomas, but rather he just omitted to do so. Frost felt this poem was a great end point to his self, which would explain why he read this just a year before he died to his Russian audience. All in all, Frost was a wonderful poet & it seems as if Finger took his criticism too far.

The Figure in the Doorway

The grade surmounted, we were riding high Through level mountains nothing to the eye But scrub oak, scrub oak and the lack of earth That kept the oaks from getting any girth. But is through the monotony we ran, We came to where there was a living man. His great gaunt figure filled his cabin door, And had he fallen inward on the floor, He must have measured to the further wall. But we who passed were not to see him fall. The miles and mils he lived from anywhere Were evidently something he could bear. He stood unshaken, and if grim and gaunt, It was not necessarily from want. He had the oaks for heating and for light. He had a hen, he had a pig in sight. He had a well, he had the rain to catch. He had a ten-by-twenty garden patch. Nor did he lack for common entertainment. That I assume was what our passing train meant. He could look at us in our diner eating, And if so moved uncurl a hand in greeting.
I assume that there is in fact a deep meaning to the poem, but I’m having numerous problems understanding. I am not a fan of how the poem is set up, or the setting. The man sounds like a cold hearted lonely widow who is stuck up in the mountains. But why are they in the mountains? Are they on a plane? Are they in a train? What are they doing? It seems that Frost didn’t re read his poem after he wrote it & it made sense to him so he felt it would make sense to others. The old man is alone with no entertainment, some farm animals & a garden. How is this okay? And why did he fall? Did he literally fall, or was it a metaphor? I just do not understand the layout of the poem, to me it sounds as if he is jumping all over the map and had limited space in the writing material. Frost could do so much better, this is a least favorite of mine.
In relation to Frost's emphasis on "the connotation of the phrasing" (Potter 163) in the three distinct segments of the poem there, are subtle clues to Frost's intended meaning. In the early part of the poem a feeling of isolation is easily discerned by the phrases "nothing to the eye," "lack of earth," "That kept the oaks from getting any girth" "through the monotony we ran," "The miles he lived from anywhere"; all of which signal the basic reality of the man's isolated condition. Yet on the positive side, phrases such as "a living man," "He stood unshaken," "He had ... He had ... He had ... He had" "Nor did he lack" are basic realities that connote the man's voluntary, bearable existence. And in the poem's final three lines where Frost adds an extra syllable, conjecture appears as the most substantive element in such phrases as "I assume," "He could look", and "if so moved," all of which underscore man's freedom to choose, and in the "Figure's" case, his decision to be a host or a guest in this world. The added syllable is necessitated by the multiple assumptions, the myriad possible alternative realities whichFrost contended with in his life. The extra syllable allows Frost to examine more fully the possible consequences of any decision he must finally make. Conjecture is not a black and white affair as the basic realities mentioned in the early parts of the poem are; it required detailed nuances which explain the change in meter.
"The Figure in the Doorway" is indeed significant, dramatizing in a most subtle fashion Frost's own thoughtful poetic dictums.
John V. McDermott
McDermott, John V.
Source Citation (MLA 7th Edition)
McDermott, John V. "Frost's fine tuning: 'The Figure in the Doorway'." Notes on Contemporary Literature 39.1 (2009). Literature Resource Center. Web. 31 Oct. 2012