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The Road Not Taken Analysis

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The Road Not Taken Analysis
The Road Not Taken Analysis

' 'The Road Not Taken ' ' is a poem written by Robert Frost. This poem is a great candidate to be one of the world 's best and this analysis will unveil why it is so. The poetic devices used in the poem bring forth its deeper meaning which ultimately resonates with the reader 's emotions. However not only this poem is great because of the literary experience it gives but it is also beautiful on a simple structural level.

First lets look at the structural aspect of this poem. It contains four stanzas and each one contains five lines each. This is called a quintain, hence this poem is made up of four quintains. In total this makes twenty lines thus a middle sized poem.

One of the most commonly used sound devices is rhyme. In this poem the rhyme pattern goes like this: ABAAB. This can be seen in the first stanza:
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, (A)
And sorry I could not travel both (B)
And be one traveler, long I stood (A)
And looked down one as far as I could (A)
To where it bent in the undergrowth; (B)

An example of can be seen in the poem at line seventeen: ' 'Somewhere ages and ages hence: ' '. Consonance and Assonance are widely used throughout as we can see in the following examples respectively: ' 'And that has made all the difference. ' ' ' 'Yet knowing how way leads on to way, ' '. Repetition is the final sound device that can be easily spotted in Frost 's poem, especially in this line: ' 'Somewhere ages and ages hence: ' '. All those sound devices add on to the complexity of the poem. They make it sound good when it is read even if it not out loud. Also like all poems the sound devices add to the entertainment value of the poem.

Just like a song this poem has rhythm. The rhythm is iambic. This implies that there is a quiet syllable before a loud syllable (ba Bum). However there are slight changes throughout. For example there can be two quiet syllables with one loud one (ba ba Bum). Additionally

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