The Road Not Taken
In the poem, “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frosts shows us how we must make many decision in life, despite not knowing where that decision will ultimately lead us. The continuous theme of the poem is man vs himself, where the speaker is conflicted internally with himself since he has to make a hard decision. He is in the middle of the autumn forest where the road he is traveling on, diverges into two. He is faced with the challenge of deciding which road to travel down. The setting and the roads have a bigger message that is revealed throughout the poem. To understand the message, the reader must have a understanding on life. With the use of metaphors and symbolism, the reader can understand the ultimate message of the poem. Nature in the
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In the poem, he is speaking of both literal and metaphoric roads. Metaphorically, the road is symbolizing the speakers life, and how his decisions will effect it. As the speaker is deciding what road he should travel down, he states that he “looked down one as far as [he] could” (4). Just like in the forest, the speaker could only look so far down a road before the undergrowth got in the way. In life, we can only see so far, or predict so much, of the consequences of the decision that we make in life until it lies in the hands of fate. The roads are then described at virtually the same. The reader states, “the other, as just as fair”, “had worn them really about the same” and “equally lay” when describing the roads (6, 10, 11). This shows how the choices we make in life can appear to be so similar but end up being completely different. The speaker nit picking though all the similarities and differences of the roads, shows that he is putting a lot of thought in this decision and really wants to make the right one. The decision is so hard for him to make that he is trying to find in leverage over the other road just to make himself feel more confident in his choice. The speaker then explained that he “kept the first for another day” but “doubted if [he] should ever come back”. This just shows how final the choices that we make are. Once someone makes a big decision, there is no going
In the poem, he is speaking of both literal and metaphoric roads. Metaphorically, the road is symbolizing the speakers life, and how his decisions will effect it. As the speaker is deciding what road he should travel down, he states that he “looked down one as far as [he] could” (4). Just like in the forest, the speaker could only look so far down a road before the undergrowth got in the way. In life, we can only see so far, or predict so much, of the consequences of the decision that we make in life until it lies in the hands of fate. The roads are then described at virtually the same. The reader states, “the other, as just as fair”, “had worn them really about the same” and “equally lay” when describing the roads (6, 10, 11). This shows how the choices we make in life can appear to be so similar but end up being completely different. The speaker nit picking though all the similarities and differences of the roads, shows that he is putting a lot of thought in this decision and really wants to make the right one. The decision is so hard for him to make that he is trying to find in leverage over the other road just to make himself feel more confident in his choice. The speaker then explained that he “kept the first for another day” but “doubted if [he] should ever come back”. This just shows how final the choices that we make are. Once someone makes a big decision, there is no going