The literary work that captured my attention was Robert Frost’s, The Road Not Taken. This particular poem caught my attention because of the metaphor it presents. The narrator comes to a fork in the road while walking through the yellow woods. He considers both paths and concludes that each one is equally well-traveled and appealing. After choosing one of the roads, the narrator tells himself that he will come back to this fork one day in order to try the other road. However, he realizes that it is unlikely that he will ever have the opportunity to come back to this specific point in time because his choice of path will simply lead to other forks in the road and other decisions. The narrator ends by wondering how different things would have been had he chosen the other path (Clugston, 2010, ch 2.2). “The archetypal framework is not limited to one individual's feelings and emotions; it is a framework made up of views and understandings held or felt universally. Every archetypal pattern illustrates how a particular human goal is commonly achieved or how a universal human dilemma is resolved” (Clugston, 2010, ch 16.2). This poem is best analyzed with the archetypal approach by breaking down the framework and understanding.
“Difference”
Like many, while reading this poem, I instantly thought an inspirational writing about making good choices. However, the more I analyzed it, the more I doubted that initial reaction. There are a few words in this poem that can and are deceiving. The first word I came across was the word difference. The word difference can either be a positive or a negative implication. “There is nothing in the poem that suggests that this difference indicates a positive outcome” (Grimes, 2006).
“Sigh”
The other word that leads readers astray is the word sigh. If you assume that the difference is a positive difference, than you would assume the sign to be a positive sign as well. It would indicate a sign