Another paper for English 102 --English Composition and Literature at Cerritos College. It's a paper on Robert Frost who is best known for his work of poetry. He is actually my favorite poet. This paper is a thematic study on his poetry. I focus on the contradiction in his poems. I take on both literal and figurative analysis. I chose four poems to analyze: "Fire and Ice," “Mending Wall,” "The Road Not Taken," and “Nothing Gold Can Stay.”
The Contradiction in Robert Frost’s View
Like other poets, Robert Frost wrote numerous insightful poems to view the world he had experienced. Frost is a man famous for his work of poetry. He won so many meritorious awards and recognitions. He has been considered an all-time favorite poet of many people. However, his life seems to contradict his achievement and popularity. His life was surrounded by death and pain. He also suffered from professional jealousies, anger, and depression. Because of this discrepancy between his life and work, Frost shows contradiction in his writing. A literary analysis reveals that Frost’s poetry is the reflection of the contradictory features that occurs in nature.
The use of contradiction can be found in Frost’s “Fire and Ice.” This poem follows a single-paragraph form that every couple of lines has rhythm scheme or repetition of phrase. Frost enfolds a strong use of contradiction in this poem by mentioning fire at the beginning and ending with the description of the power of ice. In the first two lines, there is a repetition of the phrase “some say” (“Fire” lines 1, 2). The repetition of this phrase suggest the contradiction between fire and ice that represents the two contrasting choices, which are, later on in the poem, understood to be the only two objects that would end the world. The speaker considers fire as the first choice. At the end of lines 3 and 4, respectively Frost wrote the word “desire” (3) and “fire” (4). This suggests that fire is an image of desire. This desire is hot enough to be transformed into fire, and this fire is very powerful that would destroy the world. Then, the choice changes from fire to ice in the concluding lines of the poem. And ice is known by the speaker as “hate” (6). Through the poem, hatred can be implied as cold emotion, and with its extremeness, the cold emotion has “great” (8) power and “would suffice” (9) to perish the world. By implication, the theme of the poem would suggest that the world can be destroyed by the two extreme emotions—desire and hatred; however these two are opposite emotions.
While the power of fire contradicts the strength of ice in “Fire and Ice,” Frost portrays another contradiction in his cryptic poem “Mending Wall.” This poem contains only one paragraph and is a type of free-verse. The speaker follows this pattern because he doesn’t only make suggestion about his nature but also about other individuals in his community and about the reality he is experiencing—the reality that can be considered discontent. A fence or wall literally refers to the object that would protect the owner’s property. Fence in “Mending Wall” is an image, which represents a restriction or alienation between individuals in a neighborhood. This fence or wall can also be a needless tradition that puts in place the sense of integrity of everyone’s individuality and frightens those who violate others’ possessions. There are two sentences that are repeated twice in this poem: “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall” (“Mending” Lines 1, 35) and “Good fences make good neighbors” (27, 45). And because these sentences are formed at the concluding lines of the poem, they become highly significant. Obviously, these are the two contradictory lines that have different suggestions. Respectively, the first statement may suggest that limitation is a burden to man, while the second statement may suggest that man cannot live prosperously without boundaries. These two statements are to make readers puzzle out the shade of meanings in the poem. When we look at the entire poem, we could see the two contrasting attitudes: the speaker’s attitude and the neighbors’ attitude toward the wall. The neighbor tries to build good fences to maintain good relationship with other neighbor. But the speaker seems to oppose this idea as he comes to question that “Why do they [fences] make good neighbors?” (30). The speaker sees the reality that his “apple tress will never get across and eat ones under his [neighbor’s] pine” (24-25). So, the speaker believes that fences are unnecessary, while the neighbors contend that good fences retain good relationship.
Not only do “Fire and Ice” and “Mending Wall” embrace the contradictory elements, “The Road Not Taken” is also a portrayal of contradiction in Frost’s work. There are four stanzas in this poem. It is written in a fixed form with rhythm scheme that follows a pattern established in the first five lines (abaab). This rhyme scheme illustrates the speaker’s attempts to shape his life into a pleasing and coherent pattern. In the first stanza of “The Road Not Taken,” “two roads” (“Mending” 1) are characterized as two different decisions that the speaker has to make. Coming to the second stanza, the speaker decides to choose the road that is “grassy and wanted wear” (8), and in this second stanza, there are also two contradictory claims. First, the speaker says “Then took the other/And having perhaps the better claim” (6-7). Then, he contends that “Though as for that the passing there/Had worn them really about the same” (10). Through this stanza, readers came to understand that the speaker is really indecisive about the two choices that the speaker is choosing. The third stanza reveals that even though the speaker made a choice already, the speaker still feel irresolute as he “doubted” if he “should ever come back” (15). In the forth stanza, the speaker illustrates that his decision “has made all the difference” (20) which means the path he chose has affected his entire life. There is obviously a contradiction in “The Road Not Taken” between the speaker's claim of “difference” (20) in the last stanza and his indifferent account of the roads in the first three stanzas (Richard 1). The first three stanzas are a reflection of the speaker’s nostalgia in stead of affirming a confidence in choosing a path of life. However, the last stanza reveals that the choice that the speaker made in the past has significantly changed his life. His past seems indifferent and his life after making the past decision is a “difference.”
Contradiction in Frost’s work is also perceivable in “Nothing Gold Can Stay.” This poem has only one paragraph, and it forms a rhythm scheme which is put in this way: aabbccdd. The rhythm scheme makes each couple of lines have close relationship. This poetic pattern also evokes a sense of coherency and idealization of nature. Because the word “gold” is included in the title and because it is repeated twice in the poem, this word is significant. In the first line, “green” contradicts the word “gold” (“Nothing Gold” line 1). Green can be observed in the spring because of the beautiful green leafs that flowing in the wind everywhere in nature. In the contrary, in the opening lines Frost tends to deal with nature and science that suggest the color of nature is “gold”—nature’s hardest duty to “hold” (2). The poem contends that the nature has a golden hue. “Gold” (1) here is a colorful imagery in the fall that “leaf subsides to leaf” (5). Through this image, the poet may suggest that nothing is eternal; anything in nature will perish. So, the contradiction can be discerned when we observe the image of green nature during the spring and a picture of golden leafs in the fall.
Not only his life is filled with contradictions, his work is also full of contradictory features and statements. Indeed, Robert Frost’s work employs so many forms of contradiction ranging from fire and ice, the speaker’s belief and the neighbors’ behavior, the difference of making choices, to the contradictory colorful images of nature. I think the purpose of his use of contradiction is to make the readers puzzle out the meanings and challenge with the didactic ideas of the poems.
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