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Essay, Biography or Paragraph on “Robert Frost” great author complete biography for Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes.

Robert Frost

(1874 – 1963)

Robert Frost was one of the finest of rural New England’s 20th century pastoral poets. Frost published his first books in Great Britain in the 1910s, but he soon became in his own country the most read and constantly anthologised poet. Frost was awarded the Pulitzer Prize four times. He was born in San Francisco, California on March 26, 1874. His father, a journalist and local politician, died when Frost was eleven years old. His Scottish mother resumed her career as a schoolteacher to support her family. The family hired in Lawrence, Massachusetts, with Frost’s paternal grandfather. In 1892 Frost graduated from a high-school and attended Dartmouth College for a few months. Over the next ten years he held a number of jobs. In 1 dent published Frost’s poem My Butte the New York Independent he had five poems privately printed. In 1895 he married a former schoolmate, Elinor White. Frost worked as a teacher and continued to write and publish his poems in magazines. From 1897 to 1899 Frost studied t Harvard, but left without receiving, a degree. He moved to Derry, New Hampshire, working there as a cobbler, farmer, and teacher at Pinkerton Academy and at the state normal school, in Plymouth.

In 1912 Frost published his first collection of poems, A Bay’s Will (1913) followed by North Boston (1914) , which gained international  reputation. The collection contains some of Frosts best known poems: Mending Wall, The Death of the Hired Man, Home Burial, After Apple-Picking, and The Mod-Pile. He taught later at Amherst’ College (1916-38) and Michigan universities. In 1916 Frost was made a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters. In the same year appeared his third collection of verse, Mountain Interval. His wife died in 1938 and he lost four of his children. Frost also suffered from depression and continual self-doubt. After the death of his wife, Frost became strongly attracted to Kay Morrison, whom he employed as his secretary and adviser. Frost composed for her one of his finest love. poems, A Witness Tree. Frost participated in the inauguration of President John Kennedy in 1961 by reciting two of his poems. He travelled in 1962 to Soviet Union as a member .of a goodwill group. Over the years he received a remarkable number of literary and academic honours.

At the time of his death on January 29, 1963, Frost was regarded as a kind of unofficial poet laureate of the United States.

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Robert Frost

Robert Frost

(1874-1963)

Who Was Robert Frost?

Frost spent his first 40 years as an unknown. He exploded on the scene after returning from England at the beginning of World War I . He died of complications from prostate surgery on January 29, 1963.

Early Years

Frost was born on March 26, 1874, in San Francisco, California. He spent the first 11 years of his life there, until his journalist father, William Prescott Frost Jr., died of tuberculosis.

Following his father's passing, Frost moved with his mother and sister, Jeanie, to the town of Lawrence, Massachusetts. They moved in with his grandparents, and Frost attended Lawrence High School.

After high school, Frost attended Dartmouth College for several months, returning home to work a slew of unfulfilling jobs.

Beginning in 1897, Frost attended Harvard University but had to drop out after two years due to health concerns. He returned to Lawrence to join his wife.

In 1900, Frost moved with his wife and children to a farm in New Hampshire — property that Frost's grandfather had purchased for them—and they attempted to make a life on it for the next 12 years. Though it was a fruitful time for Frost's writing, it was a difficult period in his personal life and followed the deaths of two of his young children.

During that time, Frost and Elinor attempted several endeavors, including poultry farming, all of which were fairly unsuccessful.

Despite such challenges, it was during this time that Frost acclimated himself to rural life. In fact, he grew to depict it quite well, and began setting many of his poems in the countryside.

Frost met his future love and wife, Elinor White, when they were both attending Lawrence High School. She was his co-valedictorian when they graduated in 1892.

In 1894, Frost proposed to White, who was attending St. Lawrence University , but she turned him down because she first wanted to finish school. Frost then decided to leave on a trip to Virginia, and when he returned, he proposed again. By then, White had graduated from college, and she accepted. They married on December 19, 1895.

White died in 1938. Diagnosed with cancer in 1937 and having undergone surgery, she also had had a long history of heart trouble, to which she ultimately succumbed.

Frost and White had six children together. Their first child, Elliot, was born in 1896. Daughter Lesley was born in 1899.

Elliot died of cholera in 1900. After his death, Elinor gave birth to four more children: son Carol (1902), who would commit suicide in 1940; Irma (1903), who later developed mental illness; Marjorie (1905), who died in her late 20s after giving birth; and Elinor (1907), who died just weeks after she was born.

DOWNLOAD BIOGRAPHY'S ROBERT FROST FACT CARD

Robert Frost Fact Card

Early Poetry

In 1894, Frost had his first poem, "My Butterfly: an Elegy," published in The Independent , a weekly literary journal based in New York City .

Two poems, "The Tuft of Flowers" and "The Trial by Existence," were published in 1906. He could not find any publishers who were willing to underwrite his other poems.

In 1912, Frost and Elinor decided to sell the farm in New Hampshire and move the family to England, where they hoped there would be more publishers willing to take a chance on new poets.

Within just a few months, Frost, now 38, found a publisher who would print his first book of poems, A Boy’s Will , followed by North of Boston a year later.

It was at this time that Frost met fellow poets Ezra Pound and Edward Thomas, two men who would affect his life in significant ways. Pound and Thomas were the first to review his work in a favorable light, as well as provide significant encouragement. Frost credited Thomas's long walks over the English landscape as the inspiration for one of his most famous poems, "The Road Not Taken."

Apparently, Thomas's indecision and regret regarding what paths to take inspired Frost's work. The time Frost spent in England was one of the most significant periods in his life, but it was short-lived. Shortly after World War I broke out in August 1914, Frost and Elinor were forced to return to America.

Public Recognition for Frost’s Poetry

When Frost arrived back in America, his reputation had preceded him, and he was well-received by the literary world. His new publisher, Henry Holt, who would remain with him for the rest of his life, had purchased all of the copies of North of Boston . In 1916, he published Frost's Mountain Interval , a collection of other works that he created while in England, including a tribute to Thomas.

Journals such as the Atlantic Monthly , who had turned Frost down when he submitted work earlier, now came calling. Frost famously sent the Atlantic the same poems that they had rejected before his stay in England.

In 1915, Frost and Elinor settled down on a farm that they purchased in Franconia, New Hampshire. There, Frost began a long career as a teacher at several colleges, reciting poetry to eager crowds and writing all the while.

He taught at Dartmouth and the University of Michigan at various times, but his most significant association was with Amherst College , where he taught steadily during the period from 1916 until his wife’s death in 1938. The main library is now named in his honor.

For a period of more than 40 years beginning in 1921, Frost also spent almost every summer and fall at Middlebury College , teaching English on its campus in Ripton, Vermont.

In the late 1950s, Frost, along with Ernest Hemingway and T. S. Eliot , championed the release of his old acquaintance Ezra Pound, who was being held in a federal mental hospital for treason due to his involvement with fascists in Italy during World War II . Pound was released in 1958, after the indictments were dropped.

Famous Poems

Some of Frost’s most well-known poems include:

  • “The Road Not Taken”
  • “Fire and Ice”
  • “Mending Wall”
  • “Home Burial”
  • “The Death of the Hired Man”
  • “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening”
  • “Acquainted with the Night”
  • “Nothing Gold Can Stay”

Pulitzer Prizes and Awards

During his lifetime, Frost received more than 40 honorary degrees.

In 1924, Frost was awarded his first of four Pulitzer Prizes, for his book New Hampshire . He would subsequently win Pulitzers for Collected Poems (1931), A Further Range (1937) and A Witness Tree (1943).

In 1960, Congress awarded Frost the Congressional Gold Medal.

Robert Frost reading one of his poems at the Inaugural Ceremony for President John F. Kennedy

President John F. Kennedy’s Inauguration

At the age of 86, Frost was honored when asked to write and recite a poem for President John F. Kennedy's 1961 inauguration. His sight now failing, he was not able to see the words in the sunlight and substituted the reading of one of his poems, "The Gift Outright," which he had committed to memory.

Soviet Union Tour

In 1962, Frost visited the Soviet Union on a goodwill tour. However, when he accidentally misrepresented a statement made by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev following their meeting, he unwittingly undid much of the good intended by his visit.

On January 29, 1963, Frost died from complications related to prostate surgery. He was survived by two of his daughters, Lesley and Irma. His ashes are interred in a family plot in Bennington, Vermont.

QUICK FACTS

  • Name: Robert Lee Frost
  • Birth Year: 1874
  • Birth date: March 26, 1874
  • Birth State: California
  • Birth City: San Francisco
  • Birth Country: United States
  • Gender: Male
  • Best Known For: Robert Frost was an American poet who depicted realistic New England life through language and situations familiar to the common man. He won four Pulitzer Prizes for his work and spoke at John F. Kennedy's 1961 inauguration.
  • Fiction and Poetry
  • Astrological Sign: Aries
  • Harvard University
  • Lawrence High School
  • Dartmouth College
  • Death Year: 1963
  • Death date: January 29, 1963
  • Death State: Massachusetts
  • Death City: Boston
  • Death Country: United States

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CITATION INFORMATION

  • Article Title: Robert Frost Biography
  • Author: Biography.com Editors
  • Website Name: The Biography.com website
  • Url: https://www.biography.com/authors-writers/robert-frost
  • Access Date:
  • Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
  • Last Updated: December 1, 2021
  • Original Published Date: April 2, 2014
  • The ear does it. The ear is the only true writer and the only true reader.
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Interesting Literature

A Summary and Analysis of Robert Frost’s ‘Fire and Ice’

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

‘Fire and Ice’ is one of the best-known and most widely anthologised poems by the American poet Robert Frost (1874-1963). The poem has a symbolic, even allegorical quality to it, which makes more sense when it is analysed in its literary and historical context. Frost wrote ‘Fire and Ice’ in 1920, and it was published in Harper’s Magazine in December of that year.

You can read ‘Fire and Ice’ here before proceeding to our analysis of the poem below.

The elements of fire and ice mentioned in the poem, and foregrounded in its title, are two of the four Aristotelian or classical elements, along with earth and air (although ‘ice’ is usually just described as water, Frost – whose very surname here summons the icy conditions of one half of the poem – is purposely summoning these classical elements).

In summary, ‘Fire and Ice’ is a nine-line poem in which Frost tells us that he has heard some people say that the world will end in fire, while others reckon it will end in ice. In other words, the world will either burn up or freeze up. Frost’s speaker goes on to assert that his own view is that fire is more likely, especially in light of his experiences of desire (which is often linked with fire and heat, e.g. we talk of ‘burning with desire’ for someone).

However, ice comes a close second for him: he’s also experienced enough of the destructive power of cold, icy hatred to see how that might consume the world, too, and be sufficient to destroy it.

We said that fire and ice are perhaps more allegorical than symbolic in Frost’s poem, because rather than leaving these deeply symbolic forces of fire and ice open to speculation and different interpretations, he goes on to link them very specifically to two particular emotions: desire for fire, and hate for ice.

In other words, will humans destroy the world through hating each other so much that we all kill each other? Or will passionate desire actually destroy everything?

In other words, what begins in rather elemental, open-ended terms (perhaps even inviting us to think of global warming, something unknown to Frost, when we read of the world ending in fire) comes to have a distinctly human aspect, grounded in human emotions and behaviour.

What makes ‘Fire and Ice’ such a haunting and even troubling poem is its acknowledgment that desire and passion can be more deadly and destructive than mere hate: hate (‘ice’) may well consume us all through war (we need only look at how religious and political differences can make whole groups of people hate their neighbours), but desire (‘fire’) may prove even more powerful because it can provide the zeal, the irrational belief in something, that will fuel even more destructive behaviour.

Frost wrote ‘Fire and Ice’ in 1920. This is just two years after the end of the First World War, and a time when revolution, apocalypse, and social and political chaos were on many people’s minds. And especially on poets’ minds.

A year earlier, W. B. Yeats had written ‘The Second Coming’, with its famous declaration, ‘ Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold ’, and its assertion that a ‘second coming’ must be ‘at hand’, with some sphinx-like creature slowly making its way towards Bethlehem to be born as a second Christ.

Five years after Frost wrote ‘Fire and Ice’, T. S. Eliot would offer his own version of apocalypse in ‘The Hollow Men’ (1925): ‘ This is the way the world ends ’, he says, famously, ‘Not with a bang but a whimper.’ ‘Fire and Ice’ should be seen in the broader literary context of these ‘apocalyptic’ poems.

‘Fire and Ice’ was supposedly the inspiration for the title of George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire , and lends a curiously apocalyptic meaning to Game of Thrones . Will the world end in fire or ice?

This idea of one world coming to an end and another, potentially, being born, is obviously also an important context for Robert Frost’s poem: the idea of an old world order giving way to a new was ‘in the air’ when he wrote the poem.

About Robert Frost

Robert Frost (1874-1963) is regarded as one of the greatest American poets of the twentieth century. And yet he didn’t belong to any particular movement: unlike his contemporaries William Carlos Williams or Wallace Stevens he was not a modernist, preferring more traditional modes and utilising a more direct and less obscure poetic language.

Many of his poems are about the natural world, with woods and trees featuring prominently in some of his most famous and widely anthologised poems (‘The Road Not Taken’, ‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’, ‘Birches’, ‘Tree at My Window’). Elsewhere, he was fond of very short and pithy poetic statements: see ‘Fire and Ice’ and ‘But Outer Space’, for example.

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2 thoughts on “A Summary and Analysis of Robert Frost’s ‘Fire and Ice’”

It is interesting that Eliot wrote his apocalyptic poem five years after with his own spin. Did Frost influence his version?

That’s a good question. It’s difficult to say what Eliot thought of Frost, and how familiar he was with his work, although it is certainly curious that, in the midst of the next war, in ‘Little Gidding’ (1942), Eliot gives us the line ‘This is the death of water and fire.’

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Robert Frost: Biography and Literary Works

How it works

During the late 19th century into the 20th century, the world went through many momentous events, such as two World Wars and the Great Depression. Robert Frost was the one of the most famous poets of the 20th century. He lived during a time when America and the world were experiencing events that changed the way people lived; it was also a period when writers were moving into new forms of experience; one of these was the movement toward Modernist writing.

Frost was born in the late 19th century and spent 40 years of his life as a “normal” person, working in a variety of jobs, everything from being a chicken farmer to a school teacher at the Pinkerton Academy in Derry, New Hampshire. In 1912, he moved his family to England in the hopes of advancing his career as a poet. While there, he was actually able to publish two volumes of verse, but returned to the United States in 1915 and to being a poet-teacher and summer farmer.

Frost became well known and popular because of his poems. And, even though his stories contain sadness, many readers love his writing style, “Robert Frost favored traditional devices- blank verse, rhyme, narrative, the sonnet form, and his pitiless depiction of a cruel natural universe marks him as a peculiarly modern figure who is sometimes misread as a genial Yankee sage” (Barbour 94). Barbour explains that Frost’s writing style was related to the Modernist time period. “If the reader takes a brief but incisive look into the actual life of Frost, viewing the hardships, disappointments, fears, and failings of the man Frost, then the poet Frost will better be understood as a person capable of versifying about darker elements of the human condition” (Tom 12). Because of Frost’s use of dark elements, his description of people without God, and his unique and interesting style, he establish himself as a Modernist writer.

Modernist literature contains many dark elements. Frost was a poet that wrote about the unhappinesses and barriers of human life. “Several psychological theoreticians were to also fundamentally alter the way that modern man viewed his own internal reality, an unexplored heart of darkness” (Wolfson 15). Frost’s poems contain aspects of darkness which look like types of depression of the human spirit. Firstly in Frost’s “God’s Garden,” the poem mainly compares good and evil. Starting with “God made a beatous garden” which same the bible story of the Garden of Eden, where the humanity are following God at that time, “Then came another master/ Who did not love mankind/ And planted on the pathway/ Gold flowers for them to find” (Frost) which is pointing out the evil in the world when Adam and Eve takes the fruit, and it also points out the falls of mankind. It caused the pain and suffering while God removed them out of the Garden, In this poem is contained a dark element such as “Lost, helpless and alone.” By the quote of Robert Frost in God’s Garden, “Quite hit the thorns of avarice/That poison blood and bone” which also has dark elements in it. Frost emphasizes that the world is cold and makes a person feel alone, “Frost views man as being all alone in a seemingly unfeeling and unresponsive universe” (Tom 16). Secondly in “the birds do thus” Frost also uses dark elements. “To have you soon; I gave away” (Frost) and this mainly talks about his lost of love, but he is not giving up on his life, “the unhappy days; I choose to sleep.” Through the verse the reader could discover that Frost found his way to walk out of the shadow. “The bird do thus” Frost used dark element and briefly describes the dark “Life’s not so short/ I care to keep/The unhappy days;I choose to sleep.” He cherish his life, when it is a unhappy day he choose to sleep. Thirdly in “my butterfly” Frost used a very gothic way which will use dark element to write the poem. “Thine emulous fond flowers are dead/And the daft sun-assaulter, he” this verse is a parallel between the mourning of death and the speaker himself, In this verse the flower are meaning to his child, and saying that the lost of his child. “withered leaves” and “broken wings” are also the dark element in the poem by using the leaves and the wings draw out the sadness atmosphere.

The second element that Frost employs in modernist literature is telling how dark the world is without God. “. . . modernist literature is characterized by certain themes, the genre looks at the idea of meaning in modern times and of a world without God”(Lauren 34). Frost’s link between his religious views and his poem is disconnected. Nealon said “Scholars say the materials – officially called the Victor E. Reichert Robert Frost Collection — could provide an important, missing link between Frost’s poetry and his view of religion, which has been the subject of debate for decades.”(Nealon 15). Furthermore, all the information about religion in Frost’s poems is unclear. For example, in “God’s Garden”, the poem that is mentioned above, there is a comparison of good and evil. Frost talks about God guiding people to the heaven and not getting lost in the dark, but he does not mention that he has a Christian faith in God. “Frost’s writing is often critical of religion. He is skeptical about God, frequently presenting agnostic views because he is uncertain and untrusting, and is slightly more apt to embrace scientific approaches to existence”(Fagan 369). He is telling the reader that he is not showing himself as a believer. Otherwise, from the verse that is from Frost’s poem, “”I didn’t go to church, but I like to look in the window””, the speaker can be telling the reader that he doesn’t go to church or praise God at all.

In “Ghost House,” written by Frost; in the poem he wrote “I dwell in a lonely house I know; That vanished many a summer ago” In this case the speaker used “dwell” in the “lonely house” is meaning a house is no more a house/ Upon a farm that is no more a farm, he uses a metaphor to show the reader that the house is empty and makes speaker feel lonely. From that, the reader also can draw from the information in it that the speaker is not a believer, because he has no God in his heart and that is why he feels lonely; the character in Frost’s poem is not with God. In “The Road Not Taken” starting with “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood/And sorry I could not travel both” speaks out that everyone has to face to pick a road to keep going on, where the religion view could be found in the poem that the speaker has to pick a road that either following God or not. “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” it points out that the speaker took the path that is unusually taken, meanwhile it points out that the speaker is not with God because the speaker picks the road that is unusually taken which is the road that God did not guide people to. The speaker tries to be unique and not follow crowd.

Frost’s unique and interesting writing skill establishes him as a modernist writer;.“The speaker of modernist poems characteristically wrestles with the fundamental question of “self,” often feeling fragmented and alienated from the world around him.”(EDSITEment) In the “The Road Not Taken,” the speaker says: “ two roads diverged in a yellow wood/ And sorry I could not travel both/ And be one traveler, long I stood” the experience that the speaker shows is that everyone has to make a choice for the future. “The most salient features of American modernism are a direct presentation of experience, economical use of language, symbolism and an informal, colloquial style”(Bloom 13). Meanwhile the verse in Frost’s poem shows the basic style of the Modernism and the relationship with Robert Frost. “the poet Daniel Hoffman says Frost’s early work enabled him to say out loud the sources of its own delight in the world” (Fagan 83) which is meaning that the author was trying to spread out his own idea of the world by using the influence of the poem. Furthermore, also challenges the reader’s analysis ability, based on the concept of “The Road Not Taken.” Frost is challenging the reader in how they will think about “making choices” in their life. “Birches” is one of the most famous blank verse poem that created by Frost, the theme of the poem is desire to dream and contrast of dreams and reality, and the main idea of the poem is that Frost is taking some sad thing to making it positive, where the poem shows lots of love, “Birches explores the idea of human existence and the limits we can go to as creative, loving beings.”(Spacey)

Furthermore, the starting verse “when I see birches bend left and right”, it shows two direction that the poem, which reflect to the theme of the poem where it shows the contract of dream and reality, then following the verse in the poem, “I like to think some boy’s been swinging them./But swinging doesn’t bend them down to stay/As ice-storms do.” By using the ice-storm as an example, the ice-storm always stands for dangerous, deadly, etc. By going through the timeline of the world, the poem is created during the post WWI, and the storm is reflecting to the war, which is also deadly and dangerous. And pointing out the reality is that the lost of many love in the war. “Soon the sun’s warmth makes them shed crystal shells/ Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust—/ Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away/ You’d think the inner dome of heaven had fallen” where it shows the image of the war on the battlefield. “I’d like to get away from earth awhile/ And then come back to it and begin over./ May no fate willfully misunderstand me/ And half grant what I wish and snatch me away/ Not to return.” the verse shows Frost is trying to escape the world for a while and then come back to begin over, it shows the difference between adulthood and childhood, the boy in the poem is enjoying his life, but in adulthood, it shows he wanna escape the world and begin the life again, which reflect to the reality where he could go somewhere and forget about the war.

In conclusion, Robert Frost use of dark elements, description of people without God, and unique and interesting style established himself as a Modernist writer, in the dark element he shows the darkness in the world, Frost also use his life experience to describe the world without God, and use interesting writing skill that compare his poem to the real world, which also could challenge the reader’s thinking aspet, Frost is a interesting Modernist writer that we shall all enjoy his poem and remember him.

Bloom, Harold. “American modernist poets” Ed. Harold Bloom, Bloom’s Literary Criticism, 2011.

Barbour, Scott. “American Modernism” Ed. Scott Barbour, Greenhaven Press, 1999, c2000.

Bloom, Harold. “Robert Frost” Ed. Harold, Bloom’s modern critical views, Bloom’s Literary Criticism, 2011

EDSITEment, “Introduction to Modernist poetry” https://edsitement.neh.gov/curriculum-unit/introduction-modernist-poetry

Frost, Robert. “Selected Poems of Robert Frost.” Ed. Harold Bloom, Gramercy Books, 1992

Fagan, Deirdre. “Critical companion to Robert Frost.” Facts on File, [2007].

Hire ,C. Lauren, “Modernism in Literature as a Game”, Oxford, England, United Kingdom, 2010

https://www.scripted.com/writing-samples/modernism-in-literature-as-a-genre

Koontz, Tom, “Aspects of darkness in the poetry of Robert Frost” Ball State University, 1939

http://cardinalscholar.bsu.edu/handle/handle/178095

Nealon, Cory, “Rare Collection of Robert Frost Materials Emerges, Could Shed Light on

Poet’s Religious Views” ,BUFFALO, N.Y, January 18, 2013 http://www.buffalo.edu/news/releases/2013/01/015.html

Spacey, Andrew, “Analysis of Poem Birches by Robert Frost”, Norton Anthology, Norton, 2005

https://owlcation.com/humanities/Analysis-Of-Poem-Birches-by-Robert-Frost

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Robert Frost

Robert Frost (Robert Lee Frost) was an American Poet. Before his works were published in America, they were published in England. Frost is known for his accurate description of country life and his grasp on the colloquial speech of America. Frost wrote about the rural life of New England in the early 20 th century. He used the settings of New England to analyze the philosophical and complex social themes.

Frost was admired and honored for his poetry. He is the only poet who received four Pulitzer Prizes in Poetry. He turned out to be one of the rare literary figures of America who was almost an artistic institution. In 1960, he was honored with the Congressional Gold Medal for his poetry. He was named as poet laureate of Vermont on 22 nd July 1961. 

A Short Biography of Robert Frost

Robert Frost was born on 26 th August 1874 to William Prescott, Jr. and Isabelle Moodie Frost. His father, William, was a journalist and was ambitious to make his career in California. He has only one sister Jeanie Frost. In 1885, his father died, and his mother shifted to Lawrence, Massachusetts, with her two children. The children were taken by the paternal grandparents of Robert and grew up in Lawrence, whereas his mother started teaching at different schools in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. In 1892, Robert graduated from high school. He was a top student in the class and shared his valediction honors with his beloved Elinor White.

Both Elinor and Robert shared interest in poetry; however, they were separated as Robert continued his education at Dartmouth College, and Elinor went to St. Lawrence University. The poetic career Robert had started in high school was continued by him. He published his first poem, My Butterfly: An Elegy” in 1894 in a weekly journal, The Independent. Frost left Dartmouth College before the completion of his first year because of the tiring academic routine. 

In 1985, he married Elinor. However, life was difficult, and Robert started teaching and farming to support his family. His fields of career did not meet any notable success. In the following twelve years, they had six children. Two of the children died at an early age. In 1897, Robert resumed his education at Harvard University and left the university after two years. From1900 to 1909, the family started poultry on a farm in New Hampshire; Frost also started teaching at the Pinkerton Academy in Derry. Frost turned into an ambitious botanist and attained his poetic identity of a rural sage of New England during these years. He was writing poetry during the time, but the publishing opening shows that he did not have much interest in it.

Frost was struggling against the discouragement by 1911. For him, poetry was regarded as a game of a young person. Whereas Frost, who was almost 40 years old, could not publish a book and only had published a few handfuls of poems in magazines. In 1911, Frost got ownership of the Derry farm. He made a sudden decision to sell the farm and started a new life in London. To him, the publishers in London were more approachable to new talent than in America. In 1912, Frost, along with his family, moved to England. Frost also took his poems with him that he had written in America but did not publish it. Indeed the publishers of England proved receptive to an innovative verse of Robert Frost. Frost n with his own efforts and help of Ezra pound published his book A Boy’s Will in 1913. His poems “The Tuft of Flowers,” “Mowing,” and “Storm Fear” from the first book were the standard pieces.

In 1914, he published his second collection North of Boston. The collection contained the major and most popular poems of Robert Frost. These poems include “The Death of the Hired Man,” “After Apple-Picking,” “Mending Wall,” and “Home Burial.” In 1914, Anne Lowell, the Boston poet, traveled to England and encountered Frost’s work in the bookstore. She took the books with her to America and launched a campaign to publish it in America. In the meantime, she also started writing a complimentary review of North of Boston.

Frost had achieved great fame without his knowledge. In 1915, Frost returned to America because of World War I. Till that time, the review of Amy Lowell was already published, and everyone was aware of the unusual qualities of Robert Frost. His book North of Boston had been published by Henry Holt Publishers in 1914. It was the best-seller, and when Frost was moving to America, it had already started publishing the American edition of A Boy’s Will. Frost was instantly approached by various magazines to publish his poems.

In 1915, at Franconia, New Hampshire, Frost bought a little farm. However, he was unable to support his family with the income of poetry and farm.  Thus, he started lecturing part-time at Amherst College. From 1916 to 1938, he taught at the University of Michigan. In 1916, he published a new collection of poems, Mountain Interval. The collection continued to be as successful and the previous one. In 1923, he published New Hampshire. This collection received a Pulitzer Prize for poetry. 

His further collection was published in the succeeding years. He published Collected Poem in 1930, Further Range in 1936, and A Witness Tree in 1942. He also published volumes of poetry that includes West-Running Brook in 1928, In Clearing in 1962, and Steeple Blush in 1947. From 1939 to 1943, he served as the Poet-in-residence at Harvard; from 1943 to 1949 at Dartmouth; and from 1949 to 63 at Amherst College. He gathered awards and honors from every year in his last years. He also served as the poetry consultant to the Library of Congress from 1958 to 1959.

In 1962, on a goodwill tour, Frost visited the Soviet Union. However, he, by mistake, altered the statement by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev after the meeting. The good intended by the visit was unwittingly undone.

On 29 th January 1963, frost faced complications from his prostate surgery and died. He left two daughters, Irma and Lesley. His remains are buried in Bennington, Vermont, in a family plot. 

Robert Frost’s Literary Style

A regional poet.

Robert Frost was living in the region of New England, almost in New Hampshire. He considered it to be one of the two best states in the United States of America; the other was Vermont. He was a poet in his region. He did not include the region of all of America in his poetic scope. However, he also did not attempt to bring regional unity to his characters and also create a Utopian world for them. According to John Lynen, “Frost is the best known to the public as the poet of New England. Like Faulkner, he stands forth as both the interpreter and the representative of his regional culture.”

The setting of New England offered him stories, characters, attitudes that he needed. He loved the tradition of New England and sought strength from it. His works fall in the pastoral literary tradition. His characters, subjects, and events belong to rural New England. He focuses on the ordinary setting and events of rural areas.

Symbolism in Robert Frost’s Poetry

Symbolism is an indirect and veiled mode of communication. Along with the surface meaning, a literary piece also has a deeper meaning, which can only be understood when one reads the poem/literary work through close examination. The poems of Robert Frost have symbolic meaning.

For example, the poem “Mending Wall” apparently suggests that good neighbors are made by good friends. However, the poem symbolically deals with one of the significant problems. It put forwards the question of whether to make the natural boundaries strong to protect ourselves or to remove them as they limit our interaction with other people.

Similarly, the poem “Stopping by Woods” symbolically suggests the struggle of every individual between their social duties towards others with the stresses of our practical life and the moving longing to escape into nature and relax. Moreover, darks woods in the poem that is covered with the snow, and the speaker is greatly attracted to it, symbolizes death. However, the speaker turns down the call of nature (wood) and decides on fulfilling his social obligations. The speaker says:

“The woods are lovely, dark and deep

  But I have promises to keep,

  And miles to go before I sleep,

  And miles to go before I sleep.”

The poem “Stopping by Woods on a snowy evening” has a new sort of symbolism, unlike the outdated traditional pastoral symbolism. The subtly and indirect nature of Frost’s symbolism in the poem is due to its fondness for inference than obvious statements.  It is due to this subtle quality that readers admire Frost’s poetry. Another unique quality in the reading of the poems of Frost is that our surface understanding of the poem does not coincide with deeper meaning. 

 Though the poems or subject matters, Frost’s poetry is complicated. However, clarity in verse veiled the complications and made the poem comprehensible. Even if the poems had nothing but surface meaning, Frost would be admired for his clarity of verse.

Seriousness and Spontaneity in Frost’s Poetry

The whole life of Robert Frost was dedicated to his poetry, which shows his seriousness for his art. But in the initial life, he did not pay much attention to his poetic talent or analyze the source of his poetic gift. This turned the poetry of Frost having unforced, simple, and lyric charm. It appears to be written effortlessly and naturally, just as breathing.

The verse of Robert Frost d stately, formed, and easily anticipated. The technique he employed is simple. He carefully handles the language and rhythm that his most sophisticated poems have spontaneity. Therefore, his ideas seem to be suddenly discovered, not conceived earlier.

Isolation and Loneliness in Robert Frost’s Poetry

One of the important themes of the poetry of Robert Brown is the isolation of man in the universe and his feeling of alienation from nature. The Majority of his poems deal with the feeling of loneliness and sense of isolation. These themes are also influenced by Frost’s personal experiences. Frost’s sister Jeanie has been mentally ill for a long period due to which she became completely alienated from the world. Jeanie was not able to cope with the stiffness and cruelty of existence. For her, the reality of love, birth, and death was conflicting. The ideal world of Jeanie never reconciled with her real world.

In the poem “Home Burial,” the plight of the husband is similar to the plight of Frost in being powerless to deter her sister from the view of the world. The woman in the poem is unable to accept the reality of the situation, just like Jeanie. The woman is unable to reconcile herself to the death of her child and becomes totally alienated from the world.

Similarly, in the poem “An Old Man’s Winter Night” is about an old man roaming alone in the empty house on a winter night and then goes to the store and sleep beside it. The poem efficiently portrays the loneliness of old age and shows deep hostility of life counter to death.

“One Aged Man—-One Man—Can’t Keep A House,

  A Farm, A Countryside, Or If He Can,

  It’s Thus He Does It Of A Winter Night.”

The Portrayal of Characters and Psychoanalysis

Frost’s poems also depict the characters with a psychoanalytical approach. The psychoanalytical approach shows the features of modernism in Frost’s poetry. In these poems, Frost explores the unconscious mind of his characters, although Frost does not seem to be directly influenced by Sigmund Freud. His poetry also focuses on abnormal psychology, dealing with morbid and unconventional behavior of humans. In these poems, the characters are lonely and neurotic. For example, in the poem Home Burial , there is an over-wrought mother who is outrageous in the grief of the death of her child.

Similarly, in “The Death of Hired Man,” the decaying Silas is adhering through carelessness and failure to his need for self-respect. The characters of Robert Frost are full of blood and flesh; he enters into their mind with intense awareness and brings into reality their movements, actions, and speeches with psychoanalytical power.

Narrative and Dramatic Quality of Frost’s poetry

Robert Frost’s poetry is essentially dramatic, no matter what the theme is. He dramatizes his poetry for his readers by creating full scenes of situations and a realistic atmosphere. The dramatic quality is at the peak in the poem at denouement when the fact of the world in the poem attains its metaphysical significance.

For example, in the poem “Home Burial” and “The Death of Hired Man” characters, scenes, and dialogues are shown with full narrative skills like a stage drama.

Fancy and Fact in Frost’s Poetry

The poetry of Robert Frost is beautifully blended of fancy and fact. He inculcates everything in his observation. In the poem “Stopping by Woods,” Frost blends the fancy and facts through the feeling of enjoying the scene of beautiful wood and trying to escape from reality. The speaker is captivated in a lovely scene, but at the same time, he realizes his social obligations of the real and practical life.

Conversational and colloquial Style of Robert Frost

Robert Frost mastered the colloquial and conversational style. He uses sober, quire, and bewitching sort of words. His dialogues are homely, such as in Poem “Home Burial” and “Death of The Hired Man.” His poetry has actual speech rhythm and employed it with mastery. One of his distinguishing features includes the movement of blank verse. The diction he uses is also simple and colloquial. Just like Wordsworth, he employed the language really used by the common man.

Poet of Nature

One of the dominant subjects of Frost’s poetry is Nature; however, he is not nature-poet like that of Thomas Hardy and Wordsworth. His poetry focuses on a man in nature, whereas the poetry of Wordsworth deals with the prospect of the natural world. He perceives no infusing essence in the natural objective and hardhearted. For Frost, nature provides comfort as well as a threat. 

Philosophy, Moral Didacticism, and Aphorism

The wisdom that develops by tolerance, understanding, and observation is preferred by Frost. He is a philosophical poet, and his philosophical value lies in the incentive of intelligence which assists human actions in everyday life. The main characteristics of Frost’s poetry are: it is philosophical, didactic, and aphoristic. The aphoristic verses in the poem provide philosophical and didactic quality. The Following are the examples of his aphoristic lines from different poems.

“A Home is a place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in” from the poem “Death of Hired Man.”

“Something there is that doesn’t love a wall” From the poem “Mending Wall.”

“Earth’s right place for love

I do not know where it’s likely to go better ” From the poem “Birches.”

“But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep” from the poem “Stopping by Wood.”

Though the poems of Frost have a moral purpose, however, the moral lesson is given through either an argument moving the lyric or in a dramatic situation. The moral lesson is not explicit and obvious. Similarly, he deals with the notions of life, birth, truth, and death to make his poem philosophical.

Lyrical Quality

In his poetry, Frost employs the oldest way to make a new and distinctive lyrical form of poetry. Musicality is an essential feature of a lyrical poem, and musicality in the verses is achieved by rhyme, meter, and traditional patterns of stanzas. Frost’s main reputation is based on the lyrical quality of his poetry. For example, in the poem “Stopping by Wood” and “The Road Not Taken” is full of lyricism. In his poetry, Frost not only renews the subject of lyricism in poetry but also brought originality and astonishing sophistication to it. Frost focuses much on the tune and sound of his poem.

Fusion or Integration in Frost’s Poetry

In Frost’s poetry, heterogeneous ideas and elements are fused together in a single independent unit. The main problem is to achieve fusion and integration. Once the integration is achieved, wonder, mystery, and magic are observed in the poetry. According to Frost, a variety of poetry lies not in its uniqueness of form but in the uniqueness of its subject matter. The two ideas fused together in a poem may be difficult to separate from each other. In Frost, poetry, two different subjects are happily united, not forcefully.

Metaphysical Elements in Frost’s Poetry

Just Emerson and Emily Dickenson, Frost is also a metaphysical poet. His metaphysical quality permits him to see beyond the ordinary. Throughout the poems of Frost, like other great metaphysical poems, there is an increased tension created between the simple feet and the mystery revolving around it. The conflict is resolved at the end of the poem with a moral lesson. 

The Irony in Robert Frost’s Poetry

In “Two Ways of Looking at Robert Frost, Randel Jarrell writes: “At its best, Frost’s irony is the sharpest of poetic weapons; at its worst, it is the forgivable pun of a wise old duffer.”

There are two personalities of Robert Frost. The one that everyone knows and the one nobody really knows it or talks about it. The personality of Frost that everyone knows is the one who writes poetry with good puns, and these puns are easily understood by the common readers. For academic writers, the easy side is very attractive, and it is this side that the other personality of the poet is neglected. Similarly, the poetry of Frost has two sides: simple and ironic. The irony is hardly understood by anyone. 

Works Of Robert Frost

  • The Road Not Taken
  • Mending Wall

Quote Investigator®

Tracing Quotations

In Three Words, I Can Sum Up Everything I’ve Learned About Life. It Goes On

Robert Frost? Edna St. Vincent Millay? Apocryphal?

Dear Quote Investigator: The acclaimed American poet Robert Frost was asked as an octogenarian what he had learned about life, and he succinctly replied: It goes on.

I have been unable to find a contemporaneous citation, and a popular quotation website says that the attribution is disputed. What do you think?

Quote Investigator: Robert Frost did utter this proverbial wisdom during his eightieth birthday celebration according to journalist and self-help writer Ray Josephs. In September 1954 the Sunday newspaper supplement “This Week Magazine” published “Robert Frost’s Secret” by Josephs which included the following exchange. Ellipses were in the original text. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI : [1] 1954 September 5, The Cincinnati Enquirer, Section: This Week Magazine, Robert Frost’s Secret by Ray Josephs, Quote Page 2, Column 1, Cincinnati, Ohio. (Newspapers_com)

“In all your years and all your travels,” I asked, “what do you think is the most important thing you’ve learned about life?” He paused a moment, then with the twinkle sparkling under those brambly eyebrows he replied: “In three words, I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life. It goes on. In all the confusions of today, with all our troubles . . . with politicians and people slinging the word fear around, all of us become discouraged . . . tempted to say this is the end, the finish. But life — it goes on. It always has. It always will. Don’t forget that.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

The adage was certainly not novel although Frost’s emphatic version was memorable. Decades earlier in 1915 fellow poet Edna St. Vincent Millay placed a sardonic instance into a verse of the work “Ashes of Life”: [2] 1915 September, Current Opinion, Volume 59, Number 3, Edited by Edward J. Wheeler, Voices of the Living Poets: Ashes of Life by Edna St. Vincent Millay, Quote Page 200, Column 3, The Current … Continue reading

Love has gone and left me, and the neighbors knock and borrow. And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse. — And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow There’s this little street and this little house.

In 1971 the “Des Moines Sunday Register” reprinted the article containing Frost’s statement under the title “Words To Live By”. [3] 1971 January 24, Des Moines Sunday Register (The Des Moines Register), Section: Picture, Words To Live By, (Today’s Words To Live By were selected by Author Ray Josephs), Quote Page 2, Column … Continue reading

In 1978 the syndicated feature “The Aces on Bridge” relayed an instance of the saying: [4] 1978 February 1, The Ithaca Journal, The Aces on Bridge: West learned too late by Ira G. Corn Jr., Quote Page 26, Column 5, Ithaca, New York. (Newspapers_com)

“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: It goes on.” —Robert Frost.

In 1984 the Associated Press published the following “Thought for today”: [5] 1984 April 2, Casper Star-Tribune, Almanac by The Associated Press, Quote Page B2, Column 3, Casper, Wyoming. (Newspapers_com)

Thought for today: “In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life. It goes on.” — Robert Frost, American poet (1874-1963).

In conclusion, there is substantive evidence that Robert Frost did make the remarks in the 1954 citation. The accuracy of the quotation depends on the testimony of Ray Josephs.

(Great thanks to Lino’s Version whose tweet led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration.)

Home — Essay Samples — Literature — Writers — Robert Frost

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Essays on Robert Frost

The importance of writing an essay on robert frost.

Robert Frost is one of the most renowned poets in American literature, known for his ability to capture the beauty and complexity of rural life. Writing an essay on Robert Frost is important because it allows readers to delve deeper into his works and gain a better understanding of his themes, writing style, and impact on literature.

When writing an essay on Robert Frost, it is important to consider the following tips:

1. Research and analyze Frost's poems

It is important to thoroughly research and analyze Frost's poems to gain a comprehensive understanding of his writing style, themes, and symbolism. Pay close attention to the imagery, language, and structure used in his poems to uncover their deeper meanings.

2. Consider Frost's life and influences

Understanding Frost's life and the influences that shaped his writing is essential when writing an essay on him. Consider how his experiences, relationships, and the natural environment of New England influenced his poetry.

3. Explore Frost's themes and motifs

Frost's poems often explore themes such as nature, isolation, and the human experience. When writing an essay on Frost, it is crucial to delve into these themes and identify the recurring motifs in his work.

4. Provide critical analysis

Offering critical analysis of Frost's poems is essential to writing a compelling essay. Consider different interpretations of his work and provide evidence to support your analysis.

5. Reflect on Frost's legacy

Lastly, reflect on Frost's impact on American literature and his lasting legacy. Consider how his poetry continues to resonate with readers and how it has influenced subsequent generations of writers.

By following these tips, you can write a comprehensive and insightful essay on Robert Frost that offers a deeper understanding of his poetry and its significance.

Robert Frost is often celebrated for his vivid and evocative descriptions of nature in his poetry. In this essay, we will explore how Frost uses nature as a metaphor for human emotions and experiences, and how his portrayal of the natural world reflects his own worldview.

Frost's poems often depict the rural landscape and the lives of people who live in such environments. In this essay, we will examine how Frost's portrayal of rural life reflects his own experiences and beliefs, and how his poems shed light on the complexities of rural existence.

Many of Frost's poems explore the theme of isolation and alienation, depicting characters who feel disconnected from their surroundings or society. In this essay, we will analyze how Frost's use of language and imagery conveys the sense of loneliness and detachment experienced by his characters.

Frost's New England roots strongly influenced his poetry, as he frequently drew inspiration from the landscape and people of the region. In this essay, we will delve into how Frost's upbringing in New England shaped his poetic voice and the themes he explored in his work.

Frost's poetry is often associated with the modernist movement, and in this essay, we will compare and contrast his work with that of other modernist poets such as T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound. We will explore how Frost's approach to language, form, and theme differs from his contemporaries, and how his work has contributed to the modernist literary tradition.

Many of Frost's poems reflect on the passage of time and the inevitability of change, often evoking a sense of nostalgia for the past. In this essay, we will examine how Frost's use of memory and nostalgia adds depth to his poetry, and how it contributes to his exploration of human experience.

Frost's poetry is rich with symbolism, as he often uses objects and images to convey deeper meanings and emotions. In this essay, we will analyze how Frost's use of symbolism adds layers of complexity to his poetry, and how it invites readers to engage with his work on a deeper level.

Death is a recurring theme in Frost's poetry, and in this essay, we will explore how he grapples with the concept of mortality in his work. We will examine how Frost's treatment of death reflects his own philosophical outlook, and how it resonates with readers on a universal level.

Frost's personal experiences, including his struggles with loss and grief, deeply influenced his poetry. In this essay, we will investigate how Frost's personal life shaped the themes and emotional resonance of his work, and how his poetry served as a means of grappling with his own experiences.

In this essay, we will consider Frost's lasting influence on American literature, and how his poetry continues to resonate with readers and writers today. We will explore how Frost's work has shaped the trajectory of poetry in America, and how his legacy endures as a vital part of the literary canon.

Mending Wall Symbolism

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Robert Frosts Impact of Writing

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How Robert Frost’s Poems Reflected His Life: Research Paper

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How The Life of Robert Frost is Depicted in His Works

Robert frost's use of literary devices in fire and ice, theme of choices in the road not taken by robert frost, analysis of robert frost’s use of literary devices in mending wall, analysis of imagery used in robert frost’s "to earthward", analysis of robert frost’s poem the road not taken, the complex interpretation of the mending wall, decisions and their consequences: analyzing "the road not taken", analysis of how writers present loss in out out and disabled, analysis of the forms of loss portrayed in disabled and out, out, vitality and eternal relevance of frost’s poetry, discovering the theme of death in ‘out, out’, construction and representation of identity in dead poets society and frost’s poetry, the use of imagery, figurative language and sound in "birches" by robert frost, the most of it: ambiguity and remoteness of nature, the main message in robert frost’s the road not taken, "out out" and "disabled": comparison of the poems, how authors convey their identity: shakespeare and robert frost, the literary analysis of robert frost’s sonnet design, comparative analysis of robert frost's and wilfred owen's poems.

Robert Lee Frost(1874-03-26)March 26, 1874San Francisco, California, US

January 29, 1963(1963-01-29) (aged 88)Boston, Massachusetts, US

Poet, playwright

  • A Boy's Will and North of Boston
  • Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
  • Congressional Gold Medal

March 26, 1874 – January 29, 1963

Robert Frost was an American poet who was much admired for his depictions of the rural life of New England, his command of American colloquial speech, and his realistic verse portraying ordinary people in everyday situations.

Robert Frost’s most famous poems included “The Gift Outright,” “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” “Birches,” “Mending Wall,” “The Road Not Taken,” and “Nothing Gold Can Stay.”

Frost frequently wrote about settings from rural life in New England in the early 20th century, using them to examine complex social and philosophical themes. He most commonly investigated human contacts with the natural world.

He successfully brought into light the concept of soothing nature and its role in man's life. He expressed his ideas in his poems. His poems are very much an inspiration to modern times to this day. Many modern poets attempt to imitate his style, considering him a role model for writing prose and poetry.

“In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on.” “We love the things we love for what they are.” “Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one’s definition of your life; define yourself.”

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essay on robert frost in 500 words

essay on robert frost in 500 words

Design Summary & Analysis by Robert Frost

  • Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis
  • Poetic Devices
  • Vocabulary & References
  • Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme
  • Line-by-Line Explanations

essay on robert frost in 500 words

Robert Frost's "Design," first published in a 1922 anthology of American poetry, reflects on the argument that the complexity of the world proves that a supernatural creator (i.e., God) must have designed things. The speaker of stumbles across a strange sight one morning that, on one level, might indeed suggest a guiding hand bringing different elements of nature together: a white spider holding a dead white moth on top of a white flower. Finding this sight at once miraculous and grotesque, the speaker wonders what kind of higher power would "design" a world that contains such horror and suffering—if such a power exists at all. The poem was later included in Frost's Pulitzer-winning 1936 collection, A Further Range .

  • Read the full text of “Design”

essay on robert frost in 500 words

The Full Text of “Design”

1 I found a dimpled spider, fat and white,

2 On a white heal-all, holding up a moth

3 Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth—

4 Assorted characters of death and blight

5 Mixed ready to begin the morning right,

6 Like the ingredients of a witches' broth—

7 A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth,

8 And dead wings carried like a paper kite.

9 What had that flower to do with being white,

10 The wayside blue and innocent heal-all?

11 What brought the kindred spider to that height,

12 Then steered the white moth thither in the night?

13 What but design of darkness to appall?—

14 If design govern in a thing so small.

“Design” Summary

“design” themes.

Theme The Role and Existence of God

The Role and Existence of God

  • See where this theme is active in the poem.

Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Design”

I found a dimpled spider, fat and white, On a white heal-all, holding up a moth Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth—

essay on robert frost in 500 words

Assorted characters of death and blight Mixed ready to begin the morning right, Like the ingredients of a witches' broth—

A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth, And dead wings carried like a paper kite.

What had that flower to do with being white, The wayside blue and innocent heal-all? What brought the kindred spider to that height, Then steered the white moth thither in the night?

Lines 13-14

What but design of darkness to appall?— If design govern in a thing so small.

“Design” Symbols

Symbol Whiteness

  • See where this symbol appears in the poem.

“Design” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

Alliteration.

  • See where this poetic device appears in the poem.

End-Stopped Line

Rhetorical question, “design” vocabulary.

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

  • See where this vocabulary word appears in the poem.

Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Design”

Rhyme scheme, “design” speaker, “design” setting, literary and historical context of “design”, more “design” resources, external resources.

A Further Range — Check out the full collection in which "Design" appears.

The Poem Out Loud — Listen to a reading of "Design."

Frost and Religion — An interesting article exploring attitudes towards God in Frost's poetry.

Frost at Home — Watch a 1952 interview with the poet, filmed at his house in Vermont.

Frost's Biography and More Poems — Learn more about Frost's life and work via the Poetry Foundation. 

LitCharts on Other Poems by Robert Frost

Acquainted with the Night

After Apple-Picking

A Roadside Stand

Desert Places

Dust of Snow

Fire and Ice

Home Burial

Mending Wall

My November Guest

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

The Death of the Hired Man

The Oven Bird

The Road Not Taken

The Sound of the Trees

The Tuft of Flowers

The Wood-Pile

Ask LitCharts AI: The answer to your questions

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Robert Frost Short Biography - 380 Words

Robert Frost Short Biography

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  1. Analyze the Robert Frost Essay

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VIDEO

  1. Robert Frost: A Revolutionary in American Poetry #inspiration

  2. Major characteristics of Robert Frost's poetry

  3. Tex Talks Poetry: Fire and Ice by Robert Frost

  4. "Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening" By Robert Frost

  5. "The Onset" (1923) By Robert Frost

  6. class 10 English portfolio Topic: Biography of Robert Frost

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  1. Essay, Biography or Paragraph on "Robert Frost ...

    Essay, Biography or Paragraph on "Robert Frost" great author complete biography for Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes. ... Robert Frost (1874 - 1963) ... English Shorthand Dictation "Deal with Export of Goods" 80 and 100 wpm Legal Matters Dictation 500 Words with Outlines meaning.

  2. Robert Frost

    Robert Frost (born March 26, 1874, San Francisco, California, U.S.—died January 29, 1963, Boston, Massachusetts) was an American poet who was much admired for his depictions of the rural life of New England, his command of American colloquial speech, and his realistic verse portraying ordinary people in everyday situations.. Life. Frost's father, William Prescott Frost, Jr., was a ...

  3. The Life and Works of Robert Frost: [Essay Example], 403 words

    Robert Frost was born in San Francisco, California in 1874, a lesser-known fact about the renowned poet. Despite his early years spent in small apartments in the city, Frost is most commonly associated with the natural landscapes of New England that inspired his poetry (Gerber 1967). His upbringing was marked by financial struggles and a ...

  4. Essay on Robert Frost

    Essay on Robert Frost. Robert Frost, an Americian poet of the late 19th century, used nature in many of his writings. This paper will discuss the thought process of Frost during his writings, the many tools which he used, and provide two examples of his works. Robert Frost was born in San Franciso on March 26, 1874, but later moved to Lawrence ...

  5. Robert Frost Critical Essays

    Robert Frost American Literature Analysis. Frost is that rare twentieth century poet who achieved both enormous popularity and critical acclaim. In an introductory essay to his collected poems ...

  6. Robert Frost

    Robert Frost was an American poet who depicted realistic New England life through language and situations familiar to the common man. He won four Pulitzer Prizes for his work and spoke at John F ...

  7. Robert Frosts Impact Of Writing: [Essay Example], 726 words

    Robert Frost, one of the most celebrated American poets of the 20th century, has left an indelible mark on the literary world with his profound and timeless works. His poetry, often characterized by its exploration of nature, human emotions, and the complexities of life, has resonated with readers across generations.

  8. Robert Frost

    Robert Frost was born in San Francisco, but his family moved to Lawrence, Massachusetts, in 1884 following his father's death. The move was actually a return, for Frost's ancestors were originally New Englanders, and Frost became famous for his poetry's engagement with New England locales, identities, and themes. Frost graduated from Lawrence High School, in 1892, as class poet (he also ...

  9. A Summary and Analysis of Robert Frost's 'Fire and Ice'

    Summary. In summary, 'Fire and Ice' is a nine-line poem in which Frost tells us that he has heard some people say that the world will end in fire, while others reckon it will end in ice. In other words, the world will either burn up or freeze up. Frost's speaker goes on to assert that his own view is that fire is more likely, especially ...

  10. Robert Frost

    North American Literatures. Born on 26 March 1874 in San Francisco to Isabelle Moodie and William Prescott Frost Jr., Robert Lee Frost gained distinction not only as one of the most accomplished poets of the modernist period but also as one of the most popular poets in American history. Although born on the West Coast, he is closely tied to New ...

  11. Robert Frost summary

    Robert Frost, (born March 26, 1874, San Francisco, Calif., U.S.—died Jan. 29, 1963, Boston, Mass.), U.S. poet. Frost's family moved to New England early in his life.After stints at Dartmouth College and Harvard University and a difficult period as a teacher and farmer, he moved to England and published his first collections, A Boy's Will (1913) and North of Boston (1914).

  12. Robert Frost Poetry: American Poets Analysis

    Essays and criticism on Robert Frost, including the works "After Apple-Picking", Theme of earthly existence, Dramatic situation and narrative persona, "Mending Wall", "Fire and Ice ...

  13. Robert Frost: Biography and Literary Works

    Robert Frost was the one of the most famous poets of the 20th century. He lived during a time when America and the world were experiencing. Essay Example: During the late 19th century into the 20th century, the world went through many momentous events, such as two World Wars and the Great Depression. Robert Frost was the one of the most famous ...

  14. The Cambridge Introduction to Robert Frost

    Robert Frost: The Early Years, 1874-1915. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966. The first of three volumes of the official biography of Robert Frost. The first two were completed by Thompson. Although the biography remains an invaluable resource, Thompson grew single-minded in his hatred of his subject.

  15. Robert Frost

    Robert Lee Frost (March 26, 1874 - January 29, 1963) was an American poet. His work was initially published in England before it was published in the United States. Known for his realistic depictions of rural life and his command of American colloquial speech, Frost frequently wrote about settings from rural life in New England in the early 20th century, using them to examine complex social ...

  16. Robert Frost's Literary Style and Short Biography

    Contents. Robert Frost was born on 26th August 1874 to William Prescott, Jr. and Isabelle Moodie Frost. His father, William, was a journalist and was ambitious to make his career in California. He has only one sister Jeanie Frost. In 1885, his father died, and his mother shifted to Lawrence, Massachusetts, with her two children.

  17. Robert Frost Frost, Robert (Vol. 10)

    Frost, Robert 1874-1963. An American poet, Frost described poetry as "a little voyage of discovery." The setting for his poems is predominantly the rural landscapes of New England, his poetic ...

  18. In Three Words, I Can Sum Up Everything I've Learned About Life. It

    Thought for today: "In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life. It goes on.". — Robert Frost, American poet (1874-1963). In conclusion, there is substantive evidence that Robert Frost did make the remarks in the 1954 citation. The accuracy of the quotation depends on the testimony of Ray Josephs.

  19. Essays on Robert Frost

    3 pages / 1305 words. Introduction Robert Frost, a prominent figure in American literature, stands as a testament to the enduring power of poetry to reflect the complexities of human existence and the world we inhabit. In this essay, we embark on a critical analysis of two of his seminal... Fire and Ice Robert Frost.

  20. Essay on Robert Frost

    Page 1 of 50 - About 500 essays. Better Essays. Frost, By Robert Frost. 1976 Words; 8 Pages; ... Robert Frost reminds us that time's cyclical holds both healing and destructive properties in his eloquent poem "Spring Pools." Robert Frost was born in San Francisco on March 26, 1874. He was a farmer, a father of six children, but important ...

  21. The Life And Works Of Robert Frost

    Robert Frost wrote many poems in his lifetime, many of them well known. His very first poem, "My Butterfly" was first published in the newspaper, in 1914. His most well known works are "The Road Not Taken," "Fire and Ice," "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," "Home Burial," and "Mending Wall.". Some of his books were ...

  22. Design Poem Summary and Analysis

    The Full Text of "Design". 1 I found a dimpled spider, fat and white, 2 On a white heal-all, holding up a moth. 3 Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth—. 4 Assorted characters of death and blight. 5 Mixed ready to begin the morning right, 6 Like the ingredients of a witches' broth—. 7 A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth,

  23. Robert Frost Short Biography

    ExamGuru 9:15 AM. Robert Lee Frost was born on March 26, 1874 in San Francisco, California. He was a noted and critically respected American Poet of 20th Century. The majority of his work had been published in England as well as America. He is still known for his realistic depictions of rural life and his command over colloquial speech.