|a xxxvii, 282 pages : |b illustrations |c 22 cm |a The road not taken : |b a selection of Robert Frost's poems / |c with an introduction and commentary by Louis Untermeyer illustrations by John O'Hara Cosgrave II. The writer plans to name her next book – The Road Taken.|a KEC |b eng |c KEC |d OCLCG |d NED |d OCLCQ |d OCLCO |d ZQP |d OCLCO |d OCLCF |d OCLCO Priya Hajela is author of Ladies’ Tailor (Harper Collins India). But both roads are fine – it is a personal choice, a decision. If you decide that you want to change the world, do good for it and that money matters less, then you take a different road. But what matters most is intent, the road taken – if you want to make money, you choose a road that will lead you to jobs that pay well. He died in battle only two months after he joined the war.Ī young journalist on a Report for America Fellowship to rural Pennsylvania asked if someone is smart and wants to make money, can he/she? The answer is yes. Hollis writes in his article that it was Frost’s poem, The Road Not Taken that pushed Thomas to a decision. Thomas could not decide whether he should enlist or run off to America as Frost was suggesting. This was 1914 and England was at war with Germany. He had suffered from debilitating depression and self-doubt, sought treatment for his ailment and always felt that his American friend was a little too bold, a little too sure and a little too quick with his decision making. ![]() It was because he felt his friend was making fun of his trouble with making decisions. But it was not because Thomas had got it so wrong. But Mathew Hollis writes that Frost himself would warn his audiences – ‘you have to be careful of that one it’s a tricky poem – very tricky.’Įdward Thomas was troubled with Robert Frost’s explanation of his poem and the jibe about his sigh. People often assume the poem is called ‘The Road Less Traveled.’ Most google searches for Robert Frost are accompanied by the words Road Less Traveled. (Mathew Hollis, Edward Thomas, Robert Frost and the Road to War, The Guardian, July 29 th 2011).įrost explained in the ensuing correspondence with his friend that, ‘the operative word in that last stanza was ‘sigh’ and that the sigh was a mock sigh, hypocritical for the fun of the thing.’He chided his friend, ‘no matter which road you take, you’ll always sigh and wish you had taken another.’ (Mathew Hollis)ĭavid Orr says that the poems best known lines, the last two, imply a lonely path that we take at great risk, possibly for great reward. But Frost knew that was not possible for how could one assess the outcome of the road not taken. In fact, Thomas, himself a poet and a literary mastermind, thought the poem to be a simple morality tale. He found it ‘staggering’ and not at all associated with his own dithering. ![]() ![]() Each helped the other with his career, in a way that only poets can.įrost sent adraft of the poem to Thomas who instead of reading it as a gentle jibe to his ‘crying over what might have been,’ read it the way millions of people have read it since, focusing on the last two lines that imply that the road taken was the less traveled one and that’s what made all the difference in his life. Not only did the two walk together, but they were also best friends, like brothers. The two regularly walked around the countryside of Gloucestershire together. from Yale Law School, in his article ‘ You’re Probably Misreading Robert Frost’s Most Famous Poem’ (August 16, 2016), Robert Frost first titled the poem Two Roads which he had been inspired to write by his friend Edward Thomas’ habit of constantly wondering where a second path might have led them. It is an oft quoted section of many a graduation speech, mostly focused on the last two lines – ‘Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by…’Īccording to David Orr,the poetry columnist for the New York Review of Books and a J.D. The poem has often been believed to reference the American ideal of individualism, to walk off the beaten path, to take up the challenge and to beat the odds. It is a simple fork and the speaker has a choice. The road not taken is one of two roads that look quite the same, which one to pick is not obvious or recommended or even advised. The road not taken in the very popular Robert Frost poem is not the easier road, or the uphill road, or the less scenic one, or even the road that leads to a less desirable place.
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