Thomas would always sigh over what they would have seen if they had taken the other path. Edward Thomas, an English-Welsh poet, would always regret not taking the other path. Frost used to frequently take long walks with Thomas through the countryside. The inspiration of “The Road Not Taken” came when Frost noticed a familiar habit of his close friend in England, Edward Thomas. Frost’s Inspiration for “The Road Not Taken” This poem is one of the most well-known and most often misunderstood poems of Robert Frost. It presents a narrator who is recalling his journey through the forest when he had to choose between two divergent roads. This poem was used as an opening poem of Robert Frost’s collection Mountain Interval in 1916. It was published in The Atlantic Monthly in August 1915. “The Road Not Taken” is a poem by Robert Frost. Frost’s Inspiration for “The Road Not Taken”. The good thing is that the poem is ambiguous enough to elicit diverse explanations which, being weighed on their merit, provide various perspectives that would still be right, only leaving the writer irked by being misunderstood. More confusing it gets as we try to take such a simple poem so seriously, especially when we try to understand exactly what the writer was saying. Indeed, contrary to what the narrator says that he will say he took the road less taken when actually both paths are less taken, the only actual regret is that he will never know where the other path would have led him. The sigh is misleading as it suggests regret. The same kind of difference the path he took has made but he would never have experienced if he had opted for the former. He sighs at the end because he will never know where that path would have led, he can only guess that going down that way would have made all the difference in his life. A closer look at the title reveals that the whole poem ultimately is about the path he did not take at all, simply because he can take only one path at a time. In interpreting this poem, we tend to forget that the narrator himself had declared both paths suitable, acceptable, and less taken. Indeed, this conclusion is ironic and misleading as it inadvertently suggests, that taking the road less travelled is better than the well-worn path that countless before have taken, and countless after will take. So in a mock jest, he tells himself that in ages to come, he shall look back with a sigh and declare that he took the road less taken, less travelled, and that has made all the difference. Upon which he consoles himself that on another day, he shall take the other path, though in reality, he understands that once he goes down a road, it leads to other roads and eventually, he will never get the opportunity to come back and take the second path as he would have loved to. By implication, choosing one above the other may not translate into a better experience of a walk in the woods.Īt this point, your perplexity as the reader might increase, similar to that of the narrator because it is clear that he must come to a choice and the parallel options don’t make the choice any easier. Frost, however makes it clear in the second and third stanzas that there really isn’t much difference between the two paths. The similarity does not exceed the choice of a path, for in the build up to Ato’s closing song, ancestral cultures seem to be favoured by his family and even though a compromise is reached between his wife and mother, choosing to live in a city that suits his adopted cultures may still be frowned at. His dilemma is borne out of the choice of living in Cape Coast or Elmina, two cities in Ghana that represent ancestral cultures on the one hand and adopted cultures on the other. Shall I go to Cape Coast, Shall I go to Elmina? Both paths however are not ‘wanting wear’ both paths equally ‘lay in leaves no step had trodden black’, both paths are less taken.Īto, in Ama Ata Aidoo’s “Dilemma of a Ghost” is in a similar quandary where he vacillates and his thoughts are rendered in a ghost song: In reading this line, there is a possibility of subconsciously concluding that one road is good to follow and the other ultimately leads to dire consequences. “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood.” Frost’s opening line calls the attention of the reader to one of the most common dilemmas in human history.
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