Frost...For Fun

In honor of "F" Week at ABCWednesday, I thought we'd have some fun with Frost.  His poetry is so clear on the surface, but so deep - so  much can be 'read' into it.  I say read, and not overanalyze - there's a difference, don't you think?

Please enjoy the poem below - along with some other 'food' (it is "F" week) for thought.  Please write your impressions, feelings, questions about this poem. On Friday, I will post some professional poets' and literary critiques' impressions (not mine).  I hope you join in reflecting on the poem now and come back and react to the "professional" responses as well. [But, if you don't have time skim the poem, take a look at the JFK inaugural clip, and please leave a comment.]

Some Background:
Lawrence Rabb, (Morris Professor of Rhetoric at Williams College and an award-winning poet), discusses "How to Pay Attention to a Poem."  He notes that:

"Any poem...is best read with what Henry James called "the spirit of fine attention," It's about noticing, and then noticing what you notice...

"A good poem resists paraphrase, refuses to let its meaning become too simple..." 

"No good poem, especially one as mysterious and reticent as 'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,' ever exhausts itself, even as it turns itself over to you, the reader. So you may secretly carry it around, discovering - perhaps by surprise... remembering it as a kind of revelation and finding it has changed, since you yourself have changed."

A few things to keep in mind:

• Lawrence Rabb also provides a slew of questions to focus on while reading this poem.
• Frost typically repeats the last line of the poem - his way of telling us its complete.  Does this send us an additional message?
• Keep in mind the visual and musical imagery relayed through the words he uses.
• In a letter to Louis Untermeyer, Frost called this poem, "my best bid for remembrance." Why?

Extra tid-bit I couldn't resist:
A clip of JFK reciting Frost at his inauguration, discussing the role and significance of poetry to statesmen and an incredible glimpse into a world gone by.

The Poem:
What images come to mind? What do you think it's about?  Any surprises, questions, insights? 

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
by Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

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.

For educators and parents:

• This type of exercise is wonderful for building what Levine termed "Higher Order Cognitive Functions" or what others might refer to as analytical thinking.  Asking readers to think about the poem, however, not only builds cognition, but a more acute awareness of language, rhythm and rhyme, while helping to focus attention to details.  Savoring poetry provides great 'games' to play with kids of all ages as they explore language, thought, and the world around them. 
• Not always providing immediate answers is a typical Piagetian (after Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget) approach to helping learners progress to higher levels of understanding.  When intellectual challenges are presented, the thinker must devise 'rules' or 'schema' that are tested and reconstructed as needed.

In closing: 
The Dead Poet's Society:

Have a great few days, I hope you return after Friday for Part II which will be filled in below

In the meantime, please leave your thoughts, insights and comments.

Frost's "Stopping by Woods..." Part II

(to be posted on Friday...)

Here now, are more morsels and tid-bits to help reflect and understand this poem:

John T. Ogilvie (from "From Woods to Stars: A Pattern of Imagery in Robert Frost’s Poetry." South Atlantic Quarterly. Winter 1959) reflected:

Frost relays a recurrent image of "the world of the woods...offering perfect quiet and solitude" that  exists "side by side with teh realization that there is also another world, a world of people and social obligations.  Both worlds have claims on the poet."

" We are not told, however, that the call of social responsibility proves stronger than the attraction of the woods...the poet and his horse have not moved at the poem's end.  The dichotomy of the poet's obligations both to the woods and to a world of promises... conisists in the way the two worlds are established and balanced.... What appears to be 'simple' is shown to be not really simple, what appears to be innocent not really innocent..."

                                              

Reuben A. Brower (from The Poetry of Robert Frost: Constellations of Intention. New York: Oxford UP, 1963. Copyright © 1963 by Reuben A. Brower) wrote:

 "The dark nowhere of the woods, the seen and heard movement of things, and the lullaby of inner speech are an invitation to sleep - and winter sleep is again close to easeful death... [Forst's] poetic suggestions are in the purest sense symbolic...though we feel their power. There are critics who have gone much further in defining what Frost 'meant'; but perhaps sleep is mystery enough... Frost might be described as a poet of rejected invitations to voyage in the 'definitely imagined regions' that Keats and Yeats more readily enter."

Richard Poirier (from Robert Frost: The Work of Knowing. Copyright © 1977 by Oxford University Press) wrote:

For greater depth of discussion and reference, please see:Modern American Poetry: On "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"

Have a great weekend and come visit again soon!