Robert Frost: The Road Not Taken

1. The Road Not Taken

By Rober Frost

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth;         5   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,         10   And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.         15   I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.         20   [source] Arguably Frost's most famous poem, this poem is about the illusion of nonconformity and how we use it to perceive our decisions as meaningful. This poem was in a collection of poems that were generally about the difficulties and complexities of life, which was consistent with Frost's general style. In general, realism is a pretty good term to describe Frost's style, and this movement is consistent with the time Frost was in school and published the poem (Sparknotes says the Realism movement ends around 1900; Road Not Taken published in 1916). Frost also showed a continued fascination with nature, as can be seen in this poem's forest imagery. This can be viewed as a form of naturalism, which Sparknontes says is a subset of realism. Basically, Frost tells it like it is. The two roads are the same dummy. Your life is not special. "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." ~ Yogi Berra [source]