Robert Frost (1874-1963)
Robert Lee Frost was born in California but raised on a farm in New England United States until the age of 10. The New England countryside became Frost’s favorite setting. A charismatic public reader, he was renowned for his tours. He read an original work at the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy in 1961 that helped spark a national interest in poetry. His popularity is easy to explain: He wrote of traditional farm life, appealing to a nostalgia for the old ways. His themes were universal and immutable– apple picking, stone walls, fences, country roads. His subjects were ordinary people. He was one of the few modern poets who uses rhyme. This endeared him to American readers.
Frost’s work is often deceptively simple. Many poems suggest a deeper meaning. For example, a quiet snowy evening by an almost hypnotic rhyme scheme may suggest the not entirely unwelcome approach of death. Beneath the falling snow and gentle raindrops are pain and unhappiness. Some critics blame Frost’s bitterness on the early years of his marriage when he tried to make a living on an inhospitable New England farm. From: “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” (1923):
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 sweepOf 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.