The road Not Taken
Word Meanings
Diverged : separated and took a different direction
Undergrowth : dense growth of plants and bushes
Wanted wear : had not been used
Hence : here in the future
The confusion of mind
Decision making
Regret
We go through many circumstances and experience in our lives and one of them is choosing between two or more paths.
When we come to points in our lives where we must make decisions for our next steps based on opportunities presented to us .
We all try our best to guess what lays ahead of us in every opportunity that we are presented in attempt to fight some control and later comfort over our final decisions
The character claimed the road he chose was better because it wanted where meaning, that it was tempting him .
We always choose the path which seems attractive and is of interest to us even if both the parts have the equal potential of getting to wherever it is we are headed
Sometimes in life when we reach a fork we are able to make quick decisions based on what we learned from other peoples experiences. These experiences then leave marks in the choices that we have , these marks then form our bias towards or against the path .
The character in the poem realistically tries to weigh the outcomes of both the roads .
He notices that both choices lay equally in front of him and none of these choices have been trodden black, that is, no one had walked on them . Therefore he finds himself in a dilemma in deciding which road to choose .
When we encounter choices in our lives where we find that the leaves are not “trodden black” by what we learned from the people around us it becomes harder to make a decision between them just like the character in ‘The Road Not Taken’.
The character in the road not taken is disappointed that he cannot hold onto and experience the consequences of every opportunity that is presented to him .
Often times in life in order to gain some things we must let others go which makes us disappointed that we could not experience the other path .
We like to take our time in order to make informed decisions so we can justify our choices when the regret of missing out on the other Road starts to haunt us just like the character in the poem
In real life also no matter where we end up and how informed, tempting and satisfying our choices were we will always wonder what ifs and could have beens of the opportunity that we left behind .
The regret of not exploring the other option often disturbs us .
Critical Analysis
Poet's mood and condition of his mind
The poet finds himself in front of diversion of the roads in two and he gets confused that which road should he choose .
He is disappointed that he cannot hold onto , and experience the consequences of every opportunity that is presented to him .
He is thinking about the pros and cons of both the roads in order to take informed decision as if he chooses one path he has to let go of the other .
According to the poet both the roads have the equal potential to get the poet to a good destination but he chooses the road which according to him has been travelled by less number of people .
He feels the regret of not exploring the other option and wonders of the ifs and could have beens of the other opportunity that he left behind .
The poet keeps the other road for another day but he knows that one way leads on to another and therefore it would be impossible to come back to the same point and explore the other option .
Background of the poem
The poem ‘The Road Not Taken’ was written by Robert Frost in 1915 .
The poet finds himself in a yellow wood in which two roads diverge .
He thinks for a long time and decide which road to choose . He also tried to look down both the roads as far as he could .
He was disappointed that he could not travel both the paths and chose to travel the less traveled path because he thought it was grassy and wanted wear .
But then he realized that both the roads were the same but still chose the road he had previously chosen and thought that he would keep the other road for another day though he knew one way leads on to another way .
He then thinks that after ages he will tell this with a sigh that once he found himself in a yellow wood with two paths and he chose the less traveled by road and that has made all the difference in his life .
Poetic devices
imagery
metaphor
The road is metaphor for the journey of life
The two roads is compared to two choices in life .
symbolism
The poet compares himself to a traveler .,
The undergrowth at the end of one of the roads is the obstacles and challenges / it is also hard to see what the future held for him.
The grass on one of the roads had hardly been stepped on, it means not many people had chosen that kind of life .
The two roads symbolise that the writer faces two choices and it is hard to choose one of them.
Yellow wood symbolise autumn .The setting of the poem is in autumn .
To where it bent in the undergrowth: it makes the other path seems a far harder and risky path and a far less ideal or inviting path to choose .
It was grassy and wanted wear : it shows that the other path is easier and more ideal to choose .
"Because it was grassy and wanted wear " . This helps us imagine the second path , the path that he chose .
"In leaves no step had trodden black ". The word black gives us a negative feeling .