"Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening"

Essay by jordan8900 January 2005

download word file, 5 pages 3.0

Shaji Skaria

English 206

Prof D.S.

"Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening" is a poem written by Robert Frost. The poem deals with many basic themes, some of which include responsibility, nature, and life. Frost attempts to make the reader participate, and allow the reader to interpret the poem however he or she may see it.

The setting of this poem takes place in the forest on a winter evening. Frost gives clues to the fact that it is in a forest and a wintry night when he states,

"Between the woods and frozen lake

The darkest evening of the year." (Line 7-8)

The darkest evening of the year occurs in the winter. Not only is this stated a few more times in the poem but it is also seen in the title.

The forest is an interesting place for literary works to take place, because it is a place of mystery.

It was a place where people went to search for answers, and a place where they reflected on themselves and a place where they tested their faith. One good example of this would be in Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story, "Young Goodman Brown", where Goodman Brown goes into the forest to test his faith. Frost uses the element of the forest in a similar fashion, where a man is in the forest reflecting on nature, his responsibility and his life. Frost compacts these themes in a sixteen-lined poem.

There are many themes in this poem. One of the themes that Frost tries to get across deals with responsibility. In this poem we see that the man stops in the forest to admire the beauty that surrounds him, but he soon realizes that he can't stay any longer because he had "promises to keep". In a...