Robert Frost's poetry is always simple and direct, yet strangely deep. Everyone can read into his poem but with different kind of expression. Frost has been discovering the world. He likes to explore relationships between individuals and between people and nature. One of his famous poems, 'Mending Wall', reveals his feelings and ideas about community, life and imagination.
In New Hampshire, where Frost's house was, there was a stonewall. This stonewall was the inspiration for the poem "Mending Wall". It was here that Frost used to repair this wall with his neighbor Napoleon Guay, who always says: "Good fences make good neighbors." In his poem 'Mending Wall', the persona and the neighbor are mending a wall that separates their properties. The most interesting statement in this poem: "Good fences make good neighbors" (line 25) is a paradox, which attracts our attention and lead us to further discussion on Frost's intention to write this poem.
English: The Fall of the Berlin Wall, 1989. The ph...
English: The stone covering Robert Frost's family ...
This is the stone wall at Frost's farm in Derry, N...Every winter, the wall fell down and every spring, the persona and the neighbor met together to mend it. It has somehow become an entertainment for them, as stated in line 21, "Oh, just another kind of outdoor game". Later, the persona found that there were no reasons to mend the wall at all, and this arises to the central theme of the poem. The persona kept on questioning the reasons for mending since they do not keep any animals. In the poem, it says:
Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows,
Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offense.(Line 31-34)
If a wall needs repair every year, it is not a good fence. Yet,
Mending Wall - Great Essay!
This essay is wonderful. You explain multiple angles through which to examine the poem and its two characters. However, you missed one of my favorite angles - seeing the persona as somewhat of a bastard. He initiates mending the wall so that he can make fun of his neighbor, who probably hates him. He calls him "an old-stone savage." You can look at it as this -The persona is a "liberated, intelligent man" and the neighbor is the "average, working-class man." The persona seems to think he his above the neighbor in thought and mental capacity, so he begins to question the neighbor and try to make him think. The neighbor however wants nothing to do with the persona. He probably wants to get back to his beer and watching the baseball game on television.
You did a great job with this essay. I think Frost would be glad to read it. By the way, my one angle of looking at the poem is meant to be somewhat humorous in its extremes. However, it is a reasonable angle to take.
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