Robert Frost: The 20th Century Genius, Research Paper Example

Contemporary readers know Robert Frost (1974 -1963) as one of the most popular American poets of the twentieth century whose path to general recognition and was thorny and forty years long.

Robert Lee Frost was the first child of William Prescott Frost Jr. (1850 -1885) and Isabelle Moodie (1844- 1900). He was born on March 26, 1874 and named after General Robert E. Lee. Having graduated from Harvard, William Prescott went to Lewistown, Pennsylvania, to teach. In San Francisco, he became an editor and politician. He led a dissipated life and spent much time in gambling and drinking. When Robert was ten years old, his father died of tuberculosis. His will ordered to bury him in New England. After the funeral, Mrs. Frost, Robert and his sister Jeanie Florence settled in Salem, Massachusetts. The necessary payments left them with no money; William’s way of life left his family in dismal financial situation.

The first seeds of love to the literature were planted by Robert’s mother, in his early childhood. Isabelle inspired his son to read various kinds of literature and developed his cognition. In 1892, Robert graduated from Lawrence High School and entered Dartmouth College to please his father’s father who provided his mother with residence. Being dependent on grandfather’s financial support, Robert chose Dartmouth because grandparents accused studies at Harvard of William Prescott’s bad habits. Nevertheless, he spent only two moths there.

Robert Frost made his first steps in writing in April 1890, when “La Noche Triste” dedicated to the Conquest of Mexico appeared in the Lawrence High School Bulletin. In May, the Bulletin published “The Song of the Wave”.  The above mentioned and two more poems (“A Dream of Julius Caesar” and “The Class Hymn”) were reprinted in 1951. His first professional poem “My Butterfly” was sold to New York Independent in 1894. His fiancée, Elinor Miriam White (1872 – 1938), was not enthusiastic about that poetic work.

In 1895, Robert married Elinor and began the career of a teacher. In Lawrence, Massachusetts, he supported his mother in running a private school. There, his first son was born. Despite constant writing efforts, Frost did not manage to sell more than four poems to a magazine. Two years after the marriage, Robert tried to resume the studies at Harvard. He stayed there for two years because the studies did not help to raise the family. Although disappointed in Robert’s education, his grandfather purchased a farm in Derry, New Hampshire. At the age of 25 Robert Frost earned his living by farming and poultry breeding.

Nevertheless, the years of the farming occupation solely did not make him forget about poetry writing. The poet did not publish any poem during the Derry farm period. This interval in publishing implied constant observation of local stories and customs. The calm surroundings and free time gave perfect possibility to think over the questions of literary theory. From time to time, he returned to teaching.

The Derry farm was given to the family on the terms that they would not sell it for ten years. The Frosts followed the conditions. Still, the poetic vocation did not leave his thoughts.  In his letter, to Daniel Smythe he wrote: “If you are going into poetry…give your whole self to it… If it to be your life, make everything else subordinate to it” (as cited in Donaldson, 2011, p.45).

In 1912, the poet took a significant decision to move with his wife and four children (son Carol and daughters, Leslie, Irma and Marjorie) to Europe. The Frosts sold the farm and sailed for England. An allowance given by the grandfather permitted them to settle on a farm in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire. A year later, the fist collection of poems, including previously written poems, A Boy’s Will (1913) was published and well received by the audience. Ezra Pound reviewed the collection favorably.

In May 1914, the second collection North of Boston appeared. It received approving reviews from many magazines, including The Nation, The Times Literary Supplement, The Outlook , The English Review, and The Daily News. Louis Untermeyer (2002) notes that “if the critics were enthusiastic about A Boy’s Will, they were exuberant about North of Boston which appeared a year later. They praised the second volume for many reasons. Wilfrid Wilson Gibson wrote, “Mr. Frost has turned the living speech of men and women into poetry… Tales that might be mere anecdotes in the hands of another poet take on universal significance because of their native veracity and truth to local character” (p. 9).  Comparing two first collections, Edwin Arlington Robinson (the first reader of North of Boston) stated that despite “much good stuff” in the first book, required more “force and distinction” of the second one (as cited in Donaldson, 2011, p. 50).  North of Boston presumably contains unrhymed blank verse in the form of monologue or dramatic narratives.

In 1915, the family returned to the USA and took up residence on a farm in Franconia, New Hampshire. Henry Holt and Company decided to publish Frost’s books. The same year they were published and got the recognition among the American audience. The successive years witnessed remarkable professional achievements. Robert Frost accepted the offer to teach at Amherst College for a year. Then, the position was extended. However, in few years he resigned the position to devote himself to poem writing solely with a return to Amherst in 1923. The following period brought many academic honors awarded to Robert Frost. Among them is the cofounding of the Bread Loaf School of English of Middlebury College, the position of the poet-in-residence at the University of Michigan, and doctorate degrees of Harvard, Cambridge and Oxford.

The collection Mountain Interval appeared in 1916. The next noteworthy achievement was New Hampshire (1923), which brought the first Pulitzer Prize to the poet in 1924. The next collections include West Running Brook (1928), Collected Poems (1930, 1939), A Further Range (1936), A Witness Tree (1942) and the last In the Clearing (1962). Though the thirties were marked by multiple speeches given, readings, lectures, academic honors, and, of course, three Pulitzer Prizes (in 1931 – Collected Poems, in 1937- A Further Range, and in 1943 – A Witness Tree), that decade brought sufferings into Robert Frost’s life. He lost his sister in 1929. In 1934, Robert Frost suffered the loss of his daughter Marjorie. In 1938, his wife died of heart attack. And in 1940, Carol committed suicide. Only two of his six children outlived him. The losses filling his life, beginning by his father’s early death made it rather tragic. On January 29, 1963, Frost died in of operation complications in Boston, Massachusetts.

The thematic circle of Robert Frost’s poems encompasses philosophical, meditative concepts, abundant landscapes inspiring the poet. He is known especially for his picturesque representation of American Northeast.

Some poems combine the beautiful images of nature with philosophical message. The speaker of “The Road not Taken” appears at the road fork in a yellow wood, pointing at the “autumn”, mature and experienced years of the narrator. The path having two ways is rather symbolic. This metaphor conveys multiple options and decisions a man takes during lifetime. The choice is not easy to make; it is impossible to foresee the consequences, because it “bents in the undergrowth (5). Hesitation of the traveler is emphasized by inversion: “Long I stood/ And looked down (3- 4). Though two ways attract the hero, he “kept the first for another day” (13). Both roads seem almost the same. Nevertheless, the way he took “was grassy and wanted wear” (8). The speaker supposes it a significant choice to prefer something less frequented, “less traveled by” (19). Conversational style enables communication with readers, not just to express his talent. “The Road Not Taken” is a vivid illustration of this characteristic, which is relevant to most of Frost’s poems. The simple diction introduces the readers into the poetic world of Frost. In “The Pasture”, the speaker invites the reader to join his walk: “I sha’n’t be gone long. – You come too.”

The above mentioned proves its appeal to an ordinary reader. “The Road Not Taken” dwells on the problem of choice we all face. The theme, light conversational tone, author’s openness and sincerity make the poem comprehensible for many readers.

The romanticism in Frost’s poems concerns presumably the feelings he experienced towards his wife, Elinor. She supported him in tragic times of losses; she urged the move to England. In his letters, Frost wrote: “She has been the unspoken half of everything I ever wrote, and both halves of many a thing” (as cited in Sasso, 1969, p. 97). In the letter the Elliot family he told about his feelings:  reveals Frost’s feelings: “Pretty nearly every one of my poems will be found to be about her if rightly read” (Ibid. p. 98). However, Sasso regards the theme of love contradictory and representing the man and the woman as antagonists: “Marriage, estrangement (“Hill Wife,” “House-keeper”), courtship, and even recollected love (“The Pauper Witch of Grafton”) are taken up in terms of this tension-creating polarity between man and woman. The note struck in this poem of courtship (“Meeting and Passing”) sets the tone which is observed recurring in pieces dealing with the various stages of love which follow” (Ibid. p. 107).

Robert Frost openly expressed his social and political views. He criticized directly Roosevelt in the poem “To a Thinker in Office” for “his total lack of principles” causing him “to veer recklessly from left to right” (Winchell, 2011, p. 95).

Evidently, the most known political poetic work is “The Gift Outright” read in 1961at the inauguration of John F. Kennedy (1917–1963). Frost was the first American poet to be afforded the honor to recite a poem for the president. Frost wrote a long patriotic poem for the occasion; however ill-sight hampered him from reading it. “For John F. Kennedy” touches the concept of democracy, roots and authors of Declaration:

So much those heroes knew and understood,

I mean the great four, Washington,

John Adams, Jefferson, and Madison, –

So much they knew as consecrated seers.

They must have seen ahead what now appears,

They would bring empires down about our ears

And by example of our Declaration

Make everybody want to be a nation (24-31).

At the inauguration, he read the poem he knew by heart – “The Gift Outright”. The first line of the poem “The land was ours before we were the land’s” symbolically refers the audience to the American national identity and subsequently the times described by Winchell (2011): “Because this continent was settled by people who came from somewhere else, it was initially encountered as a strange place. The original inhabitants, who probably came from elsewhere at a much earlier time, are essentially left out of the equation. As colonists of England, we may have been technically subjects of the crown, but we did not see our identity  as such. We were not yet fully Americans because the land was ours only in name—not deed” (p. 98).

In an interview, Seamus Heaney, a writer and lecturer acknowledged the great impact, Frost’s works had on his life and creations. Moreover, he emphasizes the meaning of his achievement for the country:  “And that’s another reason why Frost was very important in American culture — he was a great teacher who flew the flag for poetry” (O’Driscoll, 2008, p. 266). The creative force of Robert Frost, the way he survived many devastating losses of relatives, persistent urge towards recognition forty years long, and his inspiring public and educational activity deservedly rank him among the most outstanding poets of the twentieth century. No doubt the full picture of modern poetry would be incomplete without breathtaking views of mountains and valleys created by the genius’ imagination.

References

Donaldson, Sc. (2011). Frost, Robinson, and the Judgment of Posterity. Sewanee Review, 119 (1), 43-75.

O’Driscoll, D. (2008). An Ear to the Line. Poetry193 (3), 254 -268.

Robert Frost’s Poems. (2002). New York, NY: St. Martin’s Paperbacks.

Sasso, L. J. (1969). Robert Frost: Love’s Question. The New England Quarterly, 42 (1), 95 – 107.

Untermeyer, L. (2002).  An Introduction. Robert Frost: The Man and the Poet. In Robert Frost’s Poems (p. 1-14). New York, NY: St. Martin’s Paperbacks.

Winchell, M. R. (2011). The Southernness of Robert Frost. Sewanee Review, 119 (1), 91-106.