Robert Frost

Area of Study: The Journey

Title of the Text: the road not taken

Composer/Source: Robert Frost

Type of Text(eg. film poem, song ,novel etc): lyric poem

summarise the text(7 lines to summarise): The road not taken is basically about a traveller who has come to a fork in road and he must choose which way to go as he could only choose one road. In stanza one, the narrator told us that he was on a physical journey and that he was confronted with a choice of roads. He could only choose one road and he decided to choose one.

In stanza two, the narrator explain his decision to take the one road over the other due to its fresher appearance as it was grassy even thought the narrator points out that there was little differences between the two roads.

In stanza three the narrator started to regret the decision that he made. He regretted taking the rods that he chose and he wished that he could change his decision and chose the other roads instead. He realised that he made the wrong decisions.

The fourth stanza introduces a sense of closure to the poem in telling the reader that the experience to choose one road over another will influence the speakers lives for years to come. The narrator has chosen the rods that has not been travelled by many people and he admits that he has learn lot from the experience he got from the journey. The experience that matter is that the narrator learns of the way that matter, not the actual events and nature of the journey itself.

What aspects of the Journey are presented in this text?:

in this poem, the concept of physical journey is presented. The poem describes a persona’s choice of journey. This persona is the “I” of the poem and its possible that this “I” is Robert Frost. The plot of the poem is that the persona, he was walking through a wood one morning, comes to a fork in the road, then he contemplates the two roads as he’s not sure which road to choose. At the end, he chooses “the one less travelled” and sets off on his journey. Years later he will remember the branch in the road, and the choice of journey he made because that choice has made all the difference

It is a physical journey.

Identify 2 or 3 language features(including visual language) or structural devices used in this text. Give examples and show how each feature/structure is used to convey the idea of The Journey

There are 3 structure devices in this text and these are metaphor, symbolically and imagery.

The road not taken is an example of a lyric poem. The poem is divided into four stanza’s and each one contains an identical rhyming pattern. The rhyming pattern in the poem goes ABABB. Its telling us that the narrator is confronted with a choice of roads and he have to make a decision to choose one.

The poem has a bright and bucolic setting. The poem raises issues about how our decision are consciously made. The poem can be seen as a metaphor for the journey. The persona describes that his physical journey through the “yellow woods” down one of the “two roads” that lay before him. This physical journeys the basis for the symbolic journey of the persona.

The persona describes himself as a traveller who “stood long” looking down one of the roads, contemplating which road and journey to choose and imagining what may lie ahead on each path. This choice of journey is symbolically being unclear and difficult. Frost suggests that both roads are “just as fair” as each other and that on each “leaves no step had trodden black” when looking down and contemplating the first road, frost suggest that the vista ends as he cannot see beyond the bend in the road.

The symbolisms in the poem is the same whether the poem is read as a physical, imaginative or inner journey. The poet suggest that this unusual journey is a positive experience for the persona because at the end the persona describes his experience as having “made all the differences”

The choice of journey that is the “one less travelled by” has had a huge impact on the individual

The poem is an extended metaphor for the journey and the various choices available to the individual throughout the course of human lifetime. Symbolism is used a