The Road not taken by is one of the most adored works by Mr. Robert Frost. The poem is simple yet difficult; one can not understand it so easily and the massage, poet wants to convey. It needs appropriate attention to understand and get the implied meaning of the lines of this poem. Writer has presented his thoughts in a clear, natural manner and simple way. But in reality the poem carries a deep massage to the readers. The massage given by the author in the poetry is related to various aspects of decision making in life.
The poet start the poem by mentioning that “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and sorry I could not travel both” while crossing the yellow woods, he came to a point where he found road diversion. He saw two paths in front him, both paths were looking equal but still he had to make a choice because he can not travel both the parts. It is not possible for one traveler to travel on both the roads. Poet look at one path as far as he can and decide to go on second path which he thought that comparatively better and less damaged than other one. He thinks that what is the difference both paths are same and equally filled with fresh leaves.
The point writer is trying to make here is about one major decision we take in our life, has the capacity to change our life completely. At the beginning while taking the decision it seems good. A person always tries to take the decision which he finds better than other. The decision could be good or bad, but by the time person realize that the decision taken by him was wrong the time is usually gone and all the Possibility to again take the right decision is very less.
The author has pointed out the importance of taking decisions in life and also indicated its importance. This has been observed in a number of instances that due to indecisiveness or by taking wrong decisions people have not only spoiled everything in their life. Wrong decisions lead towards ambiguity in one’s life and at the end of the day one has nothing but left repenting his or her decisions if wrongly taken at any point of time in their life.
The author has not a single time in the whole poem has tried to impose his own view or findings on the readers of the book. Instead he is letting it to be decided by the reader himself. The author possesses tremendous imaginary skills. While commenting on his own poetry, in Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, 23 Aug. 1953 Robert Frost says "One stanza of 'The Road Not Taken' was written while I was sitting on a sofa in the middle of England: Was found three or four years later, and I couldn't bear not to finish it. I wasn't thinking about myself there, but about a friend who had gone off to war, a person who, whichever road he went, would be sorry he didn't go the other. He was hard on himself that way.
The author has not just talked about the road we travel regularly but also he has indicated towards the road of life that we travel. There are several roads in a life of a person and being an individual one can not travel on all the roads of life. Whether one road is good or that is bad is a different issue and to be decided later once it has been travelled, what the primary issue is that we can not travel on all the roads and the roads we left untraveled may cause us to think whether we have taken a good decision or bad decision by choosing that road or path. It may be a path of life or merely a literal road, sometimes we find in our life that left paths were turned out more fruitful and full of joy rather than the path we travelled.
The author has mentioned the importance and role of nature in the life. The poetry is not about the roads only but it also talks about the nature. When the author is standing at the road, he finds some hints from the nature also in choosing the way for his travel. Nature indicates the author the path and helps him to remove the confusion in taking the decision of choosing the right path of life.
The Forest is another important aspect of this poetry; forest is dense but not fearful. It is not black or green but made of yellow woods. Forest symbolizes much confusion and paths are to be selected among the confusion to achieve the desired or to reach at the desired place. Confusions are meant and intend to taste a person’s capability to take decisions in the life. Life is full of confusions and almost at every stage and time a situation comes when a person finds oneself confused and then a decision is required to be taken. Real taste of person is to choose the right path out of the confusions and to prove that his decision was right one.
The creation of the author has been explained by many scholars and much has been read out of it but more you read and find, more remains to find out. Still there are so many things to read, explore and find out from this luminous piece of literary work of the author. The poetry instead of releasing any massage lets the reader decide about their decisions of life and choose the right path for them. The author just indicates that how a wrong decision can affect the life of a person however he further adds that if the paths are left one may repent that the paths he left could not be travelled and they remained unrevealed.
Every body should read this poetry and try to find a suitable meaning out of it. The poetry has the capacity to remove confusions from life of a person and help a person in taking rights decision related to the life of a person, provided that it has been read and followed in the right and real sense.
References
Bob Holman and Margery Snyder. "About.com. poetry." poetry.about. 24 October 2011
"Sparknotes." sparknotes. 24 October 2011
