“The Road Not Taken”
by Robert Frost (1916)
TF - TASTI
T - Title
F - Facts
T - Techniques
A - Attitude
S - Shifts
T - Title
I - Ideas
Robert Frost
T = Title
Before reading the poem, take a careful
look at the title and make educated
predictions about the subject matter,
setting, themes, mood, etc. of the poem.
T - Title: “The Road Not Taken”
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Reflecting on a journey (the road)
Seems to be in the past (taken)
Regret or…?
Something “not” done
F - Facts
The literal meaning of a poem:
Who is the speaker (narrator) of the poem?
Who are the other characters in the poem?
What do you know about these people? Evidence?
Where? And When? (setting)
What are the implications of setting the poem at
this place and this time?
What happens? (plot)
F - Facts
● Speaker: older
person?
Frost himself?
● Reflecting on past
choice as a
younger person →
Robert Frost as a young man
F - Facts
● Where: A forest in the
USA probably (Frost’s
home)
● When: in the past,
Autumn before 1918
“In a yellow wood” (l. 1)
→ Autumn?
Frost’s New Hampshire home
Forest in New Hampshire
F - Facts: PLOT
● looking nostalgically at the
past, remembering two
roads to choose between
● Then they look forward, and
imagines their future, “ages
and ages hence.”
T - Techniques
Poetic techniques and how they contribute to the
MOOD and/or meaning of the poem. Look for
techniques such as:
a) Imagery and image patterns
b) Figurative language – i.e. simile, metaphor,
personification, allusion, etc.
c) Sound techniques – i.e. rhyme, alliteration,
onomatopoeia, etc.
d) other
T - Techniques: imagery
Visual imagery of a forest:
“yellow wood” (l. 1)
“bent in the undergrowth” (l. 5)
“grassy and wanted wear” (l. 8)
“leaves no step had trodden black” (l. 12)
T - Techniques: Personification
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear; (ll. 7-8)
→ roads can’t have claims or want anything!
Brings the road alive a little bit!
T - Techniques: Onomatopoeia
“I shall be telling this with a sigh” (l. 16)
We hear this sound as a word!
Like imagery, this is visceral,
Draws the reader in!
Imagery - SO WHAT!?
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Creation of an image in the mind
Appeals to the senses
Puts the reader into the places of the speaker
Visceral sense of events
T - Techniques: imagery
Extended Metaphor
Choosing from two paths in the woods and only being
able to choose one is a metaphor for making any
choice in life. The forest is life and the two roads are
choices. In life, we often cannot go back and make a
different choice for life is linear and moves forward.
This poem is set in autumn, which could be seen as
representative of the speaker being in the “autumn”
of his life.
T - Techniques: Sound Techniques
Rhyme:
A, B, A, A, B
C, D, C, C, D
etc.
Quatrains:
4 line stanzas
Masculine (1 syllable rhyme)
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
A
B
A
A
B
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
C
D
C
C
D
Rhyme - SO WHAT!?
● Catchy - helps to remember the poem
● Makes the reader want to speak it aloud
● Melodic, sing-song, comforting (sense of what’s coming)
Particular scheme:
● Carries the reader forward into the next line
● Open (not like couplets)
T - Techniques: Sound Techniques
Metre:
It’s mostly in iambic tetrameter (four feet)
8 syllables per line: 4 stressed, 4 unstressed
Anapest
2 unstressed syllables followed by 1 stressed
“Two roads / diverged / in a yell / ow wood” (l. 1)
T - Techniques: Sound Techniques
Smile shape - Unstressed
Accent - Stressed
Line - break between iambs
Blue - Anapest
This is just ONE reading of how the
poem’s metre could be read. It is
not necessarily the only way or the
right way.
Meter - SO WHAT!?
Structured -mostly iambic tetrameter Melodic rhythm
Unstressed, stressed, 1, 2, 1, 2 --> like walking forward… in the woods!
BUT More casual as Frost breaks from the rigid structure
almost conversational at times: trust? camaraderie?
Last line - emphasis:
Biggest break in rhythm - jarring - sarcastic? Or something else?
T - Techniques: Sound Techniques
Alliteration:
“wanted wear” (l. 8)
Assonance:
“And looked down one as far as I could” (l. 5)
Alliteration & Assonance - SO WHAT!?
Alliteration:
It’s fun! Draws attention!
Assonance:
Repetition of certain long vowel sounds, it literally slows
us down when reading - form matches content? He slows
down to look, as we slow down to speak his lines
T - Techniques: Sound Techniques
Parallelism:
“And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could”(ll. 4-5)
Repetition:
“Two roads diverged” (ll. 1 & 18)
“Ages and ages hence” (l. 17)
Parallelism & Repetition - SO
Echoes
of the same ideas
WHAT!?
→ melodic, completed feeling, content
Emphasizing and dramatizing “ages and ages”
“Two roads diverged” - poem comes full circle
→ Feels completed and settled
A = Attitude
Identify and explain the attitude(s) (i.e. TONE) of the
speaker and/or the writer toward the characters, events
etc., in the poem. As much as possible, provide direct
evidence from the text (i.e. words, phrases) to support
your explanation of the attitudes you identify.
A = Attitude
Preference for undisturbed nature:
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear; (ll. 6-8)
Perhaps the path that is slightly less worn would be the better
choice. … also, if you know Robert Frost, he loved nature.
A - Attitude
Conflicted: While the speaker initially think the less traveled path may be
better he also notes that once he walks there, both paths will then have
been equally worn. Neither is “less traveled.” Irony?
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black. (ll. 9-12)
A - Attitude
Nostalgic and dramatic:
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
(ll. 14-17)
S = Shifts
Identify and explain significant shifts or changes in the poem. Specifically, look for
shifts in:
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a) narrative voice (i.e. why change to a new speaker)
b) stanzas (why change to a new stanza here)
c) image patterns, diction, syntax
d) setting, action
e) logical organisation (Key Words – but, however, yet, although, etc.)
f) verb tense
g) line lengths
h) punctuation (dashes, periods, ellipsis, etc.)
S - Shifts
In the last stanza, the speaker moves on from discussing the two paths to imagining
his future. First he acknowledges how he likely will never have the chance to walk
here again. Then he reflects upon how he will think of his choosing one path over
another as an older person.
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.
T - Title
Return to the title and make further notes about its significance
and implications, especially at the level of figurative meaning, in
light of the analysis done so far.
T Title
“The Road Not Taken”
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Roads were basically the same
People have to make choices in life
Regrets not being able to take both
People lament and wonder about “what could have been”
But people have to live with their choices!
Choices make people who they are and therefore they make
“all the difference”
I- Idea
In one or two complete sentences, summarise the primary
idea(s) and/or feeling(s) that the poet is communicating in
the poem. In other words, what is the poet saying about
people and/or life in the poem? This summary statement
should be the result of and consistent with the details of
your analysis in the preceding categories.
M - Main Idea
“The Road Not Taken” - was a path that was not traveled by the speaker of the the
poem that was pretty much exactly the same as the road that was taken… but still
when the speaker is really old, he may lament about the choices he did not make
and the paths he did not walk. He will sigh about it and think of what could have
been and what he missed out on. But ultimately, he is happy with his choices, as
they have made “all the difference”. After all a person can never really see what will
come until they walk down the path anyways, since their journeys and destinations
are “hidden in the undergrowth.”