The Road Not Taken – Robert Frost
TPCASTT: Poem Analysis Method: title, paraphrase, connotation, diction, attitude, tone, shift(s), title revisited
and theme
The path of life which diverges compels us to make choices.
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One road splits into two inside the Autumn wood, /And I am sorry that I could not travel
both /And still live to be one traveler. I stood a long time /And looked down one road as
far as I could /To where it turned and was lost amongst the plants. /So, I decided to take
the other because it looked just as sincere, /And perhaps it is the better choice , /Because it
was grassy and invited someone to walk on it; /Although both tracks seemed to have
people passing there /and had been worn about the same. /And that morning the leaves of
both roads lay /Untouched by footsteps. /I would keep the first road for another day /Yet
knowing how one road often leads onto another road, /I doubt I should ever come back to
where I started. /Sometime in the future I will be telling this to someone with a sigh
/About the two roads that I had to choose from in a wood, and how I took the one less
traveled by, /And that has made all the difference to my life.
“And both that morning equally lay / In leaves no step had trodden black.” – neither of
the paths were less traveled.
“I shall be telling this with a sigh” – the sigh could be one of regret or one revisiting fond
memories.
He had a bit of a cowardly attitude because he had the choice between the rough
undergrowth path filled with weeds and tiny plants and then the other path that was
surrounded by clean grass. He chose the latter path and claims that he took the road less
traveled.
There is a shift in tone in the poem. Within the first stanza he seems to be unsure/insecure
about the rough path, however when he discovers the security of the grassy, second path,
his tone changes to a sign of relief.
The title does not suggest regret but rather fear of regret.
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The purpose of this poem, perhaps, was to force the readers to think about the the meaning
due to the simple fact that it is misleading. Frost himself had warned about the poem
stating that it is “a tricky poem”.