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comment by rob05c
rob05c  ·  3143 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: The most misread poem in America

I don't buy it.

    that the two paths “equally lay / In leaves” and “the passing there / Had worn them really about the same.”

It seems perfectly reasonable that a road taken less would be equally worn, only narrower.

    then, the speaker will be claiming “ages and ages hence” that his decision made “all the difference” only because

Everything else hinges on the initial lemma, which I find false.

I've heard a lot of 'deeper' interpretations of Frost, of everything from Mending Wall to Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening. I don't tend to find them convincing. I think Frost is populist, targetting populist readers, and what metaphors he does use are obvious. There's nothing wrong with that; but that's how I see his work.





user-inactivated  ·  3142 days ago  ·  link  ·  

It's bullshit. The poem is about regret.

user-inactivated  ·  3140 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Yep. Pretty straightforward.

Two paths. I took one. I meant to come back. Shit got in the way. I didn't come back. That made my life what it is. Done.