The Road Not taken

Hope is the sum of the mental willpower and waypower that you have for your goals. It is a motivational force comparable to human perseverance that has influenced the human race greatly. Nevertheless, how is hope portrayed in literature, specifically poems? “Hope” is the thing with feathers by Emily Dickinson portrays hope as the singing of a bird. The poem claims that hope lives in the soul and that hope is the best in the hardest times of life. It implies that hope is very hard to kill or get rid of and it shows that hope is eternal and it is everywhere. In the last line, it states that hope is beneficial and requires nothing. The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost is a poem that talks about Frost’s choices in life. The entire poem is a metaphor that takes place in a yellow forest with a road diverging into two paths, choices in life. Frost has a hard time choosing between the paths. Frost wants to take the better path but he is unsure of which is better and randomly chooses one. In the end, years later, Frost says the path he took was the one less traveled, the dangerous and adventurous one. The Poems: “Hope” is the thing with feathers and The Road Not Taken both convey hope and human perseverance differently. The first is more hopeful and conveys human perseverance and the second is less hopeful and does not convey human perseverance as well. Dickinson’s poem shows and describes hope while Frost’s poem does not show human perseverance or hope.

“Hope” is the thing with feathers claims and conveys that hope and human perseverance are real and good. The title ““Hope” is the thing with feathers” (Dickinson, l. 0) shows that in the poem, hope is real. Dickinson writes in her poem that hope exists because things with feathers also exi...

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... shows the regret of Frost. The poem The Road Not Taken is full of regret, pessimistic, and hopeless.

Dickinson’s poem “Hope” is the thing with feathers shows more hope, human perseverance and has a happier setting than Frost’s poem The Road Not Taken. Frost’s poem does not show human perseverance or hope whereas Dickinson’s shows that hope is beneficial and real. Dickinson’s poem also shows human perseverance and has a hopeful meaning. Robert Frost has said, the poem The Road Not Taken is a “tricky” poem. What was Frost intending to accomplish when he wrote the poem?

Works Cited

Frost, Robert. Mountain Interval. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1920; Bartleby.com, 1999. www.bartleby.com/119/. [Date of Printout].

Dickinson, Emily. The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson. Boston: Little, Brown, 1924; Bartleby.com, 2000. www.bartleby.com/113/. [Date of Printout].