A Short Summary of the Poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" by Robert Frost

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost

About the Poet:
Robert Frost is one of the most popular American poets of the twentieth century. He was born in San Francisco but moved to New England after his father's death. Sometime he worked as a bobbin boy and as a reporter. Later in life he moved to Cambridge and studied at Harvard for two years. He loves country life and recorded its charm and beauty in some wonderful poems. His poems are simple, straightforward and extremely sincere in tone. He became popular as one of America's most honoured poets. His poetry is about nature and everyday experiences.

Summary of the Poem: 
The present poem is one of the favourite ones of the former prime minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru. It records a moment of sheer delight and beauty. The poem refers to the beauty of nature as drawing human beings away from their duties and commitments, but a sense of one's responsibilities should be enough to keep a person attached to his goals. The speaker in this poem is deeply attracted by the beauty of the woods one dark autumn evening as snow falls and cloaks the trees and leaves. The poet is passing through some woods on a snowy evening. The poet thinks that he knows the owner of the woods who lives in a village nearby but he cannot see the poet stopping there. The poet is tempted to stay there to enjoy the sight of the woods filling up with snow. The poet feels that his horse may think it strange that his master has stopped in the middle of the jungle where there is no farmhouse nearby. The poet mentions that it is a very pretty place located between the woods and the frozen lake and it is the very darkest, beautiful evening of the year. The horse shakes his harness bells to draw the attention of his master to remind him whether he has made a mistake by stopping there as there is no farmhouse nearby. The place is very calm and quiet and there are no other sounds except that of the falling snow and the wind. The last four lines in the poem are very popular and they have symbolical meaning. The poet is attracted so much by the sight that he tempts to stay there for the night but he remembers that he has 'miles to go before I sleep'. The literal meaning of these lines is that the poet has to reach somewhere before it is too late, before it is night and so he cannot stay there. The symbolical meaning is that he has many things to do before he can take rest and sit back. In our life also many times we face such situations where we are attracted to something and we forget our goals, duties and responsibilities and we feel that this attraction is the only thing that we want but we must remember that we should never forget our goals or responsibilities because this life is very short and some day we are going to die so before we die we must fulfill all our dreams and all promises that we have made with ourselves. The opposition between responsibility and recreation is quite a common theme in Frost's poetry and is expressed here too.
The poem has four stanzas of four lines each. All the stanzas follow the rhyme scheme as aaba. The poem is written in a very simple language. The setting is nature and natural beauty; the forest, snowfall, evening and a lake.

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