Robert Frost's stone house in Shaftsbury, VT
I traveled to Bennington, VT a couple of weeks ago to visit my niece who is in college up there, and to hopefully see some spectacular fall foliage. We do get a subtle leaf change here on the Vineyard, but not as colorful a one as Vermont does, so was hoping to see something dramatic. Unfortunately for me, the season was late this year, and there was only the most minimal change while I was there. I did, however, get to visit a really nice little museum, just a few miles up the road in Shaftsbury, VT. It is the Robert Frost Stone House Museum, and is located in a house that was built in 1769, and which became Frost's home from 1920-1929. It is in this house that he wrote one of his most famous poems, "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening", which was part of his Pulitzer Prize winning book "New Hampshire".
Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening
Whose woods these are I think I know
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
Whose woods these are I think I know
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
Over the years there have been many interpretations of this poem, from a man stopping for a moment in the middle of his travels to take in the beauty of the moment...this beautiful snowy evening...to a poem about someone contemplating suicide. I suppose that is what art elicits, various responses depending on the viewer, or in this case, the reader. Each gets out of it, perhaps a different thing, something meaningful for them, but perhaps not for someone else.
I don't think I have ever interpreted this poem as one about contemplating death. Even Frost is quoted as saying that this wasn't a death poem. He loved nature, and spent many hours wandering outside in the natural world, and had a great knowledge of plants. He was moved by nature, and wrote a number of poems that used flowers, insects, cows, birches, birds, seasons, butterflies, snow, and any number of other things in nature as their main theme. I share with Frost that love of nature, and know well those moments out there that capture you, like the man in the poem stopping for a moment to take in the extraordinary beauty of the quiet snowy evening before he continues on with his journey. They hold you in thrall, as you pause, amidst some task you were about, to take it in. Those moments are often fleeting, but often feel transforming.
There is a story connected with this poem, which I don't think I had ever heard before my visit to the museum, but I think adds something special. Frost apparently wrote this poem on a hot June morning in 1922, after he had stayed up all night. The story goes that he had come out of the house into the early morning light, and had seated himself down on a stump to take in the scene around him. He had gone way past tiredness, and had entered a kind of heightened state of awareness. The air had a soft feel, and in his euphoric state he felt mesmerized by the beauty of everything around him, and the interconnectedness of it all. He then went back inside, and wrote "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening". It is said that the images in the poem came partly from his memories of his life on his family's farm in Derry, NH which he no longer owned, but where he had spent many happy years. I liked the idea of him writing this beautiful capture of a snowy woods on a cold, dark night while sitting at his desk on a hot June morning.
I don't think I have ever interpreted this poem as one about contemplating death. Even Frost is quoted as saying that this wasn't a death poem. He loved nature, and spent many hours wandering outside in the natural world, and had a great knowledge of plants. He was moved by nature, and wrote a number of poems that used flowers, insects, cows, birches, birds, seasons, butterflies, snow, and any number of other things in nature as their main theme. I share with Frost that love of nature, and know well those moments out there that capture you, like the man in the poem stopping for a moment to take in the extraordinary beauty of the quiet snowy evening before he continues on with his journey. They hold you in thrall, as you pause, amidst some task you were about, to take it in. Those moments are often fleeting, but often feel transforming.
There is a story connected with this poem, which I don't think I had ever heard before my visit to the museum, but I think adds something special. Frost apparently wrote this poem on a hot June morning in 1922, after he had stayed up all night. The story goes that he had come out of the house into the early morning light, and had seated himself down on a stump to take in the scene around him. He had gone way past tiredness, and had entered a kind of heightened state of awareness. The air had a soft feel, and in his euphoric state he felt mesmerized by the beauty of everything around him, and the interconnectedness of it all. He then went back inside, and wrote "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening". It is said that the images in the poem came partly from his memories of his life on his family's farm in Derry, NH which he no longer owned, but where he had spent many happy years. I liked the idea of him writing this beautiful capture of a snowy woods on a cold, dark night while sitting at his desk on a hot June morning.
So, each reader can take from this poem what they will, and in the end that is probably as it should be, but Frost himself was apparently quite impatient with over analysis of his poems...the constant quest by others to place some greater meaning to his simple but beautiful words. In 1954, when asked once again about the underlying meaning of "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening", he said ..."that one I have been more bothered with than anybody ever has been with a poem....in just the pressing it for more than should be pressed for. It means enough without its being pressed. That's all right, you know. I don't say that somebody shouldn't press it, but I don't want to be there. " And he is right, of course.....the poem, in its simple beauty, does mean enough without pressing it for more.
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