Portrayal of Realism and Rationalism in the Selected Poems of Robert Frost

Robert Frost (1874-1963) is a famous American Poet. As most of his poems are autobiographical in subject, it is evident that he has been mostly influenced by the environment around him in composing his masterpieces. Frost’s themes are very simple in the surface meaning endowed with an easily understandable diction and a liberal style of writing. Yet, a careful study of his works vividly reveals his greatness as a ‘true’ judge of various critical aspects associated with the everyday experiences of the humans. His major characters- the narrators in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”, “Mending wall” and “The Road not Taken” are viewed as the real people with real struggles in real life. It is seen that Frost’s poetry is highly connotative and the same reader can interpret the poetry of Robert Frost in multiple ways in multiple settings. The present article aims at critically examining Frost’s ‘realistic’ and ‘rationalistic’ approaches in the elevation of human nature under the broad spectrum of human life. This article also aims at proving that no poem of Frost ends in an absolute imagination because Frost himself seems to believe in realism as the ultimate fate of the individuals though fancy and imagination provides a temporary relief to the disturbed soul.