While reading Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall”, I find myself curious to understand the greater meaning behind the poem. What does this wall represent? Why does the narrator act as he does? Thorough analysis of rhetoric, form, purpose, diction, and syntax reveals possible implied themes such as requiring boundaries for prosperous relationships and linking futile and persistent acts of barrier-building to the segregation that was contemporaneous to Frost’s composition of this poem. Furthermore, my analysis draws an intriguing interpretation of the narrator’s motives, the analogy of the ominous, yet supporting, wall and its surrounding theme, and the paradox of the elementary, yet unorthodox, wall-like form. In order to optimally convey my
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After all the effort they put into rebuilding the wall, I discover that the narrator actually does not wish to have the wall between them in line 23. After the exact center of the poem, line 24 separates the neighbor’s side of the wall, “He is all pine,” and the narrator’s side of the wall, “and I am apple orchard,” in this well-balanced line. For the remainder of the poem, Frost segregates the neighbor and narrator to the left and right of the lines, respectively, such as in, “He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors,’” (27) where “he” is on the left, and the word “fences” is the middle of the line. Frost uses this change from togetherness to individualism to emphasize the division between the narrator’s views and the neighbor’s views. At the third section, I feel the narrator begins to show his true colors as he seems evasive, deceitful, and negative. His diction becomes dark and hostile as he discloses his dislike, or even hate, for the neighbor and the wall with, “Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top / In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. / He moves in darkness as it seems to me,” …show more content…
Lines 1 through 4 explain that companionship, “makes gaps even two can pass abreast.” Hate is another, such as that in invaders, trespassers, and “hunters” (5). Lastly, gaps in walls are made by nature, such the thawing of ice in the spring, the time where the narrator finds the gaps in the wall (11). In the first section of the poem, the narrator gestures companionship. However, just before the transition into the second section, Frost creates a barrier in line 23 which serves to represent the wall in the poem. The narrator then turns to hate, urging the removal of the wall. Moreover, before the centered barrier, the narrator refers to the neighbor and himself in plural pronouns such as “we,” “us,” and “our.” The word “we” in line 23 is the last use of the word. After, the narrator uses singular pronouns such as “he,” “I,” “his,” “me,” and “my.” He further differentiates the two sides by transitioning from using the always plural and two-syllabled “boulders” to the always singular and one-syllabled
After all the effort they put into rebuilding the wall, I discover that the narrator actually does not wish to have the wall between them in line 23. After the exact center of the poem, line 24 separates the neighbor’s side of the wall, “He is all pine,” and the narrator’s side of the wall, “and I am apple orchard,” in this well-balanced line. For the remainder of the poem, Frost segregates the neighbor and narrator to the left and right of the lines, respectively, such as in, “He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors,’” (27) where “he” is on the left, and the word “fences” is the middle of the line. Frost uses this change from togetherness to individualism to emphasize the division between the narrator’s views and the neighbor’s views. At the third section, I feel the narrator begins to show his true colors as he seems evasive, deceitful, and negative. His diction becomes dark and hostile as he discloses his dislike, or even hate, for the neighbor and the wall with, “Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top / In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. / He moves in darkness as it seems to me,” …show more content…
Lines 1 through 4 explain that companionship, “makes gaps even two can pass abreast.” Hate is another, such as that in invaders, trespassers, and “hunters” (5). Lastly, gaps in walls are made by nature, such the thawing of ice in the spring, the time where the narrator finds the gaps in the wall (11). In the first section of the poem, the narrator gestures companionship. However, just before the transition into the second section, Frost creates a barrier in line 23 which serves to represent the wall in the poem. The narrator then turns to hate, urging the removal of the wall. Moreover, before the centered barrier, the narrator refers to the neighbor and himself in plural pronouns such as “we,” “us,” and “our.” The word “we” in line 23 is the last use of the word. After, the narrator uses singular pronouns such as “he,” “I,” “his,” “me,” and “my.” He further differentiates the two sides by transitioning from using the always plural and two-syllabled “boulders” to the always singular and one-syllabled