Summary of the poem 'The Road Not Taken'

 About the poet:

Robert Frost (1874*1963) was born in San Francisco. He spent most of His adult life in rural New England. He made attempts to write poetry while working on a farm or teaching in a school. He has written a number of poems which are very simple and easy to understand.

 Summary: 

‘The Road Not Taken’ is an autobiographical poem.;

Once, the poet come across a junction when his path diverged into two and he had to take a decision of which road to take. He stood there for a Long time and gave a serious thought to each road. Then he decided to take the road which was less travelled. The reason for this was that it was grassy and as far as the condition of the road was concerned, both the roads were equally worn.

He decided to keep the other road for some other time, though he knew that he might not be able to go back to that road.

That morning, both the road lay equally covered in leaves. No traveller had trodden (walked) on them that day. The poet felt that after ages he would be telling with a sigh that both the roads diverged in a forest. And the decision of taking the less travelled road made all the difference in his life.

Conclusion:

The poem revolves round a general problem that one, we always face in life. It is of making a choice in life. Life gives us many opportunities and one has to take a decision and stick to it. One can’t get everything in life. The decision taken can sometimes be wrong also but the choice has to be made. The choice affects our life, but the step once taken cannot be retraced

By Haridas Patil