Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” isa tricky poem—very tricky.

林以亮編  美國詩選 今日世界 

Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” isa tricky poem—very tricky.

年輕寫文章便愛跩文，引兩句古文，加個典故，自以為漂亮。

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彼時常用《世說新語》謝安「中年傷於哀樂」云云，講得彷彿有隻柄，但其實不過30來歲人耳。

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等40甫過，世事多嚐，終也碰到生離死別，傷感之餘，竟也就引用起曹丕「既痛逝者，行自念也。」這句子。

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——多半強說，再漂亮也是虛！


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今時60已過，慣看死生，尤其這幾年，親戚師友告歸往生的實不在少數。或因信仰所在，倒也沒太大悲傷，卻常抽離出某種情緒，這時才知臺靜農先生最深刻的不是「人生實難，大道多歧」的感喟，而是〈傷逝〉所說：


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分明死生之間，卻也沒生命奄忽之感。或者人當無可奈何之時，感情會一時麻木的。

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一切有為法，如夢幻泡影，如露亦如電。

 The Road Not Taken 

BY ROBERT FROST

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

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The Atlantic 

Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” is often interpreted as an anthem of individualism and nonconformity, seemingly encouraging readers to take the road less traveled. This interpretation has long been propagated through countless song lyrics, newspaper columns, and graduation speeches. But as Frost liked to warn his listeners, “You have to be careful of that one; it’s a tricky poem—very tricky.” (From 2018)

In actuality, the two roads diverging in a yellow wood are “really about the same,” according to Frost, and are equally traveled and quite interchangeable.

In fact, the critic David Orr deemed Frost’s work “the most misread poem in America,” writing in The Paris Review: “This is the kind of claim we make when we want to comfort or blame ourselves by assuming that our current position is the product of our own choices… The poem isn’t a salute to can-do individualism. It’s a commentary on the self-deception we practice when constructing the story of our own lives.” In the final stanza, we can’t know whether the speaker is sighing with contentedness or regret as he justifies the choices he’s made and shapes the narrative of his life.

Frost wrote the poem to tease his chronically indecisive friend, Edward Thomas, who misinterpreted the meaning and enlisted in the military shortly thereafter, only to be killed two years later in WWI.

“The Road Not Taken” was originally published in The Atlantic in 1915 along with two other poems from Frost. It is now widely considered to be one of the most popular works of American literature.

THEATLANTIC.COM

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