Death by Suicide in Poems by Robert Frost

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The concept of suicide has been very controversial in literature since the art of writing has been around. Many poets use everyday happenings to convey the despair and grief in their lives. One poet to use the nature around him and every day life to depict the hopelessness of life and the idea of suicide was Robert Frost. His poetry presented suicide in a different light than many other authors'. Frost's characters, while contemplating suicide, usually realized eventually that their lives were worth living. In the poems "Acquainted with the Night" and "Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening", frost depicts characters that are contemplating suicide. In these poems Frost uses much imagery to convey his character's feelings, uses symbolism instead of directly stating that the character is debating suicide and he always gives the character a glimpse of hope and a way out by the time the poem ends.

In "Acquainted with the Night", the first line introduces the idea of suicide, night symbolizing death. Rain might symbolize hard times that the narrator has endured in his life. When he says he has "outwalked the furthest city light", it implies that he feels he has had more and worse troubles and hardships than most people. As he walks through the city he feels lonely and isolated commenting that an interrupting cry (possibly even coming from his own house) seems to not even care that he is gone. The watchman in this poem might symbolize God who is watching him on his "beat." The man is too ashamed that he is contemplating suicide to look God in the face, but still, he does not change his attitude, hence his unwillingness to explain.

The theme of isolation becomes apparent through the loneliness of the city. The phrases "saddest...

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...be the symbolic wish that he has miles to go in life before he can rest in the snowy woods.

In these two poems, Frost does a wonderful job of making it seem, at first glance, like wonderfully simple poems, but after taking a deeper look, one can see the deeper and darker meanings of the poems. Although these poems both deal with the gloomy, unhappy theme of suicide, Frost always leaves the character with hope and life. Neither of the characters in the poem actually commits suicide and both realize that it is not their time yet to leave the world. In one, the man realizes that time will decide when he will die and the other knows he has responsibilities in the world to attend to and take care of before he can go. So, although both people are hoping for death, Frost redeems them by having them take the higher road and leaving thoughts of death for another time.

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