Literary Explication Of 'Acquainted With The Night'

into the poem. The section of the poem that will be analyzed is the final ten lines (25-34). The

In the poem, “An Old Man’s Winter Night” Robert Frost talks of an old man living in his isolated home. Because of his age, he has trouble remembering where he is and how he got there. Through the use of diction, figurative language, and imagery, Frost accentuates a simple tale of a dying isolated man to reiterate the meaning that it is against human nature to be in isolation and by defying this notion, it causes one to become inhumane and can be the downfall to one’s life. The choice of words in the poem emphasize the old man’s dreariness and separation from humankind.

As they are travelling, walking along through the city, the walking itself is in fact a metaphor for the narrator's persistence. They are never walking alone at a brisk pace, or doing more than walking. They simply continue to walk, avoiding stopping by things or events around them. This shows that the narrator has a grudging persistence about maintaining their depressed mindset: If they bothered to stop and look around and attempt to interact with the world, they would not maintain the same monotonous mindset. By just continuing to walk, they are allowing their bad mindset to persist. I know from personal experience that just stopping to look at things, and trying to take in the world a little more, can make a positive difference. The continued walking signifies the narrator’s unwillingness to break out of their negative mindset. As they are walking however, it is always dark, and the darkness signifies their depression. If they were to stop and take in the world around them, the world they were walking though would not remain as dark as it has been. The darkness of the world is due to the narrator’s choice of time, and is a clear attempt to isolate themselves visually from the rest of the world. Furthermore, as the narrator is walking around the city, everything that is described is far away. The narrator's inability to get close to anything they are describing is a metaphor for their loneliness, the fact that they always feel so separated from everything around them. This, in turn with the walking and darkness, is the way that the narrator helps keep their mantle of depression in

“Poetry is the graffiti written in the heart of everyone,” states poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Poetry is something that stays with you everywhere, and is a tool that many are able to use to explain their feelings about certain topics- like night. In the two poems Night Luck by Heidi Mordhorst and Acquainted with the Night by Robert Frost, they explain their feelings about the topic night. Frost and Mordhorst have fairly significant difference in perspective of the night time. Acquainted with the Night is a poem where Frost explains things that have happened in his life.

The poem opens with the speaker comparing humans to "clouds that veil the midnight moon" (Line 1). The clouds move brilliantly across the sky and can even veil the light of the moon. The words "speed", "gleam", "quiver" and "streaking" personify the cloud image. They seem

The speaker of "Acquainted with the Night" seems disconsolate, as shown through their repetitive actions of walking through the rain and the outskirts of the city. Frost used anaphora with the phrase “I have” to emphasize the speaker’s gloomy actions. By being “acquainted with the night,” the speaker is referring to their depression and how familiar they are with it. Another point of contrast between "We Grow Accustomed to the Dark" and "Acquainted with the Night" is the point of view that

Everybody is faced with hard times, places of sadness and depression, places with no hope. In Robert Frost’s poem “Acquainted with the Night” the speaker is in a sad, dark place. Frost uses imagery and symbols to reveal a theme of unhappiness and isolation that nevertheless offers the reader hope. Robert Frost’s use of symbols in his poem “Acquainted with the Night” reveals to the reader a mood of melancholy and depression. In the title “Acquainted with the Night” the term ‘Acquainted’ indicates that the speaker is familiar with the night, but does not mean he knows the night well, nor does it indicate that he likes the night.

Right at the beginning of the poem, Frost’s unnamed speaker declares that they “have been one acquainted with the night” (Frost 1). The word acquainted implies a relationship that, while not unfriendly, lacks the close emotional connection often seen in friendship while the night itself, despite often being characterized as a symbol of death and darkness, can also be seen as a time of quiet, meditation, and peace free from the chaos of city life. Therefore, when the speaker says they “have been one acquainted

The night in “Acquainted with Night” represents the authors depression, a depression that has the author feeling alone in the world. The character is completely isolated, with no one that cares about him. The depth of this depression is shown through the tone and word choice, through the watchmen, and finally through the unanswered call. The first thing that shows the authors depression are the word choices and tone used throughout the poem. Frost emphasizes his depression by using the first person term I to start 7 of the lines of the poem.

Robert Frost had a fascination towards loneliness and isolation and thus expressed these ideas in his poems through metaphors. The majority of the characters in Frost’s poems are isolated in one way or another. In some poems, such as “Acquainted with the Night” and “Mending Wall,” the speakers are lonely and isolated from their societies. On other occasions, Frost suggests that isolation can be avoided by interaction with other members of society, for example in “The Tuft of Flowers,” where the poem changes from a speaker all alone, to realizing that people are all connected in some way or another. In Robert Frost’s poems “Acquainted with the Night,” “Mending Wall,” and “The Tuft of Flowers,” the themes insinuate the idea of loneliness

Moreover, the speaker uses words that describe distance such as “far”(11) and “further”(3) that in this poem, perhaps referring to his relationships to the society. Even the first impression of the poem, the comical tone, now signifies the lightness meaninglessness of these connections without sincerity. This contrast between the two tones indicates how the speaker feels as if he is separated both physically and mentally from his surroundings like the society, his friends or even his family.

The speaker is Robert Frost himself, just a bystander in the distance that so happens to stumble upon this scene and observes it enough to write about it. The poem reveals what he now thinks

The night symbolized death, and the walk was the person's journey to find their lost life. This poem was somewhat disturbing to me. I thought of a lost soul, thirsting to finish a mission that was not completed in life. Frost depicts death in a frightening manner with the contents of this piece of work.

The poem, “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening,” by Robert Frost is about the speaker walking near the woods while snowing. Though deceptive in length because of the feeling of a dream or deep sleep, the poem is rather short with only 16 lines. Ultimately, Frost creates a tension throughout the poem between a near-silent sleep or dream state and inclination to face reality. The readers are being drawn into the speaker’s response to the woods and tone of serenity, yet always reminded of the contrary, harsher disposition to confront reality.

Robert Frost’s Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening is a poem describing the journey of an unknown traveler on his way back home. At a certain point during his trip he is passing through the woods owned by a man who lives in the same village as he does. He decides to stop and savor the beauty of the woods on this particularly dark winter evening. This darkness, however, goes far beyond the physical setting in the story and is more fitting perhaps, for the way Frost’s traveler feels inside. Robert Frost’s Stopping by Woodson a Snowy Evening contains dark themes associated with death, which are symbolized by his descriptions of winter, darkness, and feelings of loneliness.