Figure of Speech [PDF]

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Figure of speech : personification Example : My little horse must think it queer(line 5),/ To stop without a farmhouse near (line 6) / He gives his harness bells a shake (line 9),/ To ask if there is some mistake((line 10). Analysis : The horse obviously cannot think for itself or ask questions, but personifying the horse in this way shows a sense of friendship between the speaker and the horse



Figure Of speech : Symbol Example : But I have promises to keep, / And miles to go before I sleep, /And miles to go before I sleep.



Analysis : The majority of the symbolism comes in the last stanza. This is the group of four lines that really get the reader thinking, and makes them stop for a second and analyze what Frost’s true intentions were in writing this poem. The woods he describes in the first line are symbolism of the speaker’s life. He is saying that they have had a good, full, and wonderful life like the lovely, deep woods. The second line refers to the speaker’s obligations outside of those woods, possibly to a family. The third and fourth lines are the true symbolism that Frost baffles readers with. “And miles to go before I sleep” (Frost, Robert) means that they have a while to walk before he can take a break and sleep. But, on a deeper level it means that the speaker still has a life to live until they die. Even though they have had a great life, it is still not over. This last stanza all together turns the poem around from just being about someone in the woods, into a meaningful poem about the glass of life being half full, not half empty. Frost uses the symbolism to create a deeper meaning of the character’s stop in the woods.



Figure of speech : simile Example : as far as I could,/ , as just as fair Analysis : Characteristic of Simile in this poem. Frost Used word “as” to comparison the meaning in the each stanza. The meaning from the word as far as i could on the 3rd line in first stanza is He stands at the fork for a long time and examines one of the roads as far as he can. He can't see the end of the road because the road curves away from his line of vision, and the meaning from the word As just as fair on the first line in last stanza is The "Second Road" is just as good as the "First Road" that he looked at. Figure of speech : symbol Example : Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, /And sorry I could not travel both



Analysis : The symbols in The Road Not Taken are the two roads that the persona must choose to take. They represent two choices in the narrator's life that he must decide between. He can pick one option, even though he wishes that he could choose both. His choice to take the lesser used path over the one that was potentially the fairer shows that he wanted to take the path in life that was morally correct.



Figure of speech : personification Example



: I was going to say when Truth broke in, / With all her matter of fact about



the ice storm. Analysis



: Personification speaking about inanimate objects and concepts as if they



were human. The word in the line 21 illustrates that the material and the fact that he will show like the ice storm.