Comment 22 of 22, added on December 26th, 2009 at 3:12 PM.
DESERT PLACES
WOULD YOU HELP ME TO ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS BASE ON POEM OF "DESERT PLACES" BY ROBERT FROST?
1. Which stanza is most negative? Consider synonyms.
2. How emotionally powerful is the word "scare"(line 13 and line 16)?
3. What multiple denotations of the word "benighted" are functional in the poem?
4. How does the etymology of "blanker" add to its force in this context?
5. What denotations of "spirits"(line7) are relevant here?
6. Who are "they"(line 13) who can create fear by talking about the emptiness of space? fear of what?
7. What are the "desert places"(line 16) within the speaker that may be compared to literal emptiness of space?


PUNCHI from Iran

Comment 20 of 22, added on November 8th, 2009 at 2:12 PM.

Through the language and imagery Frost shows how the desolate and empty landscape can make you feel alone, depressed and scared.

The whole poem is one massive piece of pathetic fallacy to show how the persona is feeling, in particular the use of snow, whiteness and absence of objects to convey his thoughts. The first clear sign of the persona’s current emotional status is in the second stanza, “I am too absent-spirited to count” and so we learn of the detachment and loneliness of his life and so he can relate to the surroundings and sees everything as bad and alone almost as if he is left bare, mirroring the landscape.
The is a sense that everything the snow touches looses form, shape and so meaning, “the ground almost covered smooth in snow” the snow forms a blanket over the land so only, “a few weeds and stubble” are visible. The snow covers up the rest of the land and leaves only the more ugly things. This shows how the snow is used in the poem to describe the loneliness and absence of happiness as it has the ability to cover up all that is lovely and pretty in the field.
This is built on in the second stanza when the snow is described as harsh and cruel as, “all animals are smothered in their lairs”. This shows the awesome power of the snow and so nature, at first the are a few sprinklings but when built up it has the power to kill. This again disturbs the persona and adds to his feelings on the snow as an agent of death and destruction.
In the third stanza the word ‘lonely’ is repeated in various forms, “And lonely as it is, that loneliness will be more lonely ere it will be less”. This repetition really drives home the message that the persona is all alone and is only a warning that the weather and his life can only get worse before it gets better. This reference to his emotional deterioration is a lot like the falling of the snow, it goes further and further down until there is nothing left, “no expression, nothing to express”.
It is not just the covering up of the land and objects that scares the persona it is also the absence of matter, “They cannot scare me with their empty spaces”. Here it is the absence that makes him feel alone because there is nothing for protection and there is a feeling of loneliness, neglect and nakedness surrounding the thought of ‘nothing’.
At the end of the poem it seems like the persona is actually more afraid of himself than anything around him, “To scare myself with my own desert places”. In his mind there is his personal desert and it is reflected by the landscape surrounding him. This shows how the loneliness can transcend nature as he is more scared of what is inside his own mind than what is outside and what potentially has more capacity to harm him.


Ollie Plunkett from United Kingdom