Point of View

Frost's point of view is that of a man who lived his whole life in love with poetry as a medium and people and the natural world as subjects. He says himself in "The Lesson for Today" that he had a lover's quarrel with the world, loving it unswervingly, but seeing the shortcomings of humanity as clearly as he saw its glories. But he writes equally about both, and over the course of his whole adult life, so while his perspective ranges from youth to age, and place to place, his timeless love for beauty, his humor and his wisdom remain consistent starting points from which he begins his writing. There are some poems in which he is speaking clearly from his own perspective, describing some beautiful place, or recording his own contemplations. In some, however, he adopts the persona of a character in a story...