I have chosen the poem The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost for my deconstruction essay. Deconstruction can be referred to the ‘theory used in the study of literature or philosophy which says that a piece of writing does not have just one meaning and that the meaning depends on the reader’ (Merriam-Webster, 2014). I chose this poem as it very popular and its basic meaning is very famous. The deconstruction of the poem may provide a very different meaning to each reader. Derrida said, ‘In a language, in the system of language, there are only differences’ and that is certainly something to take into account when deconstructing this poem (Egs.edu, 2012). The reader must consider the many signs in the poem along with the oppositions provided, as
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He tries to justify his choice to himself and perhaps his audience that the path he chose was the better option as ‘it made all the difference’. This is contradictory to his above statement that they were worn ‘really about the same’. Frost illustrated and challenged the artifice of the ideology of nonconformity, being the privileged binary opposition by showing that it is so ingrained in society (Jana, 2011). Here, Frost is perhaps opposing the idea that a more original and perhaps more difficult journey means the person undertaking it more worthy. He is making the point that if the outcomes are very similar, the path, easy or difficult, really does not matter in the scheme of things. It is no better to take an original route than to take the route of countless others previously. It may also be true to say that the narrator’s justification of his choice is an attempt to distract from the fact that he really did not achieve anything significant in his path and this may be a cause of embarrassment for him. McPhillips also argues that there is a paradox revealed in The Road Not Taken, ‘one road open to the poet is the horizontal road of time, history; and the other is the vertical road into space, the imagination and the timeless moment of epiphany’ (McPhillips, 1986). He is making the point that perhaps the poet can indeed travel on both roads but would be aware of one or the other, privileging one road over the other. However, ultimately, there is no definitive answer whether the narrator is pleased or not with the road he took. It is the reader’s own ideas on the value of each of the paths that creates the meaning.
He tries to justify his choice to himself and perhaps his audience that the path he chose was the better option as ‘it made all the difference’. This is contradictory to his above statement that they were worn ‘really about the same’. Frost illustrated and challenged the artifice of the ideology of nonconformity, being the privileged binary opposition by showing that it is so ingrained in society (Jana, 2011). Here, Frost is perhaps opposing the idea that a more original and perhaps more difficult journey means the person undertaking it more worthy. He is making the point that if the outcomes are very similar, the path, easy or difficult, really does not matter in the scheme of things. It is no better to take an original route than to take the route of countless others previously. It may also be true to say that the narrator’s justification of his choice is an attempt to distract from the fact that he really did not achieve anything significant in his path and this may be a cause of embarrassment for him. McPhillips also argues that there is a paradox revealed in The Road Not Taken, ‘one road open to the poet is the horizontal road of time, history; and the other is the vertical road into space, the imagination and the timeless moment of epiphany’ (McPhillips, 1986). He is making the point that perhaps the poet can indeed travel on both roads but would be aware of one or the other, privileging one road over the other. However, ultimately, there is no definitive answer whether the narrator is pleased or not with the road he took. It is the reader’s own ideas on the value of each of the paths that creates the meaning.