Robert Frost

Robert Lee Frost (March 26, 1874 – January 29, 1963) was, in the estimation of many, the greatest American poet of the 20th century and one of the greatest poets writing in English in the 20th century. Frost received four Pulitzer Prizes.

Although associated with New England, Frost was born in San Francisco and lived in California until he was 11. He grew up as a city boy and published his first poem in Lawrence, Massachusetts. He attended Dartmouth College and Harvard University but did not complete the degree. Eventually, after purchasing a farm in Derry, New Hampshire, he became known for his wry voice that was both rural and personal.

In March, 1894, The Independent published Frost's poem "My Butterfly: An Elegy", his first published work which brought him $15. In 1912 he sold his farm and moved to England to become a full-time poet. His first book of poetry, A Boy's Will, was published the next year. In England he made some crucial contacts including T.E. Hulme, Edward Thomas (a Welsh poet whom Frost persuaded to turn from prose to poetry), and Ezra Pound, who was the first American to write a (favourable) review of Frost's work. Frost returned to America in 1915, bought a farm in Franconia, New Hampshire and launched a career of writing, teaching and lecturing. From 1916 to 1938, he was an English professor at Amherst College.

He recited his work, "The Gift Outright", at the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy in 1961 and represented the United States on several official missions.

He also became known for poems that include an interplay of voices, such as "Death of the Hired Man". American schoolchildren often memorize his poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening". Other highly acclaimed poems include "Mending Wall", "Birches", "After Apple Picking", "The Pasture", "Fire and Ice", "The Road Not Taken", and "Directive".

On his passing in 1963, Robert Frost was buried in the Old Bennington Cemetery, in Bennington, Vermont. Harvard's 1965 alumni directory indicates his having received an honorary degree. During his later years he spent summers in Ripton, Vermont and participated in the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference at Middlebury College.

During his life, the Robert Frost Middle School in Rockville, Maryland was named after him.

Books of Poetry

• Twilight 1894 (private printing of 2 total copies, Frost almost immediately destroyed one of them)
• A Boy's Will 1913
• North of Boston 1914
• Mountain Interval 1916
• New Hampshire 1923 (Pulitzer Prize in poetry)
• West-Running Brook 1928
• The Lovely Shall Be Chooser1929
• Collected Poems 1930 (Pulitzer Prize in poetry)
• The Lone Striker 1933
• From Snow to Snow 1936
• A Further Range 1936 (Pulitzer Prize in poetry)
• A Witness Tree 1942 (Pulitzer Prize in poetry)
• Come In, and Other Poems 1943
• Masque of Reason 1945
• Steeple Bush 1947
• Hard Not to be King 1951
• In the Clearing 1962

Quotations

• "Half the world is composed of people who have something to say and can't and the other half who have nothing to say and keep on saying it."
• "Good fences make good neighbors " - "Mending Wall"

External links

• The Road Not Taken. Robert Frost's poem about choices and decision making by Antonio Gutierrez from "Geometry Step by Step from the Land of the Incas"

• Bibliography of Frost's works
• Project Gutenberg e-texts of some of Robert Frost's works
• Several of Frost's books
• A collection of poetry by Robert Frost