The Road Not Taken Literary Analysis

Opposition or Simply Non-identity Perhaps what makes a literary work different from any other pieces of writing is its capability of being approached from different viewpoints. Works of literature are potentially capable of providing sufficient material for a vast variety of interpretations. Robert Frost's poem, 'The Road not Taken', an early 20th century, modern poem replete with numerous multi-layered significations, is a perfect example. Deconstructive reading of this poem is only one among many possible approaches, and, in my idea, not the most inclusive one. All the approaches, due to their limitations, have some deficiencies: deconstructive reading of Frost's poem is, thus, inevitably defective. Since deconstructive approach is endeavoring to hunt the binary oppositions of the text in order to reverse them, it is likely to magnify the oppositions. Overstating the oppositions is exactly what the deconstructive reading of Frost's poem, written by D. M. Bowers suffers from; actually, it exaggerates the differences between the two roads to the point that they are rendered as absolute opposites. Whereas, I believe, the two roads are far from opposing each other:
I think this image stands for human condition at the crossroads of various choices where making each choice necessarily excludes the other one. The sad atmosphere of the last stanza implies the unfortunate limitations inherent in the nature of man's existence. Due to our temporal, spatial, and ontological limitations, when we select one of the available choices, we inevitably loose the opportunity to experience the possibilities provided by the other ones. This tragic fact causes a sense of loss. The title of the poem, The Road not Taken, brilliantly hints at this tragic sense of