The Road Not Taken

The Road Not Taken

Read the extracts given below and answer the questions that follow.

1. ‘Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth’

a. What does the phrase ‘yellow wood’ mean?

The poet refers to the yellow leaves of the trees which fall during the

season of autumn.

b. Why did the poet stand there looking at the two roads for a long time?

The poet stood for a long time since he could not decide which road he

should take.

c. What does the poet regret?

The poet regrets the fact that he cannot travel on both the roads. He

regrets the fact that once he chooses one road there may be no going

back to the other.

2. ‘Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,’

a. What does ‘other’ refer to in the above lines?

In the above lines, ‘other’ refers to the road that was grassy and less

travelled upon

b. Which road did the narrator choose?

The narrator chose the one that was grassy and less travelled upon.

c. Explain ‘grassy and wanted wear’

The road was covered with grass as not many people had walked this

road so it was more inviting.

3. ‘And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.’

a. What does ‘both’ refer to?

In the given lines ‘both’ refers to the two roads that forked out in

different directions.

b. Explain the line ‘In leaves no step had trodden black’ The given line means a path not commonly used so the dried leaves

that lay on the ground had not been trampled upon.

c. What made the narrator doubt whether he ‘should ever come back’?

The fact that one road generally leads to another made the narrator

doubt that he should ever come back.

B. Answer the following briefly. 

1. What is wood? What did the narrator see in the wood? Were the paths

similar?

Wood means a forest. The narrator saw two paths diverging and

disappearing in the undergrowth. One of the paths had more grass and

seemed less used than the other.

2. Does one road seem to be more appealing than the other? Use

examples from the poem to support your answer.

The narrator faces a dilemma when he comes to a fork in the road. He

is not able to decide which road to take. One of the roads looks more

tread upon while the other appears less travelled on. Though he wants

to walk on both, he decides to take the second road with the intention

of walking on the first one sometime in the future.

3. Bring out the symbolism in the poem “The Road Not Taken.”

Through the poem, Robert Frost has spoken of something more than the

choice of roads. We can interpret the poet’s quandary of choosing a

road as a symbol of the numerous choices we have to make in life.

There are occasions in our life when two alternatives appear almost

equally attractive. Through the years however, we come to realize that

the choices we make and the path we take to journey on makes a

difference to our lives.