Christina Reich

HUM 1020 Z

Professor Scheafer

March 11, 2012

Frost’s Little Horse with a Big Presence

            Robert Frost employs the use of poetic devices to add depth to his poem Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening. Sound structure and meter enhance the readers experience by expounding on the realistic qualities of the narrator’s horse.

            Sound structure embellishes Frost’s poem with the use of alliteration. The repetition of the “h” sound in “his house” and “his harness” mimics the sound of the narrator’s horse as it exhales. This lends and element of realism to the work and allows the reader feel as though he is in the horse’s presence.

            Robert Frost’s choice of iambic tetrameter also succeeds in giving an authenticity to the horse in his poem. Iambic meter alternates syllables within the line between stressed and unstressed units (Sporre, 170). These alternating stressed and unstressed syllables create a rhythmic impression reminiscent of a galloping horse, allowing the horse to remain present throughout the poem. Also notable, each line of Frost’s poem is comprised of four feet, matching the number of hooves on the horse, bringing yet another element of realism to the horse and melding the reader with the poem as he reads it.

            Poetic devices combine in Robert Frost’s Stopping by The Woods on a Snowy Evening to add depth to the poem. Frost’s manipulation of sound structure with alliteration choices, as well as choices in meter, transforms the four legged animal into to a horse with a larger, more realistic presence.

Words: 267