Stopping by Woods on a Snowy EveningWhose woods these are I think I know.

His house is in the village though;He will not see me stopping here

To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queerTo stop without a farmhouse near

Between the woods and frozen lakeThe darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shakeTo ask if there is some mistake.

The only other sound's the sweepOf easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep.But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,And miles to go before I sleep. 

"STOPPING BY WOODS ON A SNOWY EVENING" BY ROBERT FROST

Tyler Elmore5.05Analyzing 20th Century Poetry

"Robert Frost." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 1 Apr. 2004. Web. 13 Dec. 2016. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Frost>.

Urgelt. "Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening." YouTube. YouTube, 23 Dec. 2007. Web. 13 Dec. 2016. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nie5dGD6OQA>.

The “Roaring Twenties” old traditions became a thing of the past quickly. The twenties was a time of culture change and had a huge impact on the way American’s lived. Cities were overpopulated, organized crime was at an all time high due to Prohibition, and crooked politicians and gangsters were on the rise. New inventions created convenience, but also more jobs in the 1920’s, which meant people had more money to spend on things they did not necessary need, but wanted. Music like jazz and dances like the fox trot were more upbeat than traditional music from the 19th century. Radio broadcasts had the capability to spread news and entertainment across the nation. The “Roaring Twenties” was the mark of a new era in America.

During 1920’s, the world was moving much faster than ever before. Because it was, I think the poem “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” written By Robert Frost in 1922, is a poem about a man simply stopping to take in the calmness and natural beauty of a simpler time when things were not so chaotic, and also to reflect back on a time when old traditions and values meant something.

“Mending Wall” By Robert Frost

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,And spills the upper boulders in the sun;And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.The work of hunters is another thing:I have come after them and made repairWhere they have left not one stone on a stone,But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,No one has seen them made or heard them made,But at spring mending-time we find them there.I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;And on a day we meet to walk the lineAnd set the wall between us once again.We keep the wall between us as we go.To each the boulders that have fallen to each.And some are loaves and some so nearly ballsWe have to use a spell to make them balance:'Stay where you are until our backs are turned!'We wear our fingers rough with handling them.Oh, just another kind of outdoor game,One on a side. It comes to little more:There where it is we do not need the wall:He is all pine and I am apple orchard.My apple trees will never get acrossAnd eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors.'Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonderIf I could put a notion in his head:'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't itWhere there are cows? But here there are no cows.Before I built a wall I'd ask to knowWhat I was walling in or walling out,And to whom I was like to give offense.Something there is that doesn't love a wall,That wants it down.' I could say 'Elves' to him,But it's not elves exactly, and I'd ratherHe said it for himself. I see him thereBringing a stone grasped firmly by the topIn each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.He moves in darkness as it seems to me,Not of woods only and the shade of trees.He will not go behind his father's saying,And he likes having thought of it so wellHe says again, 'Good fences make good neighbors.'

Tyler Elmore5.05Analyzing 20th Century Poetry

"Mending Wall by Robert Frost." Mending Wall by Robert Frost. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Dec. 2016. <http://www.marinrose.org/poem-spring04.html>. "Mending Wall." Romancing the Road to Recovery. N.p., 28 June 2015. Web. 14 Dec. 2016. <https://romancingtheroadtorecovery.wordpress.com/2015/06/28/mending-wall/>.

Racism against immigrants and African Americans was still alive and practiced by many in the twentieth century. The Ku Klux Klan was one of the major anti-Semitic hate groups that inflicted hate crimes against immigrants and African Americans. There were laws passed to protect them from hate, however, these laws were often overlooked by elected officials. The government allowed immigrants and African American Americans to serve in World War I because they needed the numbers, but they were placed mostly in non-battle positions. There were no parades for the few selected African Americans that were chosen to fight in battle when they came home from war like there was for white soldiers. And then there was the wealthy industrial business owner, who preferred immigrants and African Americans to work for them, but only because they were willing to work for less money, which caused a lot of friction within white communities, because they felt minorities were taking their jobs. These business owners benefited from their hard labor, but didn’t treat minorities the same as their white employees because they were different.

There are many interpretations of Robert Frost’s poem, “Mending Wall”. My own interpretation was that the man did not like the fact his neighbor insisted on repairing the wall that separated their properties. He mentions the man had an Apple Orchard, and his neighbor had pine trees on his property, which is the only thing that made them “different”, but non the less, it made them different. I think the neighbor wanted to keep repairing the wall to keep him out, or at the very least at a distance. The neighbor acted like it was normal to keep repairing a wall that wasn’t keeping anything from coming in or out. Kind of like the government acted like it was normal to send immigrants and African Americans to war, but then do nothing to protect them from the violence they experienced in their own county. Or like the wealthy business owner who gave immigrants and African American jobs, which he benefited from, but treated them like trash.

The line “Good fences make good neighbors,” from Frost’s poem to me is like saying, “hey, as long as you benefit me and play nice, I will smile and pretend you really matter by allowing you to peak through the wall. However, because you feel you are the “the same” as me, we are going to keep repairing this wall just to remind you that aren’t”.