“Frost’s Sound of Sense in ‘Stopping by Woods on a

Snowing Evening’”
In Robert Frost’s essay “The Figure a Poem Makes”, he postulated his idea:
sound is the gold in the ore. According to him, sound or musicality is one of the
central elements in verse creation. He coined the term “sound of sense” to
demonstrate his own idea about verse rhythm, which is various with both Victorian
Poets and modernist represented by Ezra Pound or T. S Eliot.
In the letter to John Bartlett, he mentioned the term “sound of sense” at the first
time: sentence have meaningful tones that precede the words, “abstract vitality” and
“pure form”.
The first thing we need to stress is that his idea that sentence tone is prior to
words that can summon human being’s imaginative mood in which inherited from
primitive ancestors. And “the best place to get the sound of sense is from the voice
behind a door cuts off the words” which means to feel the verse without stressing too
much on the words meaning or literal meaning. Given that sentence have meaningful
tones that precede the words, the readers should concentrate on the sentence tone
predominantly. Different tones could convey different meanings even though in the
same verse line. In “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”, if we presuppose the
readers haven’t got an acknowledge of the verse before, just hear the voice conveyed
by writer. “And miles to go before I sleep”, given the condition that the reciter read it
in a melancholy way, the tone will summon the image of a weary traveler who has a
long way to go before the next rest and the readers who capture this tone would be
also in depression. However, if the reciter read the line in a steady and cheerful tone,
the readers will believe the traveler is willing to continue his journey. The great
contrast or diversity is formed through the sentence tones but not the literal meaning
endowed with words. Tones have already demonstrated the intentions and feelings
utilizing various rhythm, pitch before the understanding of words meaning.
The second point is the sound of sense is discussed in the context of strong
interest in human intimacy, in people and in the colloquial language. Frost’s interest in
the complexity of common language is even greater than Wordsworth. “Stopping by
Woods on a Snowy Evening” is relatively acceptable for the readers from the
syntactic and lexical perspective. The images conveyed by words are also very clear:
a man who stops his journey and have a momentary rest before woods and then he
reminds himself he must go because of the promises should keep. The language is
colloquial in the poem.
The third point is about the versification of meter. As we leaned in this week’s
lesson, Frost believes “Writing free verse is like playing tennis with the net down.”
Different from his contemporaries who detach regular metrical pattern and rhyme, he
devotes to achieve his sound of sense within the context of metrical verse. Most
obvious but not merely in iambic. However, he also utilizes “loose iambic”:
predominantly follows the iambic or trochaic (the basic or main metrical pattern of
the whole poem) but also with the breaking of the regularity brought by established
meter. The monosyllabic words could be chosen to be stressed or unstressed by
readers’ will freely compared with the polysyllabic words. And we can perceive that
most words in “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” are monosyllabic words,
which creates a sense of ambiguity. And reader can determine these words should be
stressed or not, since we can get loose iambic and the tones also be changed. In
general, the poem can be identified as iambic tetrameter, such as:
Whose woods | these are | I think | I know
But there could also be something irregular:
My little | horse must | think it | queer (catalectic)
He gives | his harness | bells | a shake (if two vowels in “harness” are both stresses it
will be spondee)
Between | the woods | and fro | zen lake (if you choose to stress the first vowel in
“between” the first metrical pattern will be trochaic)
The on | ly oth | er sound’s | the sweep (spondee and iambic)
These above are just my own interpretations on the basis of the regular iambic
tetrameter. Maybe other readers have their own variations. The general iambic
tetrameter makes the poem sounds musical and gentle, especially the repetition of the
last sentence “And miles to go before I sleep” create a serenity touch as same as
lullaby. But the spondee and trochee also accelerate the speed, intensifying the
steadiness, avoiding the poem becomes a “sing-song” poem. The tension brought by
the exception of regular meter gives the sentences power. He is a master in rhyming:
end rhyme, assonance, internal, consonance, pararhyme, alliteration……And the
enjambment, such as “The only other sound’s the sweep Of easy wind and downy
flake.” Also creates a sense of discontinuity because of the snow.
The last point is about Robert Frost’s idea that “a good sentence does double
duty: it conveys one meaning with words and syntax another by tone of voice it
indicates. In irony the words may say one thing, the tone of voice opposite.” A
complex irony caused by saying one thing but meaning another. On literal meaning,
the poem describes a tranquil snowy night. “The woods are lovely, dark and deep.”
This line demonstrates the impressions brought by woods. “Lovely” is an affirmative
and positive adjective, “dark and deep” are the features of the woods in night, it seems
that the narrator wants to glorify the beauty of woods and nature. But if we read the
line in solemn, sentimental tone, the meaning could be altered drastically. Dark and
deep in nature indicates danger and death, the narrator who stands in darkness is
suffering from unbearable loneliness. The woods covered with snow is white. White
could be purity and beauty but it can be also related with death and stillness. The
narrator stopped by woods for its stunning beauty or for the desire of death to escape
the secular responsibility. Also, the ending lines: “But I have promises to keep, And
miles to go before I sleep.” Literally, the narrator remembers his promises. But if we
read it in melancholy tone, we believe the narrator is still reluctant to reset his journey
with weariness and fatigue. Contrast with this melancholy tone is the declarative or
firm tone, which may convey the narrator determines not to indulge in the allure of
natural beauty and go on his journey. What the words say could be totally opposite to
what the tones convey.