Frost and Thoreau : a study in affinities

Although a few critics have posited Henry David Thoreau as a conscious influence on Robert Frost, the purpose of this study is to demonstrate a significant set of affinities in the thought and attitudes of the two men. For this reason the study goes beyond the Walden that Frost is known to have admired and examines Thoreau's thought wherever it may be found in his published works. The study is concerned with the literature of the two men; biographical parallels are noted only in passing. The method of the study is to examine, first of all, the "New England mind" as it develops In the Puritans; this mind set is then traced into the twentieth century through such writers as Emerson, Dickinson, and Robinson. Because in recent years such emphasis has been placed on the pessimistic side of Frost, and because Thoreau is generally thought of as highly optimistic, the study examines Frost's optimism and Thoreau's pessimism. In comparing their attitudes toward life, one finds that both Frost and Thoreau found it necessary to withdraw to a position from which they could look in both directions. They withdrew to a position between man and nature, for example, and between spirit and matter because they were determined to see the proper relationship between the pairs. At the same time, their retreat provided them with a set of significant experiences as a basis for determining the nature of life. In this insistence on experience, and In the manner In which each becomes unequal to the task, the two men show their participation in the Romantic frame of mind. The attitudes which Frost and Thoreau shared, moreover, found similar expression in their work. Both created a mythical country and a mythical hero seeking wisdom in that country. The mythical and Romantic quest, however, is domesticated to New England; hence the quest is "reduced" to the mundane activity of going for a walk. In this trope of the walk, then, the artistic attitudes and techniques of each writer become fused. It allows them the careful examination of the thing--in--itself that is so important to them; at the same time it allows each writer to bring in the spiritual and religious overtones which they find equally important. Both Frost and Thoreau are committed to the view that life is a process, and the walk is perfectly adapted to expressing this attitude. Finally, the leisurely process of walking demonstrates their common technique of proceeding slowly and indirectly to the moment of insight; hence it provides a structural unity for their works which has sometimes thought to be lacking. The significance of this study lies in its picture of literary continuity, its truly three dimensional view of the thought of each man, and a fresh insight into what they were attempting in their work; and it resolves, or at least confronts, the dichotomies that critics have sometimes found in their writings.