Summary of the poem 'The Road Not Taken'. Class 9
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
diverged: divided into two different direction
yellow wood: a forest with yellowish colour decomposing leaves
undergrowth: dense growth of plants and bushes in the forest
One fine morning the poet was walking down a road and then there was a division of the roads. He was standing at the edge of two different paths and he had to choose one path among the two. The poet says that being a solo traveller, he could travel only one road at a time. So, he stood at the edge for a long time, and looked carefully at both the roads to as far as his eyes could see. As he wanted to make a wise choice. Yellow wood here means a forest with leaves which are wearing out and they have turned yellow in colour – the season of autumn. Before choosing a path, he wanted to know how it was. Was it suitable for him or no. Everyone of us comes through situations like this in our life, when we have multiple choices, we have alternatives, but we have to choose only one out of them. In situation like this we take time to think about the pros and cons, whether it is suitable for us or not. Only then, we take a decision on what path we should choose.
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.
fair: As good as the other one,
better claim: Better option
grassy: unused
wanted wear: had not been used
The poet kept on looking at one path for a long time to check if it is the right path for him or not and then he decided and started walking on another path because he felt that the both paths were equally good. He says just as fair, so, he felt that both paths were equally good and started walking on one of them. He adds that maybe he felt that the path was better for him so he chooses it as it had grass on it which means that it was unused. Not many people had walked on this path earlier that is why this path was grassy. ‘And wanted wear’ means that it was not walked over by many people. After he walked on the path for some distance, he realized that both the paths had been worm out the same way. Both the paths were similar and worn out. Even in our life, we take any path or option but all of them have the same benefits, disadvantages, problems, challenges and we must face them. We think that we are choosing a better option, but it is not that way.
Stanza 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.
trodden- walked over
The poet says that both the paths were similar that morning. Both had leaves on them and no one had stepped on them as they were still green in colour. He decided that that day he would take one path and keep the other path for another day, although he knew that one way leads on to another way. He knew that he could not go back on the choice that he had made. Similarly, even in our life once we choose an option, we must keep on moving ahead with that option and we never get a chance to come back and take the other option that we had left earlier.
Stanza 4
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence;
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I —
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.
sigh: deep breath
hence: here, in the future
He says that in the future, he will take a deep breath and say that once upon a time, he had reached such a point in life that there were two options for him and he travelled on that road which had been travelled upon by lesser number of people. That decision of his decided his future. Similarly, in future, when you grow up, then you will say that once upon a time, when you were young, you had two options. The choice that you made, made you what you became of it. This is a very strong message for all the students - that you should be wise and be careful while making choices out of the options that you have in your life because your future depends on the choice that you make today
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