Examples:

Two Students Interpret Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall”

Let’s consider two competing interpretations of a poem, Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall.” We say “competing” because these interpretations clash head-on. Differing interpretations need not be incompatible, of course. For instance, a historical interpretation of Macbeth, arguing that an understanding of the context of English–Scottish politics around 1605 helps us to appreciate the play, need not be incompatible with a psychoanalytic interpretation that tells us that Macbeth’s murder of King Duncan is rooted in an Oedipus complex, the king being a father figure. Different approaches thus can illuminate different aspects of the work, just as they can emphasize or subordinate different elements in the plot or characters portrayed. But, again, in the next few pages we will deal with mutually incompatible interpretations of the meaning of Frost’s poem.

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After reading the poem and the two interpretations written by students, spend a few minutes thinking about the questions that we raise after the second interpretation.

ROBERT FROST

Robert Frost (1874–1963) studied for part of one term at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, then did odd jobs (including teaching), and from 1897 to 1899 was enrolled as a special student at Harvard. He then farmed in New Hampshire, published a few poems in newspapers, did some more teaching, and in 1912 left for England, where he hoped to achieve success as a writer. By 1915 he was known in England, and he returned to the United States. By the time of his death he was the nation’s unofficial poet laureate. “Mending Wall” was first published in 1914.

Mending Wall

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.

5 The work of hunters is another thing:

I have come after them and made repair

Where 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,

10 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 line

And set the wall between us once again.

15 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 balls

We have to use a spell to make them balance:

“Stay where you are until our backs are turned!”

20 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.

25 My apple trees will never get across

And 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 wonder

If I could put a notion in his head:

30 “Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’t it

Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.

Before I built a wall I’d ask to know

What I was walling in or walling out,

And to whom I was like to give offense.

35 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 rather

He said it for himself. I see him there

Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top

40 In 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 well

45 He says again, “Good fences make good neighbors.”

Jonathan Deutsch

Professor Walton

English 102

5 March 2016

The Deluded Speaker in Frost’s “Mending Wall”

Our discussions of “Mending Wall” in high school showed that most people think Frost is saying that walls between people are a bad thing and that we should not try to separate ourselves from each other unnecessarily. Perhaps the wall, in this view, is a symbol for race prejudice or religious differences, and Frost is suggesting that these differences are minor and that they should not keep us apart. In this common view, the neighbor’s words, “Good fences make good neighbors” (lines 27 and 45), show that the neighbor is shortsighted. I disagree with this view, but first I want to present the evidence that might be offered for it, so that we can then see whether it really is substantial.

First of all, someone might claim that in lines 23 to 26 Frost offers a good argument against walls:

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 across

And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.

The neighbor does not offer a valid reply to this argument; in fact, he doesn’t offer any argument at all but simply says, “Good fences make good neighbors.”

Another piece of evidence supposedly showing that the neighbor is wrong, it is said, is found in Frost’s description of him as “an old-stone savage” and someone who “moves in darkness” (40, 41). And a third piece of evidence is said to be that the neighbor “will not go behind his father’s saying” (43), but he merely repeats the saying.

There is, however, another way of looking at the poem. As I see it, the speaker is a very snide and condescending person. He is confident that he knows it all and that his neighbor is an ignorant savage; he is even willing to tease his supposedly ignorant neighbor. For instance, the speaker admits to “the mischief in me” (28), and he is confident that he could tell the truth to the neighbor but arrogantly thinks that it would be a more effective form of teaching if the neighbor “said it for himself” (38).

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The speaker is not only unpleasantly mischievous and condescending toward his neighbor, but he is also shallow, for he does not see the great wisdom that there is in proverbs. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition, defines a proverb as “A short, pithy saying in frequent and widespread use that expresses a basic truth.” Frost, or at least the man who speaks this poem, does not seem to realize that proverbs express truths. He just dismisses them, and he thinks the neighbor is wrong not to “go behind his father’s saying” (43). But there is a great deal of wisdom in the sayings of our fathers. For instance, in the Bible (in the Old Testament) there is a whole book of proverbs, filled with wise sayings such as “Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate thee: rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee” (9:8); “He that trusteth in his riches shall fall” (11:28); “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes” (12:15; this might be said of the speaker of “Mending Wall”); “A soft answer turneth away wrath” (15:1); and (to cut short what could be a list many pages long), “Whoso diggeth a pit shall fall therein” (26:27).

The speaker is confident that walls are unnecessary and probably bad, but he doesn’t realize that even where there are no cattle, walls serve the valuable purpose of clearly marking out our territory. They help us to preserve our independence and our individuality. Walls — man-made structures — are a sign of civilization. A wall more or less says, “This is mine, but I respect that as yours.” Frost’s speaker is so confident of his shallow view that he makes fun of his neighbor for repeating that “Good fences make good neighbors” (27, 45). But he himself repeats his own saying, “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall” (1, 35). And at least the neighbor has age-old tradition on his side, since the proverb is the saying of his father. In contrast, the speaker has only his own opinion, and he can’t even say what the “something” is.

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It may be that Frost meant for us to laugh at the neighbor and to take the side of the speaker, but I think it is much more likely that he meant for us to see that the speaker is mean-spirited (or at least given to unpleasant teasing), too self-confident, foolishly dismissing the wisdom of the old times, and entirely unaware that he has these unpleasant characteristics.

Felicia Alonso

Professor Walton

English 102

5 March 2016

The Debate in Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall”

I think the first thing to say about Frost’s “Mending Wall” is this: The poem is not about a debate over whether good fences do or do not make good neighbors. It is about two debaters: one of the debaters is on the side of vitality, and the other is on the side of an unchanging, fixed — dead, we might say — tradition.

How can we characterize the speaker? For one thing, he is neighborly. Interestingly, it is he, and not the neighbor, who initiates the repairing of the wall: “I let my neighbor know beyond the hill” (line 12). This seems strange, since the speaker doesn’t see any point in this wall, whereas the neighbor is all in favor of walls. Can we explain this apparent contradiction? Yes; the speaker is a good neighbor, willing to do his share of the work and willing (perhaps in order not to upset his neighbor) to maintain an old tradition even though he doesn’t see its importance. It may not be important, he thinks, but it is really rather pleasant, “another kind of outdoor game” (21). In fact, sometimes he even repairs fences on his own, after hunters have destroyed them.

Second, we can say that the speaker is on the side of nature. “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,” he says (1, 35), and of course, the “something” is nature itself. Nature “sends the frozen-ground-swell” under the wall and “spills the upper boulders in the sun; / And makes gaps even two can pass abreast” (2–4). Notice that nature itself makes the gaps and that “two can pass abreast” — that is, people can walk together in a companionable way. It is hard to imagine the neighbor walking side by side with anyone.

Third, we can say that the speaker has a sense of humor. When he thinks of trying to get his neighbor interested in the issue, he admits that “the mischief” is in him (28), and he amusingly attributes his playfulness to a natural force, the spring. He playfully toys with the obviously preposterous idea of suggesting to his neighbor that elves caused the stones to fall, but he stops short of making this amusing suggestion to his very serious neighbor. Still, the mere thought assures us that he has a playful, genial nature, and the idea also again implies that not only the speaker but also some sort of mysterious natural force dislikes walls.

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Finally, though, of course, he thinks he is right and that his neighbor is mistaken, he at least is cautious in his view. He does not call his neighbor “an old-stone savage” (40); rather, he uses a simile (“like”) and then adds that this is only his opinion, so the opinion is softened quite a bit. Here is the description of the neighbor, with italics added to clarify my point. The neighbor is . . .

like an old-stone savage armed.

He moves in darkness as it seems to me . . . (40–41)

Of course, the only things we know about the neighbor are those things that the speaker chooses to tell us, so it is not surprising that the speaker comes out ahead. He comes out ahead not because he is right about walls (real or symbolic) and his neighbor is wrong — that’s an issue that is not settled in the poem. He comes out ahead because he is a more interesting figure, someone who is neighborly, thoughtful, playful. Yes, maybe he seems to us to feel superior to his neighbor, but we can be certain that he doesn’t cause his neighbor any embarrassment. Take the very end of the poem. The speaker tells us that the neighbor

. . . will not go behind his father’s saying,

And he likes having thought of it so well

He says again, “Good fences make good neighbors.”

The speaker is telling us that the neighbor is utterly unoriginal and that the neighbor confuses remembering something with thinking. But the speaker doesn’t get into an argument; he doesn’t rudely challenge his neighbor and demand reasons, which might force the neighbor to see that he can’t think for himself. And in fact we probably like the neighbor just as he is, and we don’t want him to change his mind. The words that ring in our ears are not the speaker’s but the neighbor’s: “Good fences make good neighbors.” The speaker of the poem is a good neighbor. After all, one can hardly be more neighborly than to let the neighbor have the last word.

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