Thinking activity on Bob Dylan & Robert Frost

Hello readers, I hope you are all doing well. Today I'm going to talk about two major American poets and songwriters, Bob Dylan and Robert Frost. This task is given by Vaidehi ma'am. For more information about thinking task you can visit the teacher's blog, https://vaidehi09.blogspot.com/2021/05/bob-dylan-and-robert-frost.html.So let's start…

●Bob Dylan●

Bob Dylan (born Robert Allen Zimmerman; May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter, author and visual artist. Often regarded as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture during a career spanning nearly 60 years. 

I like one of his poem "Blowin’ in the wind" the most. Here is this poem… 

How many roads must a man walk down

Before you call him a man?

Yes, ’n’ how many seas must a white dove sail

Before she sleeps in the sand?

Yes, ’n’ how many times must the cannonballs fly

Before they’re forever banned?

The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind

The answer is blowin’ in the wind

How many years can a mountain exist

Before it’s washed to the sea?

Yes, ’n’ how many years can some people exist

Before they’re allowed to be free?

Yes, ’n’ how many times can a man turn his head

Pretending he just doesn’t see?

The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind

The answer is blowin’ in the wind

How many times must a man look up

Before he can see the sky?

Yes, ’n’ how many ears must one man have

Before he can hear people cry?

Yes, ’n’ how many deaths will it take till he knows

That too many people have died?

The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind

The answer is blowin’ in the wind. 

"Blowin' in the Wind," Bob Dylan's classic 1962 protest song, has had a long, rich life as an anthem for causes from civil rights to nuclear disarmament. In this song, the speaker poses a series of huge questions about the persistence of war and oppression, and then responds with one repeated, cryptic reply: "The answer, my friends, is blowin' in the wind." Finding an end to human cruelty, the song suggests, is a matter of understanding a truth that's all around but paradoxically impossible to grasp. 

◆Summary of the poem :-

How many paths does a person have to walk along before they're treated like a human being? How many oceans does a white dove have to fly over before she can rest on dry land? And how many times must weapons of war be fired before they're outlawed forever? The answer to these questions is just moving through the air, my friend, it's just moving through the air.

How long can a mountain be around before it crumbles into the ocean? How long can some human beings be around before they're finally freed from oppression? And how many times can a person look away from that oppression, acting like they simply don't see it? The answer to these questions is just moving through the air, my friend, it's just moving through the air.

How many times does a person have to look up before they actually see the sky? How many ears does a single person have to have before they'll actually listen to other people weeping? And how many people have to die for that same person to understand that there's too much death in the world? The answer to these questions is just moving through the air, my friend, it's just moving through the air.

◆Why i like this song ?

I like this song among all Bob Dylan songs. And it made an impact on me. Because this song indicates the reality of society and incomprehensible cruelty of war and oppression.

"Blowin' in the Wind," Bob Dylan's classic 1962 protest song, has had a long, rich life as an anthem for causes from civil rights to nuclear disarmament. In this song, the speaker poses a series of huge questions about the persistence of war and oppression, and then responds with one repeated, cryptic reply: "The answer, my friends, is blowin' in the wind." Finding an end to human cruelty, the song suggests, is a matter of understanding a truth that's all around but paradoxically impossible to grasp.

This song addresses the incomprehensible cruelty of war and oppression. In this song, the speaker asks a series of unanswerable questions about how long it will take for humanity to establish lasting peace, compassion, and justice, and then repeatedly concludes

“The answer is blowin’ in the wind.”

This ambiguous reply suggests the complexities of the question itself, if the answer is “blowin’ in the wind,” it’s either right there in front of people or it's impossible to grasp or both! That paradox also reflects on the nature of human cruelties, those obvious evils that humanity can’t seem to stop perpetuating. 

The speaker presents listeners with a series of big questions about war, oppression, and indifference throughout the song, treating these questions both as worldwide problems and the problems of every individual. To that end, the song's language is grand and general, and the use of biblically inflected images for instance, the searching dove as a symbol of peace suggests the scale and depth of the questions at hand, these are issues, the song implies, that go right to the roots of human nature itself. 

Of course, these questions also work on a more personal scale. Stopping war and oppression is the individual, internal work of “a man,” the song suggests, as much as that of a government or a nation, big cruelties can grow from individual attitudes to the world. 

Here i want to say that as the solution to all these problems, the song repeatedly insists, is both ever present and impossible to grasp: it’s “blowin’ in the wind,” at once as obvious and as invisible as the air itself. This paradoxical non answer suggests bewilderment in the face of human cruelty, but also a strange sort of hopefulness. One can’t pin the wind down, but it is everywhere.

Perhaps the song is suggesting that people need to think and perceive in new, freer ways in order to break out of their old patterns of war and violence. That this is a job both for humanity at large and for every “man” offers a grain of hope in the song as well, 

"If individual people can think in novel ways and come to understand how the answer might be “blowin’ in the wind,” maybe an end to war, cruelty, and oppression is possible after all." 

●Robert Frost●

Robert Frost, in full Robert Lee Frost, (born March 26, 1874, San Francisco, California, U.S. Died in January 29, 1963, Boston, Massachusetts), American poet who was much admired for his depictions of the rural life of New England, his command of American colloquial speech, and his realistic verse portraying ordinary people in everyday situations.

I like one of his poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" the most. Here is the poem… 

Whose 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 queer 

To stop without a farmhouse near 

Between the woods and frozen lake 

The darkest evening of the year. 

He gives his harness bells a shake 

To ask if there is some mistake. 

The only other sound’s the sweep  

Of 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" was written by American poet Robert Frost in 1922 and published in 1923, as part of his collection New Hampshire. The poem is told from the perspective of a traveler who stops to watch the snowfall in the forest, and in doing so reflects on both nature and society. Frost claimed to have written the poem in one sitting. Though this is likely apocryphal, it would have been particularly impressive due to the poem's formal skill, it is written in perfect iambic tetrameter and utilizes a tight-knit chain rhyme characteristic to a form called the Rubaiyat stanza.

◆Summary of the poem:-

The speaker thinks about who owns the woods that he or she is passing through, and is fairly sure of knowing the landowner. However, the owner's home is far away in the village, and thus he is physically incapable of seeing the speaker pause to watch the snowfall in the forest.

The speaker thinks his or her horse must find it strange to stop so far from any signs of civilization. Indeed, they are surrounded only by the forest and a frozen lake, on the longest night of the year.

The horse shakes the bells on its harness, as if asking if the speaker has made a mistake by stopping. The only other sound besides the ringing of these bells is that of the wind and falling snowflakes, which the speaker likens to the feathers of goose down.

The speaker finds the woods very alluring, drawn both to their darkness and how vast and all encompassing they seem. However, the speaker has obligations to fulfill elsewhere. Thus, though he or she would like to stay and rest, the speaker knows there are many more miles to go before that will be possible.

◆Why i like this song ?

This song made an impact on me. We see the contrast between society and the natural world. While society is a place of confinements and restrictions, nature is a place of respite and peace. I like one of this stanza, 

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. 

Speaker said that the woods are lovely, dark and deep, but he or she keeps promise that they have miles to go before they sleep. The speaker of the poem is mindful that he has "miles to go before" he can stop to rest, so aware is he and so pressing are his responsibilities that he actually repeats this idea twice at the end of the poem. He knows that his "promises" must be kept, his responsibilities met. However, he cannot help but be arrested by the beautiful and tranquil sight of the deep, dark woods "fill[ing] up with snow." It is the darkest evening of the year and the "downy flake" blows gently through the "lovely, dark and deep" forest. The speaker is so awed by the sight of the dark woods and the pure white snow that he stops, and even his horse is a little confused because he is used to their routine and knows that they would not normally "stop without a farmhouse near." Thus, one theme of the poem is that the beauty and tranquility of nature can provide a respite from the demands of society and work. 

Thank you…