Compare And Contrast Birches By Robert Frost And The Schoolboy byWilliam Blake

Differences:-
(1) Background. The poets share differences in territorial background; William Blake was an English poet born in Broadwick St. Soho, London. While Robert Frost was an American poet born in San Francisco, California.

(2) Plot. Both poems go different direction in terms of narration. The Schoolboy by William Blake talks about child who preferred informal education to the mandatory formal education enforced on him by his parents; while Birches by Robert Frost speaks of his delightful childhood experience of swinging birches

when he happened to find a bent birch tree in passing.

(3) Structure. Another difference can be seen in the craft of both poems. The Schoolboy is a 30 line rhyming poem of six stanzas (with end rhyme scheme of ABABB ACACC) while Birches is a 60 line blank verse with no stanza division.

Similarities:-
(1) Nature. They are romantic poets which makes the theme of nature so inevitable. Both persona found an undeniable delight in natural elements; "So was I once myself a swinger of birches/ And so I dream of going back to be" (says Birches by Robert Frost) "I love to rise in a summer morn/ When the birds sing on every tree" (say The Schoolboy by William Blake)

(2) Youthfulness. This is also found in both poems while the youthful schoolboy worried what his adult memories of youth would be if his childhood joy is caged like a bird, on the other hand, the speaker in Birches reminisced his youth at the sight of a bent birch tree.

(3) Freedom. The theme of youthful freedom and the importance of freedom to humankind cannot go unnoticed in the two poems. With the repeated use of rhetorical questions in stanzas 4-6, the schoolboy called for his freedom while Robert Frost in Birches did not only point out the freedom derived in swinging the birches, he also demand his freedom to act without imposition or criticism; "May no fate willfully misunderstand me/ And half grant what I wish and snatch me away/ Not to return. Earth's the right place for love" (says lines 51-53) he closed the poem by saying "One could do worse than be a swinger of birches".

(4) Diction. Another noted similarity is in the chosen words which are very simple to comprehend. Both persona spoke from the first person perspective "I".

[attitude of poet towards nature in birches]

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Samuel C. Enunwa aka samueldpoetry
(the Leo with wings flying)

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How Can You Explain Nostalgia In Birches By Robert Frost

Nostalgic feeling partially surfaced in the poem Birches by Robert Frost in line 23 to 24, "I should prefer to have some boy bend them/ As he went out and in to fetch the cows_"
partially making reference to the nature of his own background as a rural boy who played alone swinging the birch trees remembering how the pleasure used to be "riding them down over and over again/ Until he took the stiffness out
of them/ And not one but hung limp, not one was left/ For him to conquer."( line 29-32)

The full nostalgia began from line 41-44: "So was I once myself a swinger of birches/ And so I dream of going back to be/ It's when I'm weary of considerations/ And life is too much like a pathless wood" because of the burdens and boredom and monotony in adulthood and aging excluding the act of love he enjoyed.

The poem speaker further explained how swinging birches will balance his leaving the earth and returning compared to his leaving the earth after he must have died and wont be opportuned to return.

The poem maintained the theme of balancing, the theme of natural effect versus artificial effect, the theme of irreversibility, etc.

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Samuel C. Enunwa aka samueldpoetry
(the winged Leo in the sky soaring

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