Fire and Ice
By– Robert Frost
Value Points of the Poem
- The poet feels that this world of ours will come to an end.
- He is not very clear when the end will come.
- He comes to this conclusion on the basis of what people say on this subject.
- He seems to show his agreement at what people say regarding the ending of the world.
- On the basis of what people think, the poet believes that this world will come to an end by the two highly contrasting but powerful elements of nature — fire and ice.
- Either fire or ice or both will be the cause of the ending of the world.
- Then the poet links these two powerful natural elements to human beings and their emotions.
- In the first stanza, the poet shows his agreement with those who believe that fire will cause the end of the world.
- He links the element of fire to the human emotion of desire or passions.
- The uncontrolled fire of passion and desire may lead us to the end of this world.
- Then, the poet comes to the second alternative that can cause the end of this world.
- It is the ‘ice’ which can also cause the end of the world.
- In terms of human emotion, ice means ‘hate’ created by ‘cold reasoning’.
- Cool and calculated icy reasoning can lead to hate and can be the cause of the end of this world.
- The poet himself has experienced both these primal emotions of love as well as hate, fire as well as ice, passions as well as cold reason.
- He has experienced enough of hate which is born out of icy cold reasoning.
- In the end, Frost agrees that it doesn’t matter whether it is fire or ice, bo can cause the end of the world.
- ‘Ice’ or ‘hate’ born out of cold reasoning is quite sufficient for causing the end of the world.
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