{"product_id":"the-road-not-taken-finding-america-in-the-poem-everyone-loves-and-almost-everyone-gets-wrong-9780143109570","title":"The Road Not Taken: Finding America in the Poem Everyone Loves and Almost Everyone Gets Wrong","description":"\u003cb\u003eA cultural \"biography\" of Robert Frost's beloved poem, arguably the most popular piece of American literature\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e\"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood . . .\"\u003c\/i\u003e One hundred years after its first publication in August 1915, Robert Frost's poem \"The Road Not Taken\" is so ubiquitous that it's easy to forget that it is, in fact, a poem. Yet poetry it is, and Frost's immortal lines remain unbelievably popular. And yet in spite of this devotion, almost everyone gets the poem hopelessly wrong. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e David Orr's\u003ci\u003e The Road Not Taken \u003c\/i\u003edives directly into the controversy, illuminating the poem's enduring greatness while revealing its mystifying contradictions. Widely admired as the poetry columnist for\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003ethe\u003ci\u003e New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e, Orr is the perfect guide for lay readers and experts alike. Orr offers a lively look at the poem's cultural influence, its artistic complexity, and its historical journey from the margins of the First World War all the way to its canonical place today as a true masterpiece of American literature. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \"The Road Not Taken\" seems straightforward: a nameless traveler is faced with a choice: two paths forward, with only one to walk. And everyone remembers the traveler taking \"the one less traveled by, \/ And that has made all the difference.\" But for a century readers and critics have fought bitterly over what the poem really says. Is it a paean to triumphant self-assertion, where an individual boldly chooses to live outside conformity? Or a biting commentary on human self-deception, where a person chooses between identical roads and yet later romanticizes the decision as life altering? \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e What Orr artfully reveals is that the poem speaks to \u003ci\u003eboth \u003c\/i\u003eof these impulses, and all the possibilities that lie between them. The poem gives us a portrait of choice without making a decision itself. And in this, \"The Road Not Taken\" is distinctively American, for the United States is the country of choice in all its ambiguous splendor. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Published for the poem's centennial--along with a new Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition of Frost's poems, edited and introduced by Orr himself--\u003ci\u003eThe Road Not Taken \u003c\/i\u003eis a treasure for all readers, a triumph of artistic exploration and cultural investigation that sings with its own unforgettably poetic voice. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cb\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003eThe Road Not Taken\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \"The most satisfying part of Orr's fresh appraisal of 'The Road Not Taken' is the reappraisal it can inspire in longtime Frost readers whose readings have frozen solid. The crossroads between the poet and the man is where Frost leaves his poems for us to discover, turning what seems like a fork in the road into a site of limitless potential.\" --\u003ci\u003eThe Boston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e David Orr\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Penguin Publishing Group\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 08\/16\/2016\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 192\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.3lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 7.70h x 5.00w x 0.60d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780143109570","brand":"Penguin Publishing Group","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43256041078921,"sku":"9780143109570","price":24.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0636\/9240\/6921\/files\/img_e587d44b-5051-482e-8530-e36bc821052e.jpg?v=1736236159","url":"https:\/\/sonsanddaughtersbooks.com\/products\/the-road-not-taken-finding-america-in-the-poem-everyone-loves-and-almost-everyone-gets-wrong-9780143109570","provider":"Sons and Daughters Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}