Your introduction to the famous Robert Frost poem “The Road Not Taken” might have been when your grade-school teacher told you that the road in question was the one fewer people traveled. The road of independence. The better road. Go the wilder route, the poem says. Bushwhack to unseen beauty! Discover what others haven’t. You may have held on to that interpretation, but the road not taken, if you read carefully, is clearly not the same road as the “one less traveled.” The road not taken is simply the other road—the one that “bent in the undergrowth” of the yellow wood. The roads aren’t even that different, as described in these overlooked lines: “Though as for that the passing there/ Had worn them really about the same, / And both that morning equally This story is from Kinfolk Issue Thirty-Four Buy Now Related Stories Arts & Culture Issue 44 Hannah Traore The art world's next big thing is a gallerist. Arts & Culture Issue 44 The False Mirror Compositions inspired by the iconic clouds—and surrealist sensibilities—of René Magritte. Arts & Culture Issue 44 Boaz Nechemia Meet Jerusalem’s favorite weatherman. Arts & Culture Issue 44 Fredi Otto One scientist's mission to prove the link between extreme weather and climate change. Arts & Culture Issue 44 Ghostlore Four questions about supernatural studies. Arts & Culture Issue 44 Word: Anecdata Fact, meet fiction.
Arts & Culture Issue 44 The False Mirror Compositions inspired by the iconic clouds—and surrealist sensibilities—of René Magritte.
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