Robert Frost’s poetry is infused with symbolism and connotativeness. Frost’s treatment of nature is not Romantic, and does not belong to moral edification like Wordsworth.” While Wordsworth makes the natural supernatural, and Coleridge leaves the supernatural natural, Robert Frost renders the natural universal. Fire and Ice”, though a small poem; it is full of powerful riddles and therefore has a universal appeal.
Some say that the world will end in fire;
Others with ice.
From those things that taste longing
I hold fire for those who favor it.
But if it were necessary to perish twice;
I think I know enough to hate
To say to the destruction of the ice
Also great
It would be enough.
Let me first address the essential difference between fire and ice. The four elements are earth, water, air and fire. They all hold exquisite cleansing properties. But fire has a property that none of these have. They purify the rest, but prepare the impure. Fire is the only element that purifies and remains uncontaminated even after purification. Furthermore, humans are more vulnerable to extreme cold than extreme heat. Hence the poet seems to favor ‘fire’ as an element over ice. To give the element of frost the second place, that is, if the earth perished twice.
Fire also represents the passion and warmth of love. Now that “ice” signifies the indifference and coldness of the blood, when the poet wants to love the earth in the previous article; in the latter part he comprehended the more easily to separate men from one another.
Then we take the ability of the earth to stop “ice” or “fire”. Only believers of faith should proceed to the second option; the agnostics would go for “ice”. He would therefore reveal the conflict between science and religion. Modern Science teaches how global warming is triggering a new ice age that will destroy all life like us. to know In Frost’s “Birches” he says that he wants to fold into the branches of the birches and climb to the heavenly heights. Afterwards he declares that he wishes to return to the earth, for “the earth is the place of love.” In “The The Road Not Taken”, he takes one of two roads and then thinks there is another way . Here also the poet seems to have been seized with U. He chooses fire first; then, if the earth is to perish twice, he is instead of ice. Anna.K.Juhnke in her essay “Religion in Robert Frost’s Poetry: A Story of Self Possession” states that “religious” is one of is the last of the adjectives used to describe Robert Frost’s poetry.
The following interpretation, which I find most probable, is: ‘fire’ and ‘ice’ for ‘hell’ and ‘heaven’ respectively. In the first case, he ultimately considers the world of hell to be appropriate through ‘desire’. He who cries out guilty must be examined. But he still asserts that if the world is going to perish twice, then he wants to choose ice or heaven, because the world has had enough of hatred. Robert Frost echoes that man is not always a ‘Faustian contract’. Man does not essentially have to pay a price for his product, he also owes his share of the ice.
Finally, as a literal analysis of the poem, I find that if Frontinus wanted the world to be destroyed by frost twice, it must have been due to ambition. Why? Because “ice” is nothing but a synonym for “Front” (the poet’s name).
