In A Vale by Robert Frost

By: Ana Salinas & Diana Martinez

Background on Robert Frost This poem was written between 1896-

1901, but it was not published until 1915 when he sent it to his close friend Sidney Cox.

In 1897, Frost enters Harvard as a freshmen.

In 1900, his first son Elliot dies of cholera, making his wife Elinor go into depression. His mother also dies of cancer

In 1901, his grandfather dies leaving Frost his Derry farm.

In a Vale When I was young, we dwelt in a vale 

By a misty fen that rang all night, And thus it was the maidens pale 

I knew so well, whose garments trail Across the reeds to a window light. The fen had every kind of bloom, 

And for every kind there was a face, And a voice that has sounded in my room 

Across the sill from the outer gloom. Each came singly unto her place, 

But all came every night with the mist; And often they brought so much to say 

Of things of moment to which, they wist, One so lonely was fain to list, 

That the stars were almost faded away Before the last went, heavy with dew, 

Back to the place from which she came- Where the bird was before it flew, 

Where the flower was before it grew, Where bird and flower were one and the same. 

And thus it is I know so well Why the flower has odor, the bird has song. 

You have only to ask me, and I can tell. No, not vainly there did I dwell, 

Nor vainly listen all the night long. 

TPCASTT: In a ValeTitle (prediction

& revisit) Prediction: -The speaker goes through a

significant, life changing event in a valley.

-The speaker is stuck and forced in a life/world that he/she does not desire to be in.

Revisit: -It is a good-bye to his

childhood memories (Vale in Latin means farewell)

-Vale could have been used as a pun for ‘veil’ meaning ‘a piece of fine material worn by women to protect or conceal the face’

Paraphrase The speaker is

remembering his childhood memories. His childhood memories remind him of a magical place that helps him escape reality. The magical place that he creates implies that there is some type of company that makes him feel less lonely and helps him with his problems. But at this point in his life, he realizes that it is time to mature and enter the real world.

TPCASTTAttitude

Reflective

Relaxed

Reminiscing

Tranquil

Comforting

Placid

Shift

The poem starts off with a relaxed, reflective tone because the speaker is remembering his childhood but then shifts to a more understanding tone when the speaker realizes that things have to change and that life is not how he pictured it.

TPCASTT

Theme

The overall theme of “In a Vale” is growing out of one’s comforting youth into the unexpected stage of adulthood. The poem also addresses gender roles and sexuality in the form of metaphors. The poet wants the reader to take away the idea of growing up and how the exploration of one’s body can influence general growth as a person, leaving all innocence aside.

TPCASTT

Connotation• Lines 18-20: Metaphor/ Figurative Language- The bird

represents a masculine character and the flower represents a feminine character. This suggests that before maturing (in any way, one of them being sexual relations) both genders were once both innocent.

• Lines 6-8: Personification- ‘Bloom’ is portrayed as a female character and the poet gives it human characteristics such as a face and voice.

• Lines 1,2, 5, 6, 9,11, 16: Diction- The poet’s choice of words like vale, fen, reeds, bloom, gloom, mist, and dew have an impact on the understanding of the work because it implies that the poem is about the pureness of nature which can relate to human innocence.

• Line 1: Latin Denotation- The word ‘vale’ in Latin means farewell.

Literary Criticism #1:

The poem “In a vale" focuses on a certain choice of words that distracts the reader from the actual meaning of the poem.

Poetic inspiration: the past and present provide the nutrients for a poetic future.

“’In a Vale’ is a dream wholly of the past, but it, too, looks ahead to a future where in the past will have been redeemed by the writing of the poem inspired by it”

The speaker is telling a story of the world that reveals itself in forms of odor and song which have been done so by human imagination including dreams.

Literary Criticism #2: He wrote it in the late 1990s but sent it to his friend Sidney

Cox in 1915. The maidens are portrayed as fairies who are looking for the

speakers home (the window). The word ‘vale’ may have been used as a pun with ‘veil’,

picturing many brides in the night behind the garments. Also the maidens emerged from the flowers and talked to the

speaker, which are the voices from his room, until the “stars were almost faded”.

He sees his youth as beauty resulting in a wonderful place in his memory with a great environment.

He does not regret his past, and as the poem comes to an end, he realizes that he has to mature and that the fairies will only visit him as long as his imagination is alive.

Keeping in mind that the word ‘vale’ in Latin means farewell, implying that the stage of immatureness had to come to an end.

This criticism considers that fact that it was only Frost's first years as a poet and he wanted to be unique.

Literary Criticism #3:

Frost creates a vision of a place where language and desire relate to each other by implication.

The vision of the world reflects a masculine struggle which is maturing.

The vale is an understandable place compared to the real world.

‘A veil in a vale’ The pale maidens are flowers come to life that

visit him nightly to converse with the speaker who willingly listens to them because he is lonely and young.

The maidens teach the speaker lessons. This poem contradicts Frost’s view of gender

roles.