Robert Frost Biography

Robert Frost (1874-1963) was an American poet who is widely considered one of the most important and influential poets of the 20th century. He was born in San Francisco, California, but spent most of his childhood in New England, where he developed a love for the natural world that would later become a major theme in his poetry.

Frost attended Dartmouth College and later Harvard University, but he did not graduate from either school. Instead, he worked a variety of jobs, including as a teacher and a farmer, while also writing and publishing poetry. In 1912, he moved his family to England, where he became friends with several prominent poets, including Edward Thomas and Rupert Brooke.

Frost's first book of poetry, A Boy's Will, was published in 1913, followed by North of Boston in 1914. These books established Frost's reputation as a major poetic voice, and he went on to publish many more volumes of poetry over the course of his career.

Frost's poetry often explores themes of nature, rural life, and the human condition. He is known for his use of traditional forms and meters, as well as his skillful use of language and imagery. Some of his most famous poems include "The Road Not Taken," "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," and "Mending Wall."

Frost was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry four times during his career, and he was also awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 1960. He died in 1963 at the age of 88, leaving behind a legacy as one of the greatest poets of his time.

Robert Frost Childhood

Robert Frost was born in San Francisco, California. Robert Frost’s father is journalist William Prescott Frost who is descended from Nicholas Frost of Tiverton, Devon, England, who had sailed to New Hampshire in 1634 on the Wolfrana. His mother is of Scottish descent Isabelle Moodie.

Frost's father was a teacher at the San Francisco Evening Bulletin. This place could be later to become the San Francisco Examiner. After his father died on May 5, 1885, the family eventually moved nationwide to Lawrence, Massachusetts, under the auspices of Robert's grandfather who is William Frost Sr., the foreman of a New England factory. Frost graduated from Lawrence High School in 1892. At the same time, Frost's mother joined the Swedish Bolivian Church, where she was baptized, but he left her as an adult.

In spite of, his later association with rural life, Frost grew up in the city, and published his first poem in his high school's magazine. Then he attended Dartmouth College long enough to be accepted into the Theta Delta Chi fraternity. Frost returned home to teach and to work at various jobs including delivering newspapers and factory labor. He did not enjoy these jobs at all, feeling his true calling as a poet.

Adult years

In 1894, he sold his first poem, My Butterfly: An Elegy that poem published in New York Independent, November 8, 1894 for $ 15. Proud of this success, he proposed to Erinor Miriam White to marry her, but he rejected because she wanted to graduate from college before her marriage. Frost then traveled to Greater Dismal Swamp, Virginia, and asked again when he returned to Erinor for marriage. After her graduation, she agreed.

He and Elinor were married on December 19, 1895. Their first child, a son they named Elliott, was born on September 29, 1896. Robert was accepted at Harvard as a special student, but had to drop out due to tuberculosis and the birth of the couple's second child in 1899. He never finished his college education.

After working at Harvard, he left to help his growing family. His grandfather Frost had bought a farm for young couple in Derry, New Hampshire, shortly before his death. Robert then worked on the farm for nine years, writing early in the morning and producing many of the later famous poems. Eventually his farming failed and he returned to teach English teacher at Pinkerton Academy and New Hampshire Normal School (now Plymouth State University) in Plymouth.

In 1912 Frost sailed with his family to Great Britain. His first book of poetry, A Boy's Will, was published in 1913. Frost wrote some of his best work while in England.
As the new century dawned, the Frost family was afflicted with the first of the tragedies that would dog them all of their lives. Elliott contracted cholera and died in July of 1900, a development that rocked the Frost marriage (Frost later addressed the event in his poem "Home Burial"). Frost's mother died that year from cancer, and his grandfather, William Prescott Frost Sr., passed away in 1901.

As World War I began, Frost returned to America in 1915. He bought a farm in Franconia, New Hampshire, where he launched a career of writing, teaching, and lecturing. This family homestead served as the Frosts' summer home until 1938, and is maintained today as 'The Frost Place', a museum and poetry conference site at Franconia. During the years 1916–20, 1923–24, and 1927–1938, Frost taught English at Amherst College, Massachusetts, notably encouraging his students to account for the sounds of the human voice in their writing.

As World War I began, Frost returned to America in 1915. He bought a ranch in Franconia, New Hampshire, where he launched a career of teaching, writing, and lecturing. This family homestead served as the Frosts' summer home until 1938, and is maintained moment as' The Frost Place', a museum at Franconia.

For forty-two years, from 1921 to 1963, Frost taught at the Bread Loaf School of English of Middlebury College, at the mountain campus at Ripton, Vermont. He is credited as a great effect upon the development of the school and its writing programs; the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference gained reputation during Frost's tenure there.

Harvard's 1965 alumni guidebook specifies Frost received an honorary degree there. He also received honorary degrees from Bates College and from Oxford and Cambridge universities; and he was the first person to take two honorary degrees from Dartmouth College. Frost has been frequently but erroneously mentioned as a Nobel laureate, but he never won the prize.

Frost was 86 when he spoke and did a reading of his poetry at the opening of President John F. Kennedy on January 20, 1961. Approximately two years later, on January 29, 1963, he died, in Boston, of complications from prostate surgery.

He was buried at the Old Bennington Cemetery in Bennington, Vermont. His epitaph reads, "I had a lover's quarrel with the world."

In 1996 three poets who won the Nobel Prize for literature, Joseph Brodsky, Seamus Heaney and Derek Walcott jointly published an homage to the influence of Frost, whom they feel is one of literature's greatest poets.

Against the end of his life he had achieved a popular acclaim unique for an American poet, though his critical reputation had declined due to a diminution of his powers. "A Witness Tree", his last truly important book of verse, was published in 1942. His final three books of poetry were not as praised as his older poetry had been, though certain pieces were acknowledged as among his best. Frost's poems are critiqued in the "Anthology of Modern American Poetry", Oxford University Press, where it is mentioned.

One of the inventive collections of Frost materials, to which he himself contributed, is found in the Special Collections department of the Jones Library in Amherst, Massachusetts. The collection consists of approximately twelve thousand items, including original manuscript poems and letters, correspondence, and photographs, as well as audio and visual recordings.