Use of Dramatic Dialogue in Robert Frost’s Poetry

With reference to” The Death of Hired Man “and “Home Burial”.

A Paper prepared by:

Mr. Mohan H.Kalawate

Lecturer in English

S.I.T.C.O.E. Yadrav

Use of Dramatic Dialogue in Robert Frost’s Poetry

Robert Frost, in his poems has practiced some techniques in order to render the artistic effect of those poems. His famous collection of poems;”North of Boston (1913)”is known as A Book of People, because many of poems in this collection are about people, their lives etc .His technique of using human relationships, especially the husband-wife relationship as a theme of his po-ems is notable and the very purpose of this is to dramatize the’ marital dif-ferences’ and for the same he exploited some devices such as dramatic monologues, dramatic dialogues etc. Robert Frost has used five types of dia-logues, so for the proper understanding of his poetry it is obligatory to know how he used these in his poems.

Prior to all his use of dramatic monologue. Dramatic monologue is a type of lyric poem that was perfected by Robert Browning, in which a single per-son utters the speech and makes up the whole of the poem. Robert Brown-ing” My Last Duchess “is the best example of dramatic monologue. Like-wise in Robert Frost’s dramatic monologues which he used in his lyrics and meditative poems, he uses highly dramatized speaker. This speaker holds at-titudes and feelings that we are expected to credit. We tend to identify it as that of the poet himself. In Robert Frost’s “A Servant to Servants” the de-pressed, half mad woman speaking of her inner voice about serving men and of asylums, makes us to look behind the scene to Frost’s that is the implied poet’s judgments of his character. Either he himself is speaking or as a cre-ator stands apart lets the characters speak for themselves.

Second type of dialogue that he used arises from his extensive use of irony, the interplay between tow meanings as a struggle between two voices or selves. Such kind of struggle or ironic doubleness of sense implies ‘a muted dialogue’ between two selves within a single persona. e.g.

Better go down dignified,

With bough ten friendship at your side

Than none at all.” Provide. Provide.”

In above lines, the ironic is so sarcastic. The reader tends to separate the speaker distinctly from the poet after reading the words ‘provide, provide’.

Third type of dialogue also arises from the symbolic meaning or doubleness of meaning e.g. the dualistic allegories like ‘Road Not Taken” has in it the ex-treme use of symbolic effects which produce conflicting meanings and feel-ings which seems like dialogue.

The fourth kind of dialogue reveals Frost’s more broadly imaginative, highly sensitive self to surface and be identified as distinctly poetic voice in the lit-

erary tone. (Ref. “Robert Frost: An Anthology edited by Manorama Trikha > John Perry’s article: ‘The Voice dialogues in Robert Frost.’)

The fifth and most important type of dialogue is dramatic dialogue J.L.Styan defines dialogue as a dramatic speech. In that sense dramatic dialogue is di-alogue which creates dramatic situation. As far as the use of dramatic dia-logue in Frost’s poetry is concerned “The Death of Hired Man” and “Home Burial” are important poems. Both of the poems have the use of dramatic di-alogues which play a vital role. It gives us the clear cut idea about human re-lationships, their emotions, their conflict etc.

”The Death of Hired Man “is a narrative poem in which the function of dra-matic dialogue is rather crucial this poem may be regarded as a short drama because whole poem is nothing but the conversation between husband and wife, apart from these two characters Warren and Marry respectively there is another character Silas the hired man but he does not appear in the whole poem, even we can understand about him through the exchange of dia-logues between the couple. So here dialogues’ function is to give the infor-mation about character. The couple’s attitude about the old man creates the conflicting situation. Warren’s practical attitude and anger about Silas re-veals when he says:

“What good is he? who else will harbor him

At his age for the little he can do?”

Vise versa, his wife Mary is quite sympathetic towards Silas; she tries to con-sole her husband by saying:

“Be Kind”

So, here dramatic dialogue exhibits feelings before us such as anger and sympathy which can be regarded next function of dramatic dialogue.

There is an ongoing debate between husband and wife. Both they differ from each other in their way of thinking. This conflict of thoughts and exchange of philosophical opinions create dramatic situation e.g.

Warren defines home as:

“Home is the place where, when you

Have to go there they have take you in.”

Mary further adds:

I should have called it;

“Something you somehow haven’t to deserve”

These dialogues show us about Warren’s ‘practical’ attitude and Mary’s somewhat ‘spiritual’ because she thinks home as a heaven where Silas had came to die.

At the end of this poem, poet has created ambiguous situation. Mary felt that Silas would die soon and requests Warren to know about Silas’ plans regard-ing the farm and further she says he must not ridicule on him. She says:

“He has a plan; You mustn’t laugh at him,

He may not speak of it, and then he may,

I’ll sit and see if that small sailing cloud

Will hit or miss the moon.”

The underlined dialogues disclose that somehow she thought about Silas’ death symbolically the small sailing cloud stands for ‘death’ and if it will hit or miss the moon she want to know. After some time Warren returns and she just says:

“Warren?’

And then “Dead “was all he answered. Through these dialogues we get the final truth and that is Silas’ death.

“Home Burial” is another poem which is worth noting for use of dramatic dialogues. In this poem also there is an interaction between husband and wife. As it is mentioned earlier that Frost’s main purpose behind using dra-matic dialogues is to show the ‘marital differences’ and it becomes clear af-ter analyzing the poem. Both the husband and wife are emotionally blind. The husband’s practical view about his child’s death simply reflects when he describes the mound of his child as:

There are three stones of slate and one of marble,

Broad shouldered little slabs there in the sunlight

On the side hill, we haven’t to mind those,

But I understand; it is not the stones,

But the child’s mound.”

When he utters these dialogues he doesn’t understand the situation of the mother. And we can feel it when she says:

“Don’t don’t, don’t, don’t.”

So, the “emotional gulf” between the couple is presented by using the dra-matic dialogues and this gulf widens after as time passes. And for the reason

Frost has used such devices in order explain to the excessive intensity of the emotions.

Conclusion -

To sum up it can be said that Frost has intention to put the “marital differ-ences” and the complexity between human relationship; the conflict, and the conflict is better understood with the help of “ dialogues “and Frost has done the same thing by using dramatic dialogues in the poem.

Reference : Robert Frost: An Anthology, edited by Manorama Trikha. Drama: Theory and History.