John H. Timmerman
Published: 2002
Total Pages: 212
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Robert Frost: The Ethics of Ambiguity examines Frost's ethical positioning as a poet in the age of modernism. The argument is that Frost constructs his poetry with deliberate formal ambiguity, withholding clear resolutions from the reader. Therefore, the poem itself functions as metaphor, inviting the reader into a participation in constructing meaning. Furthermore, the ambiguity of ethical positioning was intrinsic to Frost himself. Nonetheless, by holding his poetry up to several traditional ethical views -- Rationalist, Theological, Existentialist, Deotological, and Social Ethics -- one may define a congruent ethical pattern in both the poetry and the person.