Imagery and Theme in Frost\'s \"Out\" Robert

¶ … Imagery and Theme in Frost's "Out"

Robert Frost's "Out" may appear to be simple in its narrative, straightforwardly telling a story, yet its complex poetic style enables the reader to experience the tragic events that occur through a variety of poetic devices that Frost uses. The poem demonstrates the fickleness of fate and how some things are beyond an individual's control. In "Out," Frost explores the limitations that an individual has over how their life turns out through vivid imagery and its theme.

The poem tells the story of a young boy who accidentally had his hand cut off by a buzz saw and who subsequently died from the shock. "Out" highlights how quickly things can happen and how even a quick response may be futile. Frost establishes a narrative backdrop through imagery and onomatopoeia. For instance, the poem opens, "The buzz-saw snarled and rattled in the yard/And made dust and dropped stove-length sticks of wood/Sweet-scented stuff when the breeze drew across it." This description helps to establish where the horrific incident took place; Frost also helps to establish the region of the country where this lumbar yard, if it is a lumbar yard, is located. Frost establishes that this mill, or yard, is located somewhere where "lifted eyes could count/Five mountain ranges one behind the other/Under the sunset in far Vermont."

The tone quickly changes from a serene place where "sweet-scented stuff" fills the air to one of unexpected horror. Frost continues, "the saw snarled and rattled, snarled and rattled/As it ran light, or had to bear a load/And nothing happened: day was all but done." Frost's use of repetition in these lines helps to illustrate how the saw was continuously running, whether there was no wood that was being cut, or a load had just come in. Despite it being a mechanical object, Frost personifies the buzz-saw to emphasize its seeming excitement to have reached the end of the day. While the that operates the buzz-saw clearly knows that it is quitting time when supper is called, the buzz-saw appears to react to the same dinner call; "At that word, the saw/As if to prove saws knew what supper meant/Leaped out at the boy's hand, or so seemed to leap/He must have given the hand." It can be argued that both the boy and the saw attributed work with lumber and supper with meat and flesh hence the buzz-saw jumping to have a taste of the boy's hand.

The poem's tone once again shifts from serenity to horror to confusion as the boy does not know how to react to the buzz-saw's attack. Initially, "the boy's first outcry was a rueful laugh/And he swung toward them holding up the hand/Half in appeal, but half as if to keep/The life from spilling," however the boy is "old enough to know, big boy/Doing a man's work, though a child at heart." This description enables the reader to recognize the possibility that the boy was working not because he wanted to, but because his and his family's livelihood depended on it. Moreover, the boy, though a doctor was brought in to see if he could be saved and thus still be a valuable contribution to the work being done, may just be seen as another mouth to feed when resources are limited. While his death was tragic, everyone had to move on and was not given time to mourn. Frost ends the poem with a sense of helplessness writing, "No more to build on there. And they, since they/Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs."