By ROBERT FOREST

‘The way to dust death. Out, out, brief candle!’, in these lines, Shakespeare
comments on the fragility of life, comparing it to a candle that can so easily be
blown out. Frost uses this allusion since the main theme of his poem is death and
so this quote from Macbeth is particularly relevant.
Auditory imagery used to give the reader a vivid experience

Alliteration of harsh
There’s is stark contrast The buzz saw snarled and rattled in the yard consonants- creates
in the atmosphere, a sense of danger
And made dust and dropped stove-length sticks of
hence Juxtaposition is
created.
wood,
Sweet-scented stuff when the breeze drew across it. Sibilance- gives a
sinister value
Only the people that And from there those that lifted eyes could count
has time would enjoy
the scenery whereas Five mountain ranges one behind the other
these people do not Personification- The
Under the sunset far into Vermont.
have the time since buzz saw is compared
they must work. Sunset shows the end of the day. It is appropriate to a ferocious beast by
because as the day come to an end, the boy’s life the word ‘snarled’.
ends too.

Feels foreshadowing
And the saw snarled and rattled, snarled and rattled, We are brought back to
as ‘nothing the lurking danger.
happened’ seems like As it ran light, or had to bear a load.
something is going to
happen. And nothing happened: day was all but done.
Repetition of ‘snarled
Call it a day, I wish they might have said and rattled’ shows the
repetitive work of the
Sadness is created as
To please the boy by giving him the half hour machine.
the little boy is working
nonstop even without That a boy counts so much when saved from work.
a break when he
should play at that age
instead of working,
emphasizes the boy’s If they had stopped working at this time, nothing bad would have
youth and innocence. happened and the boy’s life would have been saved

Dinuli de Alwis Year 11S1 Horizon College Int.

 ‘Leaped’ seems as if
the saw has responded
to ‘supper’, as if the
saw has life. It also
hints that the saw is
evil.
Enjambment- used
to enhance the
tension of the
climax of the poem
and emphasize the
horror and intensity
of the moment.
The boy’s sister is
also doing domestic
His sister stood beside them in her apron work, this portrays
To tell them “Supper.” At the word, the saw, the cruel child labor.
As if to prove saws knew what supper meant,
Leaped out at the boy’s hand, or seemed to leap— The use of many
punctuations shows
He must have given the hand. However it was, the confusion of what
happened.
Neither refused the meeting. But the hand!
Creates a lot of shock to the reader as all this
happens at once and is very unexpected.

Oxymoron- shows how

confused and shocked the
The boy’s first outcry was a rueful laugh, boy is. This evokes
Creates a lot of sympathy in the reader
impact and shocking As he swung toward them holding up the hand, for the boy.
visual imagery as if
Half in appeal, but half as if to keep It also shocks the reader
with the blood, the
and helps us understand
boy’s life is also The life from spilling. Then the boy saw all—
the boy’s shock.
spilling away.
Since he was old enough to know, big boy
Disturbing visual
Doing a man’s work, though a child at heart—
imagery created.
Creates a lot of He saw all spoiled. “Don't let him cut my hand off—
impact in the
reader. The doctor, when he comes. Don't let him, sister!” Evokes sympathy for
the boy as was
expected to grow up
Direct speech- creates sympathy for the child as he is soon and do a man’s
desperate and is literally begging to keep his hand. work. This shows the
insight of the society.

Strong word choice-

shows that the boy’s Repetition- The fast-paced
hand is beyond any dialogues show the desperation
repair. and the fear of the small boy

Dinuli de Alwis Year 11S1 Horizon College Int.


Short sentence- cuts off
the boy’s speech just like
how his hand was cut off,
which creates a sense of
finality.
Short, fragmented
sentences make the
moment of his death
sudden which creates
a lot of impact.
So. But the hand was gone already. The only thing they
could do was relieve
The doctor put him in the dark of ether. the boy of pain
He lay and puffed his lips out with his breath.
Alludes to death as
And then—the watcher at his pulse took fright. it foreshadows
No one believed. They listened at his heart. what is to come.
Little—less—nothing!—and that ended it.
Matter of fact tone-
No more to build on there. And they, since they shows that death
might be a common
Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs.
thing for them.

So, in the end the boy's life meant really very little to the Repetition emphasizes the ambiguity
of ‘they’- could be refereeing to how
others, they who have to carry on the struggle for survival
all the society is so cruel and
in what is a harsh New England environment. This echoes insensitive.
the words of Macbeth in Shakespeare's play when he
suggests that life is like a brief candle, all too easily
snuffed out.

Form and Structure

➢ This is a free-verse poem that portrays the shock of the incident and the
tragedy of the boy.
➢ The sudden breaks in the lines also shows the confusion of the boy during the
climax.

• ALLITERATION of ‘s’ and ONOMOTOPEIA of ‘buzz’, ‘snarled’, ‘rattled’

and ‘breeze’ early in the poem to establish the sound of the saw.

• ALLITERATION of ‘day was all but done’ which gives a sense of finality to
make the accident which is about to happen even more unexpected.

• Saw is PERSONIFIED in ‘had to bear a load’ and is a METAPHOR for the

hard work and industrial labor of people.

Dinuli de Alwis Year 11S1 Horizon College Int.

 • COLLOQUIL PHRASES such as ‘call it a day’, ‘supper’ and ‘big boy’ gives a
sense of familiarity that CONTRASTS with the emotionless machine and the
cold attitude given in the poem when the boy dies.

• FORESHADOWING such as ‘I wish they might have said’ and ‘put him in
the dark’, ups the tension and makes us feels sympathy for the boy.

• 4 lines to describe the single moment of cutting his hand- reflets how scary
moments last forever and increases the intensity of the moment. In contrast
the moment of death is given in a mere 3 stilted words, to reflect his sudden
anti-climatic death. The climax is cutting the hand- death is just the
aftermath.

• ‘No more to build on there’, is a pun, because the boy can no longer work-
so he’s apparently not worthy to talk about anymore.

• CAESURA (pause for effect) in the ‘life from spilling’ emphasizes the intense
moment and realization of the boy that he would probably die from this.

• CUTTING OFF the title quote and the boys dialogue with one-word
sentences ‘So’, mirror the literal cutting off his hand and subsequently his life.

Dinuli de Alwis Year 11S1 Horizon College Int.