Mending Wall

Every year in spring, the poet and his neighbour walk along the stone wall which separates their two farms and they repair the wall -- putting back the stones which have rolled off.

The poet asks questions about how the wall might have fallen down in the first place -- making a game of it by suggesting such things as the elves having done it.

The two men, however, have very different ideas about the purpose of the wall: the poet sees no need for it because it acts as a barrier between them, while the neighbour believes that the wall keeps the good relationship going between the owners of the separate farms.

Robert Frost was born in San Francisco in 1874. At the age of 11, he moved to New England, and it would be there that he would attain his rural poetic flair.

He attended Harvard University, where he married Elinor White. His grandfather bought them a farm where they would stay for some nine years and where he would work early in the mornings writing many of the poems which made him famous.

In 1912, Frost moved to England where he would flesh out his poetic ability and come under the influence of several English poets -- and also of the American, Ezra Pound.

In 1915, soon after the Great War began, Frost and his wife returned to America and bought a farm in New Hampshire. There the poet spent much of his time writing and teaching. From 1916 through to 1938 he lectured English at Amherst College.

Frost was already 86 when John F. Kennedy was inaugurated as President of the United States of America. The poet was invited to attend and to speak at the function. It was the final moment of an illustrious life. Two years later -- in January 1963 -- he died from blood clots to his lungs.

"Mending Wall" was written in 1916 and describes an incident on his farm in New Hampshire. He would use the expression, "Good fences made good neighbours", an idea which he himself clearly despised -- and yet the quote has gone on to be used ever since in a most positive light.

Read the left column and then answer
the following questions:


"Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast."

• What is it that doesn't love a wall? (4)

[Need help?]

The poet is playing with words here. There is some Being, he says, which sends the frost that causes the ground to swell. Is it Jack Frost? At the same time, however, the poet's name is also Frost and he too does not like the wall. Therefore neither Jack Frost nor Robert Frost like the wall!

• What word or words tell you that the fallen rocks are not carefully stacked on the ground? (2)

[Need help?]

The poet uses the word "spills" which means that something is upset in no organised fashion. It's all higgledy piggledy!

• Is "frozen-ground-swell" an example of a proper noun, a common noun, an abstract noun or a compound noun? Explain your answer. (3)

[Need help?]

A compound noun is a word which is made up of several parts and is joined together by hyphens. So, yes, this is a compound noun.

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"The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there."

• Name the TWO forces that are at work to destroy the wall? (2)

[Need help?]

There is the frost which expands the rocks and causes them to fall, and the hunters who rip parts of the wall to pieces to get to the rabbit hiding within.

• What THREE CONSECUTIVE WORDS tell you clearly that the poem is set in Spring? (3)

[Need help?]

"At spring mending-time" surely! Do I hear you say that that is FOUR words? Remember that "mending-time" is a compound noun and therefore classifies as only ONE word.

• Describe the wall in your own words. (6)

[Need help?]

It's an old stone wall, isn't it? The rocks are sometimes quite large so that they struggle to lift them. And they are of different shapes, some even so round that they find it very difficult to balance them. But, after the winter, there are gaps in the wall here and there where stones have fallen down -- either because of the frost or from the hunters tearing the rocks down looking for rabbits which are hiding there from the dogs.

• Why do you think the hunters destroy the walls? (4)

[Need help?]

Be careful here. The hunters take the wall to pieces to uncover the rabbit which has hidden amongst the rocks. The object is NOT to kill the rabbit but to set it free so that they can chase it once again.

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"No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go."

• Where does the neighbour live? What words tell you this? (4)

[Need help?]

The neighbour lives on the next-door farm which is "over the hill" from the poet.

• What is the difference between the neighbour's farm and that belonging to the poet? (2)

[Need help?]

The neighbour grows pine trees while the poet grows apple trees. "He is all pine and I am apple orchard."

• Explain in your own words how the neighbour and the poet go about mending the wall. (4)

[Need help?]

They each walk on their own side of the wall, keeping the wall between them. Each picks up the stones that have fallen on his side, and places them back on the wall. They do appear to converse as they walk, although it seems that they have their disagreements.

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