Robert Frost: A Lover's Quarrel with the World Page #3

And there's usually an occasion.

I don't know- meeting somebody

or reading somethin' in the paper...

hearing something about the World.

It's all just- just this one thing:

A think.

And the excitement

you get out of havin' a think...

that you Want to pass to other people.

And sometimes, as I say,

when it's too much for me...

and I can't say anything to it,

I say, Me for the woods.

- [Audience Laughs]

- That's one of my oldest sayings.

Doesnt matter What it is,

family troubles...

any kind, I say,

Me for the woods.

[ Birds Tweeting ]

This is a regular spring thing...

to get here and see

what's lived through the Winter.

It took a long time to be a Vermonter.

I came here in '20.

See how many years ago that is.

And for years

I wasn't called a Vermonter.

They'd have meetings and things

about poetry...

but they considered me an outsider.

Then this last year they made me

Poet of Vermont.

[ Man Reciting]

Oh, the little town of Ripton...

up near the mountaintop,

Where city folks come and go...

and for a short time stop...

to view the mountain scenery

and breathe the mountain air...

and wonder at us simple folks

who get our living there.

It is Robert Frost the poet

that put Ripton on the map.

While others we are proud to know,

he is our leading champ.

For others our esteem may grow.

None shall go above him.

For he loves man and nature so,

that is why we love him.

[Man ] Built that lawn for him.

I put that lawn in.

And though there's

a number of things...

that he can think of-

[ Laughs ]

He's a nice man. Nice man.

-[ Man] Do you like his poetry'?

- Yes, I like it very well.

It, uh- I think he's one

of the most famous in Vermont.

[ Woman ]

I think perhaps with Sandburg...

he's one of the truly great

American poets that we have.

At any rate, in my opinion.

Perhaps in Mr. Kennedy's.

[ Man ]

What is your favorite Frost poem?

I think I like Birches.

Birches.

Birches.

[ Chuckles ]

[ Man ] Which of Robert Frost's

poems is your favorite?

- Who?

- Robert Frost.

- [Water Running]

- Funny world, isn't it?

[ Frost ] Where you came from

is of very great importance.

Your family ways.

I was brought up

and started life in San Francisco.

My father was Chairman

of the Democratic City Committee...

when Cleveland was elected.

I never Went to school

till I was about 12 years old.

And I wasn't very well. And I Went

downtown with my father all the time.

I had all of my of my noon meals

in the big headquarters...

of the democratic party, the saloon,

Abe Levy's saloon...

and I was a sort of...

a political kid around.

L- I came East.

My mother would leave us at

Omaha, then Chicago...

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