The Portrayal Of Landscape Relating To Friendship In The Poems Written By Thomas And Frost

In an examination of the close relationship between the portrayal of landscape and friendship in the poems of Edward Thomas and Robert Frost, I would like to particularly focus on one poem by each poet: `Iris by Night` by Robert Frost, and `The sun used to shine` by Edward Thomas. These, I feel offer a compelling insight into this relationship, as well as an interesting contrast in that Frost`s poem, published in 1936, was written after the death of Thomas, and so is arguably more nostalgic about the friendship between the two men.

Both `Iris by Night` and `The sun used to shine` can be presumed to reflect on the unique summer month of August 1914 that the two men spent together in Gloucestershire, as this was the only substantial length of time Frost and Thomas spent in each others company. We can see in each poem the importance of landscape and nature to the time that they spent together, which is in a sense biographical as it is documented that they would spend hours walking together, during which they "talked-of flowers, childhood, Shakespeare, women, England, the war-or [they] looked at the far horizon, which some dip or gap occasionally disclosed." (Thomas` article for The Nation in Elected Friends, 24)

Tim Kendall writes "Walking and talking: how fortuitous it is that they should rhyme. After all, what is poetry but a special way of pacing out speech; a play of content and measure?" (`One Another`s Guide: Robert Frost and Edward Thomas`, 4) Looking particularly at `The sun used to shine`, the rhythmic pattern of the poem is fairly disjointed and often feels oddly punctuated, perhaps somewhat mimicking the meandering movement and pace of the `two walk[ing]`, without particular purpose, but to admire beauty and converse. Indeed, Thomas himself states that they would walk `in a long loop` (Elected Friends), suggesting both the purposeless ease of their strolls, as well perhaps as indicating the inclusive and eternal unity of their friendship, which I will return to when addressing Frost`s poem in a moment. The idea of inclusiveness is particularly strong in Thomas` poem with the constant reiteration of their company: `we two walked`, `our eyes`, `like us two`. In any other situation perhaps the level of intimacy suggested by this bond could be representative of a romantic love, however here this simply reinforces the easy affinity between the two men. This idyllic affinity is further emphasised in Thomas` portrayal of the landscape around them and their place within it. The way he describes the `yellow flavorous coat of an apple`, both sets the scene of summer weather, as well as insinuating perhaps biblical references to the temptation and the fall. This places the men in Thomas` memory firmly in the pre-fall, paradisiacal era, particularly resonant as it took place during what was known as `the golden summer` before the war, in 1914. Thomas` assertion that the men `never disagreed which gate to rest on` further illustrates the ease of their relationship, and the harmonious connection portrayed between that unity and the pair`s interactions with the landscape that surrounds them. There is perhaps symmetry to be noted between the natural ease of the men`s friendship, and the innately natural scenery and circumstance of many of their poems describing their friendship, illustrated nowhere more perfectly than the descri ption of the men in the final stanza as `under the same moon`. Critic Jeremy Hooker notes that `the delight [the poets] shared, in each other, in nature and books, in walking and talking, shines in their reminiscences." (`Alone in Life: The friendship of Robert Frost and Edward Thomas`, 39) This is perhaps particularly notable in the way Thomas attempts to historicise the men`s shared experiences in `The sun used to shine`. There is a purposeful transcendental quality to be noted perhaps in the mythological references used in regards to the landscapes, `as if.In sunless Hades fields`, and the way in which their eyes `could as well imagine the Crusades or Caesar`s battles` taking place there. This serves both to illustrate the importance of these visions to the two men, but perhaps also by describing them in such language, implies an ascension to the ranks of mythology, as though they are the kind preserved by years of being remembered, which of course foreshadows Frost`s long lifetime of remembrance. The final stanza of the poem is perhaps that which most neatly ties together the portrayal of landscapes with it`s significance to the friendship of the two men, as Thomas describes that which facilitates a friendship`s `easy hours` as `other flowers in those fields under the same moon`. Here once again, we find implication of nature, or in this case, the moon particularly, illuminating and assisting the mens` friendship, and more generally, of the moon as a soothing presence, uniting all men who wish to `go talking`. There is also arguably an allusion to a passing on or rebirth in the mention of `other men` rather than a continuation of their own story. This theme can also be noted in Frost`s `Iris by Night` in his reference to `the fragments of a former sun`, which `concentrate anew and rise as one`. Written after Thomas` death, this could be an allusion to pieces broken parts of a memory back together, or to pieces of the picture having been lost along the way, but `renewed` by his reliving the memory in this poem. This motif of the sun as both self-healing and healing of others is reinstated in Thomas` own letter to Frost, where he writes: There was a beautiful return of sun yesterday after a misty moisty morning and everything smelt wet and warm and cuckoos called and I found myself with nothing to say but `God bless it`. (Elected Friends, 52) "Iris by Night` is almost entirely written in iambic pentameter, excluding one line: `Had taken all the water it could as dew`. There are several possible reasons for this exclusion, which is interesting in an otherwise particularly rhythmic poem, and worth noting. It is possible that the line`s representation of the `rowan on the ground` having taken too much water to handle, and therefore that greed and bloating, is being represented by that same over-filling of the line and the rhythmic meter. Alternatively, perhaps the word `taken`, is almost blameful of the natural world`s "taking" of Thomas, and as such is an almost bitter refusal to fit into any understandable or conforming pattern within the poem. In the first line of the poem, Frost calls the men `one another`s guide.down a Malvern side`, which fairly explicitly relates their friendship to the scenery around them. In this case, they are helping each other to realise and navigate the landscape, with the purity and naturalness emphasised with language such as `wet fields` and `dripping hedges`. This togetherness is further illustrated throughout the descri ption of the men seeing the rainbow, similarly to Thomas` poem, as Frost describes `our eyes`, `we two stood` and `we were vouchsafed`. The symmetry between this unity and togetherness between the men and that in the landscape is much more didactic in Frost`s `Iris by Night`, as I would argue that it is represented by the rainbow, which, despite nature`s laws stating its ends should be separated, joined them `together in a ring` in a `moon-made prismatic bow`. This idea of the moon as a unifying force resonates with Thomas` similar theme, and the language used to describe the rainbow, as a `gate` and as `a miracle` certainly implies a transcendental quality to the union. This is particularly poignant given that Frost writes years after the death of his friend. In `Iris by Night`, I would argue there is perhaps an element of Frost searching for that connection with Thomas again, and finding it in his memories of such a unifying shared experience, illustrated by the way the rainbow `softly circled round` the two men, protecting them `from all division time or foe can bring`. This foreshadowing of the division that would separate them only a few years after the occasion occurred is likely due to hindsight of course, however Frost clearly illustrates the peace and tranquillity that the beauty and `wonder` of that moment bestowed upon the men. He reiterates the inclusiveness of the shared experience, describing it as a `miracle/ That never yet to other two befall/ And I alone of us have lived to tell`, suggesting that whilst he only is able to relate the story through his poetry, the memory still very much belong to the men as a pair, as a solidifying moment in their friendship. I would argue that each of these poems, through use of rhythmic pattern, elevated language and descri ptions, particularly focus on aspects of the landscape they experience together which especially illuminate or transform it, such as the sun, the moon and the rainbow. By relating these powerful illuminations to their friendship, Frost and Thomas are able perhaps to reflect the inspiration that each poet offers to the other, and therein represent the innate and transformative nature of their friendship, and what it has contributed to each of them, personally and creatively.