Robert Frost house vandals sentenced to poetic punishment

It's not like it's a new issue. That poetry affects daily life is, almost literally, the first rule in the book. (You know, Plato's book, from 2400 years ago.) In his Republic, he expelled poets because they lie and lead to immoral behavior.

Of course, when a group of teenagers broke into the Vermont summer home of American poet Robert Frost to party last December and trashed the place—leaving beer cans, marijuana paraphernalia and vomit on the floor—the youthful perpetrators were likely not thinking a whole lot about ancient-Greek philosophy.

But the criminal justice system in Ripton, Vt., which offered partiers the option of studying the poetry of the man whose house they vandalized as court diversion, seems to have had a dialogue or two on its mind. Perhaps, as Plato's student Aristotle (and Frost himself) have insisted, poetry can be a good influence. Argued Frost once in a speech, "unless you are at home in the metaphor, unless you have had your proper poetical education... you are not safe anywhere."

For 25 of the teens, the classes began last week. Jay Parini, Frost biographer and professor at local Middlebury College, began by teaching "The Road Not Taken" (of two-roads-diverged-in-a-wood fame). "This is the irony of this whole thing," Parini railed, according to CNN. "You come to a path in the woods where you can say, 'Shall I go to this party and get drunk out of my mind?' Everything in life is choices.”

Parini couldn't resist waxing a bit poetic himself: “Believe me, if you’re a teenager, you’re always in the damned woods. Literally, you’re in the woods—probably too much you’re in the woods. And metaphorically you’re in the woods, in your life. Look at you here, in court diversion!" Mixed a bit, perhaps, but a metaphor indeed.

Related links:
Homer Noble Farm at FrostFriends.org
Robert Frost at PoetryFoundation.org
NPR: Vandals Forced to Study Poetry of Frost

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