Brodsky's "On Grief and Reason" Interpretation

Joseph Brodsky’s argument in “On Grief and Reason” is that the terror, tragedy, grief, and most importantly reason are “language’s most efficient fuel.” Brodsky examines Frost’s lyrical and narrative sides in “Come In” and “Home Burial,” and with each assertion he explicates a bigger picture than the one given, he breaks down each line to show the pain within it, and the reason for its importance. He supports this argument several times by first asserting how people see simple things differently such as an American and European viewing of a “tree.” He takes both poems by Frost line by line showing what they each mean beyond what they seem like from the exterior. He spends most of his examination of “Come In” discussing the thrush and its importance in the poem despite its simplicity. He shows how “Come In” is really in part about a man “shielding himself from his own insights,” which is his grief as well as Frost’s reason. The same goes for “Home Burial” and how it is “drama” from the beginning. He explains the poems continued tragedy and how it is “darker than the mind of the maker.” I do buy this argument because I have always gravitated towards a more tragic interpretation of poems. I believe there is always a more painful meaning within literature whether it be poetry or a full length novel. Brodsky’s interpretation of “Home Burial” is what I find most interesting. The way he finds attachment to the man and the woman, the way he says one cannot take side, and the way he is so moved by their argument is what moved me by reading this. What confuses me is the connection between Frost and Virgil, Theocritus, and more because I know very little about those people. This deepens my understanding of Frost’s work because it shows more than just the exterior of the poem it connects his personal life to the implicit meaning. At one point the biblical lens is employed because he relates “Come In” with Frost’s protestant beliefs. The psychoanalytical lens in employed with “Home Burial” because Brodsky is breaking down both the man and the woman’s psyches.