 Hello and welcome to a summary of all you need to know about Out Out, the poem by Robert Frost. Now I'll explain the meaning related to this poem as well as language techniques and contextual factors that you need to be aware of if you were analysing this poem as part of your exams or coursework. So let's get started. Now as I mentioned, Robert Frost authored Out Out and essentially this poem is about a New England community. Now do you remember contextually that Robert Frost himself, his ancestors were actually originally New Englanders, so a lot of his work has focused on the New England community including this poem. So let's begin by reading part of this stanza because it's only one whole stanza and then we'll talk about techniques that you need to be aware of and then we'll read the remaining stanza and also analyse that too. As the saw snarled and rattled, snarled and rattled as it ran light or had to bear a load and nothing happened, day was all but done. Call it a day, I wish they might have said to please the boy by giving him the half hour that a boy counts so much when saved from work. His sister stood beside them in her apron to tell them supper. At the war the saw, as if to prove saws knew what supper meant, leaped out at the boy's hand or seemed to leap, he must have given the hand. However it was neither refused the meeting but the hand. The boy's first outcry was a rueful laugh and then he swung toward them, holding up the hand. Now this part of the stanza essentially focuses on the New England community initially and then of course narrows our focus down to the boy who's been working and then we learn of a horrific cut that he received his hand. Now the poem begins, buzz saw and the focus on the buzz saw really reveals the crude and primitive agricultural tools that this New England community are using. Furthermore it snarled and rattled and essentially this onomatopoeia is quite animalistic. It has really acoustic effects and it shows that the saw is almost possessed by devilish spirits. Of course already from the start there's this sense of foreboding that's created within us. We realise that this is a very dangerous object. Furthermore the alliteration dust and dropped really shows just how violent the saw is as it's cutting this wood and it's cutting of course these trees. Moreover the sibilants sweet scented stuff to describe the breeze that drew across it and carried the smell of the wood essentially is an interesting contrast with the saw. Now essentially frost mixes in the imagery of this really violent saw with actually a very rural utopic idea of this New England community so there's the sibilant sweet scented stuff in the breeze which do across it so this is symbolic of a rural utopia. Furthermore the alliteration and the enjambement here shows how busy the New England community is so it's stating there that those that lifted eyes could count because it's emphasising that actually majority of people couldn't lift their eyes they were so focused on labour they're only focused on survival so it's showing that in spite of this New England community living in what is really a rural paradise all they can do is literally survive because they are living in rural poverty. Also there's the semantic field of nature which really compounds the idea of the sweet scented and the breeze so there's the five mountain ranges of sunset and this semantic field of nature really shows how beautiful and scenic and utopic the imagery of the Vermont area that the New England community lives in really is. However this is in contrast to the saw itself which snarled and rattled snarled and rattled and this is a repetition of the first line snarled and rattled and a repetition of this onomatopoeia. What this does is it shows how repetitive and monotonous and relentless the work is and also how brutally difficult this work is. Moreover there's this sense of monotony that's compounded we learn that nothing happened so the work day is much the same every single day. Furthermore here the caesura shows the pause of another very busy day so the people that live in this New England community have very puritan work ethic they really survive and struggle hard to survive and this is Frost's way actually interestingly of dismissing notions of rural utopia so as I mentioned his ancestors are originally New Englanders however rather than depicting New England in this very nostalgic way as a rural utopia actually he's showing a very harsh element that probably his ancestors had to endure in rural poverty. Moreover the first person pronoun I in line 10 shows an anonymous persona we wonder who is this person. Furthermore this is in contrast to the boy that's mentioned so again this goes in with Frost's way of dismissing this rural utopia we're actually quite shocked at the child labor so the person who's holding this all isn't even an adult it's a young boy and this creates pathos within us as we're reading this. Furthermore there's work language related to him so this young boy already knows the labor of a man and even understands the language and the jargon related to get in a half an hour of a lunch break for instance so this alliteration emphasizes the work language and the rest break that he gets rather than being a child and just indulging in his childhood he is having to work. Furthermore the direct speech from his sister which says supper and it's a minor sentence this is what distracts the boy and it causes everything to change. Now this personification of this saw so in line 15 and 16 as if to prove saws new and then in line 16 it leaped out what this shows is just how horrible and vicious this animalistic saw really is. Furthermore there's this interesting qualifier that's coupled with this personification so it seemed to outsiders to leap towards the boy so this is an important qualifier which suggests to some degree that the boy had some agency in this matter he maybe is partly to blame for his severed hand. Furthermore this suggestion is coupled with he must have given the hand now this is a suggestion that maybe the boy offered his hand as a sacrifice to the saw maybe it's an attention seeking aspect because this is the only way he's going to get any attention from his family or the wider community who just see him in terms of labor. Also the exclamatory simple sentence but the hand really focuses in on his limb that's been lost and of course this is a fateful accident which causes the boy's life and he swung toward them holding up the hand and this seems almost like a cry for attention from the boy to his family to really look at him as a child rather than as a man. So let's carry on half in a pill but half as if to keep the life from spilling then the boy saw all since he was old enough to know big boy doing a man's work though a child at heart he saw all spoiled don't let him cut my hand off the doctor when he comes don't let him sister so but the hand was gone already the doctor put him in the dark of ether he lay and puffed his lips out with his breath and then the watcher at his pulse took fright no one believed the listened at his heart little less nothing and that ended it no more to build on there and they since they were not the one dead turned to their affairs so now this second half of the stanza and do you remember it's only just one stanza or one verse really shows that firstly the boy ends up dying and the doctor actually interestingly plays a role in this death because he gives him ether which actually causes his heart rate to fall dangerously low and this plays a massive part in his death in addition of course to the severed hand and blood loss but then whilst the new england community is really shocked and frightened at this they turn back to their work of course this shows that the poverty doesn't really allow them to do anything else now here the quote the life from spilling is a metaphor and it emphasises of course that the boy is rapidly losing blood and rapidly dying also there's a bit upon here the boy saw all so it's got a two-way meaning on the one hand he saw all he cut everything with the saw that could be the literal meaning however the other meaning behind this is that he experiences an epiphany a realisation about his life and his poverty and what life will really be like for him for the future also the literation big boy is a play on words what we usually say to young children to encourage them we say you're a big boy you're a big girl now so people perhaps use that language to encourage him to carry on working and using these dangerous instruments but also the community whilst they speak to him in a way that we speak to children they still treat him like an adult and of course this is what causes this strategy to happen also of course there's a contrast between boy and man so big boy doing man's work and this contrast emphasises he actually really shouldn't be working he should be a child he should be going to school he should be enjoying himself with his friends rather than cutting and felling trees in 925 he saw all spoiled and essentially what this does is it shows and emphasises that this young boy realises he will die and of course spoiled is a euphemism for death furthermore he we hear directly from the boy there's direct speech he's really frantic don't let him cut my hand off the doctor when he comes don't let him sister and this foreshadows how the doctor will play a role in his death he's actually fearful of the doctor who's supposed to be an expert again this foreshadows this quotation because in this phrase the doctor put him in the dark of ether we actually learned that he is correct the doctor does essentially cause his death and this is because the ether kills him as it loads his blood pressure too much more over here in line 30 the caesura really emphasises his death it's a pause and essentially this causes the watcher to take fright so the young boy has now lost his life and the watcher it's unclear who this is maybe it's his family perhaps it's even his father who's really shocked at what's happened however we we're not sure who this is also the simple sentence no one believes shows that the whole community the whole new england community is really shocked at this untimely death of the young boy furthermore the adjectives little less nothing show his diminishing heartbeat and this is of course coupled with the hyphens or the caesura and this shows how he gradually the life starts leaving his body furthermore the caesura here before and shows that his life has now ended and this is interesting how his life has ended and rather than they kind of pausing and maybe reflecting on their community we learn that they so this is a third person pronoun the community simply moves on so the poem ends on a very very sad note they turned to their affairs and the literation here turned to their emphasises the poverty and the limited options that this new england community has so really it's really interesting that frost actually depicts the new england community in a really negative way and what this shows is that he's really dismissing this idea that the rural countryside was a rural utopia it was like this perfect place away from the city actually there was a lot of rural poverty which he wants to emphasise and show so that's all if you found this useful do make sure you visit our website there you will find lots of useful revision materials for english and indeed other topics that you were studying thank you so much for listening