# Plowmen explained — New Hampshire

> Chapter companion for New Hampshire by Robert Frost.

## What happens

A brief, ironic poem about plowing snow, suggesting the futility of cultivating barren rock.

## Themes in this chapter

### Work and Labor

The act of plowing, typically associated with farming, is applied to snow, highlighting the absurdity and futility of labor in a harsh environment.

### Nature and Transience

Snow and rock represent the transient and unyielding aspects of nature, mocking human attempts to cultivate or control it.

## Key lines

> A plow, they say, to plow the snow. They cannot mean to plant it, though— Unless in bitterness to mock At having cultivated rock.

People speak of using a plow to clear snow, but surely they don't intend to plant crops in it—unless they are bitterly mocking the fact that they have been trying to farm on rocky, barren land.

_The poem uses the image of plowing snow to comment on the impossibility and irony of farming in a rocky, northern landscape._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/new_hampshire_se/chapters/plowmen
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/new_hampshire_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/new_hampshire_se/chapters