The poem The Snow Man by Wallace Stevens is a short poem filled with various imageries that the poet uses to relate to more general concepts. The poem has a wintery pastoral setting that gives a cold mood to the poem but points to a more significant issue. The poem seems to be a rejection of the perception that nature is a reflection of the human emotions and views, and an emphasis that nature is merely the truth of the land because of the way it is and so should be accepted as it is. The use of imagery, pathetic fallacy (personification) and the repetition of words and allows the poet to emphasize the theme of empathy and the broader issue of having a detached mind and free-will.
The poem starts off with vivid imagery of winter and snow, implying that one must be able to comprehend the characteristics of the winter season to appreciate it fully. At first, glance, while the title suggests that the poem might be about a snow-man, on a closer look to the compound word ‘Snow Man’ we can see that the poem will be about snow itself and the winter season. Stevens says that “one must have a mind of winter/to regard the frost and the boughs/of the pine-trees crusted with snow…” With the imagery of the winter season, Stevens says that one should be able to disregard the chaotic world, the unraveling emotions of the dramas. In a sense, the poet asks his readers to unite with winter, become part of it rather than standing against it. Through the use of wintery imagery, Stevens says that it is compulsory to put emotions and reactions aside, take hold of reason to understand the beauty of the nature of the world. Stevens continues the poem with the imagery he creates in the lines, “Of the January sun; and not to think/of any misery in the sound of the wind/in the sound of a few leaves.” Once the Stevens provides information about the time of the season, the poem seems to become even colder and more intense. The pines, berries, and tress of the season are so sturdy and frozen that they remain so even when the sun shines. At this point, Stevens uses the imagery to transform something substantial like the sun into a defeated enemy; even the sun that is the source of heat cannot melt away the coldness of the winter season. While the incapability and lack of heat might cause negative mood and gloomy atmosphere in the poem; it is at this point that Stevens says it is essential to appreciate the cold, even in a sunny January day, to understand its beauty.
The use of connotative words gives different moods to the poem. In the second stanza, Stevens says, “The spruces rough in the distant glitter,” where ‘rough’ refers to both an unidentifiable silhouette that appears in the winter season and the hard and frosty feature of snow and the “junipers shagged with ice” that has changed into something unidentifiable. In the last stanza of the poem, Stevens uses the word ‘nothing’ in three different meanings. First, as the nothingness in himself, referring to the emptiness of his emotions and his negative capability. The poet reminds us of Emerson’s transcendental eyeball, where he asks us to become like the eyeball, able to see and become a part of what we see. Second, Stevens refers to nothing that is not there, referring to the naturalist aspect of nature: existing as it is. Thirdly, Stevens once again refers to the nothingness of nature, which exists but we can only talk about it as long as we imagine and think about it. Nature exists, in reality, out in the world; but unless it is considered and felt, it becomes real. Therefore, Stevens seems to suggest that it is humans that make nature lively through the practice of thought and imagination; otherwise nature only exists as a reality of the world.
Stevens makes use of the poetic device of pathetic fallacy, in which he projects his feelings unto nature with the descriptions he creates through the use of the ‘sound’ of the wind and leaves. The poet is disturbed, apparently, and cannot overlook the fact that if a humans project their feelings on nature, they will not be able to understand nature truly. At his point, Stevens points to the theme of empathy and its significance. He seems to suggest that until and unless emotions are put aside, one would not be able to comprehend and thereby appreciate the beauty of nature fully. The sound of the leaves, wind, and land, the cold snow must be observed as it is, the sound of reality itself. Only by accepting nature and land is it is, and only by looking with a free mind without the influence of the society can one make a well-developed and mature decision on an issue regarding life. Stevens seems to be pointing to the influence that emotional and mental trauma has on the decisions of one’s life and experience.In general, the poem points to the bigger question of knowledge of the world. Stevens seems to ask his readers how much they know for certain, how much of their knowledge is their own true experience and how genuine is their emotions. Stevens uses poetic devices to make his point: to stop seeing certain things as a loss and to look at it as what it represents: the reality of the land. According to Stevens message, it is important to stop projecting our emotions to our opinions and perceptions and see things from a broader perspective as they are.