April 23, 2021, 12:24pm
Poetry-heads rejoice, and then leap into action: a handwritten copy of Robert Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” is currently up for auction through Lion Heart Autographs.
The copy is not the original manuscript of the poem, but is nevertheless quite rare; David Lowenherz, president of Lion Heart Autographs, told the Bennington Banner that he has only ever seen one or two fair copies of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Lowenherz believes the manuscript dates to the 1940s or ‘50s, a few decades after Frost initially wrote the poem. The bottom of the manuscript reads, “For Miss Parson’s Room,” indicating that Frost wrote out the copy for a teacher whose classroom he visited.
The document was originally expected to sell for $8,000 to $10,000. But as of today, five days before the formal auction it has 14 bids and its price has worked its way up to $12,500—and if history is any indication, it still has miles to go.