Am Lit 24 Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson &
Walt Whitman
PRECURSORS TO
MODERNISM
Two Transitional Writers
“The Poet of the Inner-Soul”
Emily Dickinson was born in 1830

and is considered one of the
greatest American poets
Dickinson published only seven poems
before her death in 1886.
She was a reclusive person who hardly
ever left her home town.
Education
Emily was educated at Amherst Academy and

Mount Holyoke Female Seminary.
The founder, Mary Lyon, ranked students of

the basis of those who would receive God’s
grace, those who had some hope, and those
who had no hope at all.
She placed Emily in the last category.

Dickinson’s Own Religion
Not having “conventional” religious views

may have also contributed to Emily’s
isolation.
In college, she refused to sign an oath to
dedicate her life to Jesus Christ, and then
dropped out of school.
Even so, she clearly had an interest in
spirituality, but it was different than the
views held by her peers.
Dickinson’s Friendships
She began a friendship with Charles

Wadsworth of Philadelphia. He was
married and they corresponded regularly.
He visited her twice.
She called him her “dearest earthly friend.”
In 1862, he moved to San Francisco, and she
was devastated.
Soon afterwards, she withdrew from
Amherst society.
Even her best friends rarely saw her unless
it was out working in her beloved garden.
Dickinson’s Friendships
Dickinson became friends with

writer Thomas Wentworth Higginson,
known for encouraging younger writers.
She sent him a brief note with four of her
poems with the message:
“Are you too deeply occupied to say if my
verse is alive?”
He was fascinated and asked for more
poems.
A Meeting
Higginson maintained a long correspondence

with Dickinson, and eventually he went to
visit her in 1870.
The following frame is his description of first
meeting her:
“A step, like a pattering child’s in the entry,
and in glided a little plain woman with two
smooth bands of reddish hair and a face of no
good feature—in a very plain and exquisitely
clean white pique and blue net worsted shawl.
She came to me with two white day lilies, and
she put them in a childlike way into my hand
and said, ‘These are my introduction’ in a soft,
frightened childlike voice—and she added,
under her breath, ‘Forgive me if I am
frightened; I never see strangers and hardly
know what to say.’ ”
Higginson said that after
this first moment, Emily
talked easily and
continuously.
He later said, “I never was
with anyone who drained
my nerve power so much…
Emily Dickinson had more
charm than anyone I ever
knew.”
E Emily Dickinson’s
Home in
Amherst,
Massachusetts
The lawn and garden of the
Dickinson Homestead.
Publishing the Poetry
Emily probably wanted to have her

poems published -- but on her own terms,
and publishers may have been unwilling
to take the risk, as the poems were very
unconventional.
Higginson thought that Walt Whitman
had influenced her poems, but she said
that she had heard his poetry was
“disgraceful.”
Dickinson’s Poetic Style
 Regular meter—hymn meter and ballad meter, also

known as Common Meter (think of the meter to
“Amazing Grace”)
 Quatrains
 Alternating iambic tetrameter and trimeter
 Often 1st and 3rd lines rhyme, 2nd and 4th lines rhyme
in iambic pentameter
 The use of dashes
 Natural and spiritual themes
 Use of slant rhyme, irregular punctuation,
capitalization
Idiosyncratic Style
Dickinson's verse is highly idiosyncratic. The poems

are quite short, but they contain very complex ideas.
She frequently uses the dash for punctuation—how
do these dashes affect your reading of the poems?
Most of the poems we're reading end not with
terminal punctuation, but with a dash—what do you
make of that kind of ending?
What else seems unusual to you about the poems?
Her “Letters to the World”
Even without a publisher, Emily kept on

writing her poetry privately, “my letters
to the world which never wrote to me.”
She tied them up in little blue ribbons
and hid them away in drawers and boxes.
After her death in 1886, her sister Lavinia
discovered 1,800 poems in drawers in her
room.
Most were not published until 1955,
nearly seventy years after Emily’s death.
Posthumous Publication
After her death, her poems were heavily

edited and published by Higginson and friend
Mabel Loomis Todd.
In 1955, Thomas Johnson produced a
collection of Dickinson’s more than 1700
poems in three volumes; he restored her
original capitalization and punctuation.
Early editions
Early editors removed all capitals but the first of the

line, or tried to apply editorial logic to their usage.
For example, poem 632 is now commonly
punctuated as follows:
Poem 632 (original)
 The Brain – is wider than the Sky –

For – put them side by side –
The one the other will contain
With ease – and You – beside –
 The Brain is deeper than the sea –
For – hold them – Blue to Blue –
The one the other will absorb –
As Sponges – Buckets – do –
 The Brain is just the weight of God –
For – Heft them – Pound for Pound –
And they will differ – if they do –
As Syllable from Sound –
Edited version of Poem 632
The above capitalizations, which include such

seemingly unimportant words as “Blue," “Sponges,"
and “Buckets," capitalizing “Sky” but not “sea," were
regularized into the following traditional
capitalization and punctuation by early editors:
Poem 632 (edited version)
 The brain is wider than the sky,

For, put them side by side,
The one the other will include
With ease, and you beside.
 The brain is deeper than the sea,
For, hold them, blue to blue,
The one the other will absorb,
As sponges, buckets do.
 The brain is just the weight of God,
For, lift them, pound for pound,
And they will differ, if they do,
As syllable from sound.
Dickinson’s Legacy
Along with Walt Whitman, Dickinson is one

of the two giants of American poetry.
Dickinson is considered to have influenced
many modern poets including Adrienne Rich,
Richard Wilbur, Archibald MacLeish, and
William Stafford.
https://www.emilydickinsonmuseum.org/bo
ok/export/html/108
General Reading Questions
For each of the poems, try to describe how you feel

while reading it. Consider every element of the
poem: Diction; tone; speaker? Audience?
Themes: How do poems on similar themes, such as
death or nature or solitude, develop different aspects
of the theme?
Aspects to Consider
What is the setting? Real? Abstract? What about the

situation? Is there action in the poem? What is it?
What is the form of the poem? What is the meter?
the rhyme scheme? Where does ED depart from
these patterns and forms? Why?
What kinds of images does she use? olfactory?
tactile? visual? auditory? thermal?
What is the tone of poem? Solemn? Playful?
Irreverent? Mournful? Objective? What is Dickinson
trying to convey?
Poems from the 10th edition
Poems 112 (Success is counted sweetest); 202 (Faith

is a fine invention); 339 (I like a look); 340 (I felt a
funeral); 359 (A bird came); 372 (After great pain);
409 (The Soul selects); 479 (Because I could not stop
for Death); 591 (I heard a Fly buzz); 620 (Much
madness); 764 (My Life had stood); 1096 (A narrow
Fellow) ; 1263 (Tell all the truth).
Poems 112, 202, 620
“Success is counted sweetest…”

“Faith is a fine invention…”
“Much Madness is divinest Sense –”
These poems aim to DEFINE certain words or

issues, but do so in an unconventional way. Can
you comment on the apparent “message” or
messages of each poem?
Poems 764, 1263
“My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun –”

“Tell all the truth but tell it slant –”
For the first poem, what do you think the Loaded

Gun metaphor represents? Test your theory
against the clues in the poem. As for the “slant
truth,” what do you think of this approach to
writing and communicating with the world?
Poem 339, 372, 409
 “I like a look of Agony…”

“After great pain, a formal feeling comes”
“The Soul selects her own Society –”
 How do these poems describe psychological states,

especially suffering, isolation and shock?
Poems 340, 479, 591
“I felt a Funeral, in my Brain…”

“Because I could not stop for Death…”
“I heard a Fly buzz – when I died –”
Here ED takes on different aspects of Death. How is

death described in each of these? Compare these
with poems on the same topic by Whitman and Poe
Poems 359, 1096
“A Bird, came down the Walk –”

“A narrow Fellow in the Grass”
How is Nature described in these poems? Is Nature

here different from what appears in the Romantic
poets? How about Whitman’s vision of nature?

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Emily Dickinson &

Emily Dickinson was born in 1830

Emily was educated at Amherst Academy and

The founder, Mary Lyon, ranked students of

She placed Emily in the last category.

Not having “conventional” religious views

She began a friendship with Charles

Dickinson became friends with

Higginson maintained a long correspondence

Emily probably wanted to have her

 Regular meter—hymn meter and ballad meter, also

Dickinson's verse is highly idiosyncratic. The poems

Even without a publisher, Emily kept on

After her death, her poems were heavily

Early editors removed all capitals but the first of the

 The Brain – is wider than the Sky –

The above capitalizations, which include such

 The brain is wider than the sky,

Along with Walt Whitman, Dickinson is one

For each of the poems, try to describe how you feel

What is the setting? Real? Abstract? What about the

Poems 112 (Success is counted sweetest); 202 (Faith

“Success is counted sweetest…”

These poems aim to DEFINE certain words or

“My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun –”

For the first poem, what do you think the Loaded

 “I like a look of Agony…”

 How do these poems describe psychological states,

“I felt a Funeral, in my Brain…”

Here ED takes on different aspects of Death. How is

“A Bird, came down the Walk –”

How is Nature described in these poems? Is Nature

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