American Literature (I) Autumn 2008 Emily Dickinson 1830-1886 Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, in...

American Literature (I) Autumn 2008

Emily Dickinson 1830-1886Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, in 1830

Father was an attorney, a state rep. and senator.

Attended Mount Holyoke Female Seminary, a Calvinist school.

Failed to “convert” or conform to religious expectations of the school.

This liberated her to think on her own.


Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)She was well read and was especially interested in British female contemporary writers: the Brontes, George Eliot, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

As an adult, she became increasingly isolated, rarely leaving her home.

On the last ten years of her life, she remained within her house and garden.

Dressed only in white and would not allow neighbors or strangers to see her.

Between 1874 and 1885, she lost her father, her mother, her beloved nephew, and her close childhood friend.

Not publicly recognized during her lifetime.

Dickinson published seven poems during her lifetime. After her death in 1886, her sister discovered over 1,000 poems in her bureau. A collection was published in 1890.

Some poems were edited to make them more conventional. (Gasp!)Considered one of the greatest poets in American literature.

Dickinson and Whitman exerted the most influence on poetry to come after them.


Her style

Distinctive voice, looks inward

Transformed traditional forms and meter of poetry to irregular meter.

Enjambment

Slant rhyme

Dash

Unconventional capitalization

Startling imagery


Topics of her poetryPersonal pain and joy

The relationship between self and nature

The intensely spiritual

The intensely ordinary

Confronting death

Immortality: “the flood subject”

Religion: reverence, rebellion, uncertainty

Love


“Hope is the thing with feathers”254

"Hope" is the thing with feathers—That perches in the soul—And sings the tune without the words—And never stops—at all—

And sweetest—in the Gale—is heard—And sore must be the storm—That could abash the little BirdThat kept so many warm—

I've heard it in the chillest land—And on the strangest Sea—Yet, never, in Extremity,It asked a crumb—of Me.

Because I could not stop for Death –

He kindly stopped for me –

The Carriage held but just Ourselves –

And Immortality.

We slowly drove – He knew no haste

And I had put away

My labor and my leisure too,

For His Civility –

We passed the School, where Children strove

At Recess – in the Ring –

We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –

We passed the Setting Sun –

Or rather – He passed us –

The Dews drew quivering and chill –

For only Gossamer, my Gown –

My Tippet – only Tulle –

We paused before a House that seemed

A Swelling of the Ground –

The Roof was scarcely visible –

The Cornice – in the Ground –

Since then – 'tis Centuries – and yet

Feels shorter than the Day

I first surmised the Horses' Heads

Were toward Eternity –

Because I could not stop for Death –

I heard a Fly buzz (465)

I heard a Fly buzz (465)

I heard a Fly buzz – when I died –

The Stillness in the Room

Was like the Stillness in the Air –

Between the Heaves of Storm –

The Eyes around – had wrung them dry –

And Breaths were gathering firm

For that last Onset – when the King

Be witnessed – in the Room –

I willed my Keepsakes – Signed away

What portions of me be

Assignable – and then it was

There interposed a Fly –

With Blue – uncertain stumbling Buzz –

Between the light – and me –

And then the Windows failed – and then

I could not see to see –


Emily DickinsonBorn in 1830 in rural Amherst, Massachusetts, Emily Dickinson spent her entire life in the household of her parents. Between 1858 and 1862, it was later discovered, she wrote like a person possessed, often producing a poem a day. It was also during this period that her life was transformed into the myth of Amherst. Withdrawing more and more, keeping to her room, sometimes even refusing to see visitors who called, she began to dress only in white—a habit that added to her reputation as an eccentric.

In their determination to read Dickinson’s life in terms of a traditional romantic plot, biographers have missed the unique pattern of her life—her struggle to create a female life not yet imagined by the culture in which she lived.


Emily DickinsonDickinson was not the innocent, lovelorn and emotionally fragile girl sentimentalized by the Dickinson myth and popularized by William Luce’s 1976 play, the Belle of Amherst. Her decision to shut the door on Amherst society in the 1850’s transformed her house into a kind of magical realm in which she was free to engage her poetic genius. Her seclusion was not the result of a failed love affair, but rather a part of a more general pattern of renunciation through which she, in her quest for self sovereignty, carried on an argument with the puritan fathers, attacking with wit and irony their cheerless Calvinist doctrine, their stern patriarchal God, and their rigid notions of “true womanhood”.


Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

The chief tension in her work comes from her inability to accept the orthodox religious faith of her day and her longing for its spiritual comfort. Immortality she called “the flood subject,” and she alternated confident statements of belief with lyrics of despairing uncertainty that were both reverent and rebellious.Her verse, noted for its aphoristic style, its wit, its delicate metrical variation and irregular rhymes, its directness of statement, and its bold and startling imagery, has won enormous acclaim and had a great influence on 20th-century poetry.


Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

“If I read a book [and] it makes my whole body so cold no fire ever can warm me I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.”

-Emily Dickinson


Before the Ice Is in the Pools

Before the ice is in the pools,

Before the skaters go,

Or any cheek at nightfall

Is tarnished by the snow,

Before the fields have finished,

Before the Christmas tree,

Wonder upon wonder

Will arrive to me!

What we touch the hems of

On a summer’s day;

What is only walking

Just a bridge away;

That which sings so, speaks so,

When there’s no one here, —

Will the frock I wept in

Answer me to wear?


Retrospect

‘Twas just this time last year I died. I know I heard the corn,When I was carried by the farms, — It had the tassels on.

I thought how yellow it would look When Richard went to mill;And then I wanted to get out, But something held my will.

I thought just how red apples wedged The stubble’s joints between;And carts went stooping round the

fields To take the pumpkins in.

I wondered which would miss me least, And when Thanksgiving came,If father’d multiply the plates To make an even sum.

And if my stocking hung too high, Would it blur the Christmas glee,That not a Santa Claus could reach The altitude of me?

But this sort grieved myself, and so I thought how it would beWhen just this time, some perfect year, Themselves should come to me.


The Mystery of Pain *

Pain has an element of blank;It cannot recollectWhen it began, or if there wereA day when it was not.

It has no future but itself,Its infinite realms containIts past, enlightened to perceiveNew periods of pain.


As Imperceptibly As Grief *

As imperceptibly as griefThe summer lapsed away, —Too imperceptible, at last,To seem like perfidy.

A quietness distilled,As twilight long begun,Or Nature, spending with

herselfSequestered afternoon.

The dusk drew earlier in,The morning foreign shone, —A courteous, yet harrowing

grace,As guest who would be gone.

And thus, without a wing,Or service of a keel,Our summer made her light

escapeInto the beautiful.


The Bustle in a House *

The bustle in a houseThe morning after deathIs solemnest of industriesEnacted upon earth, —

The sweeping up the heart,And putting love awayWe shall not want to use againUntil eternity.


Forbidden Fruit *

Forbidden fruit a flavor has

That lawful orchards mocks;

How luscious lies the pea within

The pod that Duty locks!


I Felt a Funeral in My Brain *I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,And Mourners to and froKept treading--treading--till it

seemedThat Sense was breaking through--

And when they all were seated,A Service, like a Drum--Kept beating--beating--till I thoughtMy Mind was going numb--

And then I heard them lift a BoxAnd creak across my SoulWith those same Boots of Lead,

again,Then Space--began to toll,

As all the Heavens were a Bell,And Being, but an Ear,And I, and Silence, some strange

RaceWrecked, solitary, here--

And then a Plank in Reason, broke,And I dropped down, and down--And hit a World, at every plunge,And Finished knowing--then--


Speech is One Symptom of Affection *

Speech is one symptom of AffectionAnd Silence one --The perfectest communicationIs heard of none --

Exists and its indorsementIs had within --Behold, said the Apostle,Yet had not seen!

American Literature (I) Autumn 2008 Emily Dickinson 1830-1886 Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, in...

Documents

Transcript of American Literature (I) Autumn 2008 Emily Dickinson 1830-1886 Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, in...