Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson lived a life of self induced seclusion in Amherst, Massachusetts (Leiter). She expressed herself through her poems and letters, many that she did not show to anyone until her sister, Lavinia, published her writings against Emily's death wish (Leiter). To understand Emily Dickinson's writing style, one has to understand her life. Dickinson never was religious and became a member of the church, like her friends and family did (Lieter). Through a rigid schooling and her father's strict and stubborn view on women and their place in society, Dickinson's writings reflect a "state of eruption, throwing off the rules her elders had pounded into her" (Leiter). As she did not share her writings with anyone, the poems and letters truly express Dickinson's inner thoughts and feelings in an unadulterated and uncensored way. Emily Dickinson often felt at a loss for words to adequately describe her thoughts, and turned to her Webster's Dictionary for guidance (Leiter). Ironically, Noah Webster, the author and compiler of the dictionary was a neighbor of the Dickinsons' (Leiter).

Emily Dickinson's poems are popular today and are considered classics. The poems can fall into both categories because of the subject matter and the manner in which they were written. Dickinson wrote of love, life, death, nature, and "the question of immortality" (McChesney). Those themes are also popular in today's literature (Harry Potter for four out of five categories). But the way that Dickinson wrote the poems is what makes them resonate in the twenty first century. By using dashes, the reader feels as if the narrator of any given poem is physically speaking and taking a pause at crucial and important parts in their tale (McChesney). In Poem 549, Dickinson speaks to the reader and the lines resonate through time as they will always be true: "That till I loved/ I never lived—Enough—" (McChesney). Because Emily Dickinson did not belong to a church and was not committed to the teachings of the Bible and the Bible's interpretation of the world and universe, her writings show her "knowledge of a boundless Universe, unfettered by the strictures of church" and enrich her poems with deep thought and meaning that would prove blasphemes to some religious readers of the time (McChesney). Instead of using the traditional pagan symbols of a dove for peace, Dickinson creates her own symbols to better represent her and her writings. She uses a daisy to represent calm and innocence in one poem "The Daisy follows soft the Sun—/ And when his golden walk is done—/ Sits shyly at his feet—" (McChesney). Instead of a volcano traditionally meaning anger, rage, and an explosion of some sorts, Dickinson uses an image of a volcano to represent passion and force (McChesney). Emily Dickinson agreed with Plato that "writing itself is only a poor imitation of a poet's words", but tried her best through Webster's Dictionary and by working through the limitations of words on paper to express her thoughts and opinions on life, love, death, and nature (McChesney).



Leiter, Sharon. "Dickinson, Emily." Critical Companion to Emily Dickinson: A Literary Reference to Her Life and Work, Critical Companion. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2006. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.

McChesney, Sandra. "A View from the Window: The Poetry of Emily Dickinson." In Harold Bloom, ed. Emily Dickinson, Bloom's BioCritiques. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2002. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.