Analysis Of Emily Dickinson 's ' A Narrow Fellow '

The Bustle in a House is a poem by Emily Dickinson about the painful loss one feels after the death of a loved one. Dickinson was quite familiar with the kind of pain expressed in her poem. Her father, mother, nephew, and three close friends, all died within an eight-year period. It is no small wonder that a common theme in Dickinson s poetry is death. She uses many literary devices, including structure, imagery, figurative language, sound devices, and capitalization; to convey the hurt one experiences when a loved one passes on.

Emily Dickinson’s poetry arose during a time of much deep questioning going on in the literary world. Many of her poems lend themselves to various interpretations, as Dickinson looks at the world through a variety of perspectives. Dickinson wrote concisely and broke the traditional rules of writing poetry, and in doing so often wrote in one way but meant something entirely different. Poem 340, or “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,” is one of these such poems that has no clear answer and is ultimately left ambiguous for the reader to interpret. This essay will highlight how this poem can be interpreted in the formal elements of rhythm, rhyme, assonance, and alliteration, and how these elements can affect the meaning of the poem.

In the opening lines, Dickinson cleverly states the subject of the poem, a snake. She makes the snake sound harmless. The term "narrow

In the poems of Emily Dickinson, there are many instances in which she refers to her seclusion and loneliness, and how wonderful the two can be. In a book entitled, Emily Dickenson: Singular Poet, by Carl Dommermuth, she writes: "She (Dickinson) apparently enjoyed a normal social life as a school girl, but in later years would seldom leave her home. She was passionate yet distant." This distance Dommermuth speaks of is quite evident in Dickinson's works. Dickinson not only loves her loneliness but also feels as though she cannot live without it.

Emily Dickinson was an exceptional writer through the mid-late 1800’s. She never published any of her writings and it wasn’t until after her death that they were even discovered. The complexity of understanding her poems is made prevalent because of the fact that she, the author, cannot expound on what her writing meant. This causes others to have to speculate and decide for themselves the meaning of any of her poems. There are several ways that people can interpret Emily Dickinson’s poems; readers often give their opinion on which of her poems present human understanding as something boundless and unlimited or something small and limited, and people always speculate Dickinson’s view of the individual self.

The third stanza describes the snake as “cool and gleaming as a braided whip” (9-10). Describing the snake as a braided whip demonstrates the intricate woven pattern of the snake’s scales and the poet’s appreciation for nature and its’ beauty. The snake is not a useless piece of rubber, but a beautiful and vibrant part of nature. “He is as beautiful and quiet as a bead brother” (10-11). The snake is quiet, makes no sound, and snuggles into

The last two lines of the poem are a timid reflection on what might happen “Had I the Art to stun myself/ With Bolts—of Melody!” (23-24). The idea that creation is a power that can get loose and injure even the creator illuminates why in this poem the artist positions herself firmly as a mere spectator. In these first two poems, we meet a Dickinson who is not entirely familiar to us—even though we are accustomed to her strong desire for privacy, these poems can be startling in the way they reveal the intensity of Dickinson’s fears. She is, after all, shrinking from what is dearest to her—nature, one of her favorite subjects, becomes a harsh judge, and poetry, her favored medium of communication, can suddenly render the reader “impotent” and the writer “stun[ned]” (19, 23). The extremity of her positions in shrinking from the small and beautiful things she loves creates the sense that this is just the beginning of a journey by leaving so much room for change.

The positive outlook that Whitman portrays towards death in his poem the "Wound-Dresser", is similarly shown in Emily Dickinson's "Narrow Fellow in the Grass". She tells a simple story with impressive word choices that allow for deep interpretation and symbolism. Her poem narrates the story of a dead man laying on the ground that looks as if "the Grass divides as with a comb-" (line 5). "He (meaning the dead man) likes Boggy Acre/ A Floor too cool for Corn-" (lines 9-10). Notice as she uses the word 'likes' as if the dead man still lived or had feelings towards the

Within the poem, Dickinson writes, "The simple news that Nature told, With tender majesty." Dickinson is using personification because nature cannot literally speak to her and tell her the basic truths about life. In this poem, Dickinson communicates with the world, though the message from Nature. She views nature as her friend, which stresses to the reader that nature is personified. Dickinson uses slant rhyme within the poem, she also uses

Poetry is meant to provoke in a thoughtful way. It makes the reader consider what the deeper meaning behind the piece may be. I Heard a Fly Buzz—when I died does all that but it also perplexes the reader, making one wonder what was Emily Dickison writing about in this poem? And what is the reader supposed to take away?

     Emily Dickinson is one of the most famous authors in American History, and a good amount of that can be attributed to her uniqueness in writing. In Emily Dickinson's poem 'Because I could not stop for Death,' she characterizes her overarching theme of Death differently than it is usually described through the poetic devices of irony, imagery, symbolism, and word choice.

The poem, “A Narrow Fellow in the Grass,” by Emily Dickinson is a collaboration of fear and intrigue. The poem is presented through a young boy as he makes his way through cool and damp grassland during the afternoon. The issue the young boy must deal with is the unwelcome encounter with a snake. From the first glimpse of the slithering snake the tone of the poem is set: an uneasiness mood followed by persistent fear. The combination of external conflict and dexterous imagery create the atmosphere of this poem.

Two of Dickinson’s universal techniques are metaphor and the fresh application of language; both techniques result in powerful images, and can be seen in two of her poems that focus on nature themes, “ A Bird came down the Walk” and “narrow Fellow.” She closes the poem, “ A Bird” with a stanza equating flight through the air with movement through water,

There has been many views on the what human understanding and the individual self actually are. There has been even more, how much we can learn, or in other words, how much knowledge we can gain, and what we think about ourselves as ourself. Dickinson decided to tackle these both in her lifetime. Dickinson was born on December 10, 1830, in Amherst, Massachusetts. She was very social in her teen years, then became a recluse for her later years. She would almost never leave her house, and she had very few visitors. With that said, she had plenty of time to get to know herself, and to really find out how much a person get actually know, how much knowledge they can gain. Dickinson has a very interesting opinion on the individual self, we as humans have the opportunity to have unlimited knowledge, but are confined in a limited body.

In today’s society, people are told to follow the trends and to not stray too far away from society, however, Judy Garland, famous actor and singer, once said, “Always be a first rate version of yourself and not a second rate version of someone else.” Judy Garland’s view of people, society and herself are similar to the poems “The Soul Selects Her Own Society” by Emily Dickinson and “In Paths Untrodden” by Walt Whitman in that people should focus more on being individual than following what society tells them. These poems, along with research about the authors of these poems, individuality, and the analysis of Steve Dininno’s painting, Businessman walking away from crowd conclude that people should be more individual and take their own paths