The Sun By Emily Dickinson Literary Devices

“I decided that it was not wisdom that enabled poets to write their poetry, but a kind of instinct or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets who deliver all their sublime messages without knowing in the least what they mean” (Socrates). What does it mean to be this type of poet? How can someone accomplish such success in poetry, the answer is just two words Emily Dickinson. Emily Dickinson spent a large portion of her life in isolation, not because she was forced to or because she was ill, Dickinson simply wanted to be alone and because of her isolation she became one of the greatest female poets of all time. Emily Dickinson set the bar high for other female poets and created some of the most renowned poems in the world. The two poems “The Soul Selects Her Own Society” and “Tell all the Truth but Tell it Slant” are drastically different poems that tell two different stories, but there are some aspects that cause them to be similar: Imagery, tone, and the statement that the two poems make.

“Success is counted sweetest, by those who ne’er succeed.” -Emily Dickinson. When Dickinson speaks of the pain of failure and the satisfaction of victory, she speaks from experience. The hermit-like poet wrote nearly 2,000 poems by the time she died at 55. Emily Dickinson was a reserved poet and her work was largely unpopular during her life. She wrote under the topics of mortality and romance, however her works are always questioned of originality and for their vague nature.

Lyrical poetry is often used for the poet to express their emotions and tend to be written in a first-person perspective as a result. Because Dickinson never wrote in hopes of her poems being seen by the public, her poems are theorized to be a reflection of her thoughts. This is strengthened by poem 788 (709), “Publication – is the Auction”, where she deems it arrogant to publish when poems come from God. She says that “Thought belong to Him who gave it” (Dickson, “Publication – is the Auction”, 1) and it is not the right of the poets to sell that knowledge. Therefore, it’s clear that she is against publishing and this norm to conform to what society wants. As a result, it’s only reasonable to believe that her unpublished poems are a reflection of her thoughts. However, it is unknown as to what those thoughts were, due to the vagueness of her poems. She never outright explains what they mean and any answers that the poem may give, it just raises more questions. In 476 (712), “Because I could not stop for Death”, an explanation is never given as to what Death was a metaphor for and why she found it necessary to refer to what she passed by in the

what the author wants to imply past the surface level of the work. In Emily Dickinson’s poem

Two literary pieces, Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night by, Dylan Thomas and Because I Could Not Stop for Death by, Emily Dickinson are both poems that discuss the topic of death. While there are some similarities and comparisons between the two poems, when it comes to the themes, both poets writing styles are quite different from one another which makes each poem unique. Thomas and Dickinson both use identical figurative language devices and other literature symbolisms as they explain their main themes which contrasts the differences to the concept of death. These distinct variations between poems are apparent in both the form, and how the choice of words is used in the poems. Dickinson and Thomas have presented two different ideas on the topic and concept of death. The poems are well distinguished literature devices, they share minor similarities and differences between each other and how they present the meaning of death to a toll.

In Dickinson's poem “This is My Letter to the World,” she is expressing her reclusiveness towards the world. What Emily means by this is that she wrote a letter to the world, but the world does not know who she is since she never leaves her home. She also writes about what nature has taught her in hopes to teach other people lessons. In the closing of the poem she asks the readers to not judge her harshly on what she has written. The overall theme of this poem is that if people were to judge, they should judge by the truth. She does not want to be judged harshly for separating herself from the world, she just wants to belong. She uses many devices through all of her poems to help convey the overall theme. In the poem “This is My Letter to the World,” Dickson uses the personification of nature, rhyme scheme, and metaphor to show her overall theme.

The opening, “We Grow accustomed to the Dark.” In this, I found a sense of friendliness with the mentally ill. It uses “dark” as a metaphor for the insane to contrast with the light which is sanity. In other words, Dickinson, creates a contrast between two scenarios: one that I will call sun and the other moon. They refer to day and evening respectively.

Emily Dickinson was one of the most well-known poets, being considered as one of the most leading nineteenth-century poets. She commanded a remarkable cleverness of style and honor of idea. Only ten of Dickinson’s nearly one thousand, eight hundred poems are known to have been published in her entire lifetime. Devoted to private quests, she sent hundreds of poems to friends and correspondents while apparently keeping the greater number to herself. She habitually worked in verse forms suggestive of hymns and ballads, with lines of three or four stresses. She freely ignored the usual rules of versification and even grammar, and in the intellectual content of her work she came off exceptionally bold and original. Her verse is distinguished by

Emily Dickinson spent most of her life isolated from society in her room. This isolation gave Dickinson the keys for success. Unfortunately, her fame was not in the time while she was alive. In time, Dickinson would write thousands of poems about what she observed about nature through her room window. One component of nature that she carefully observed was death and sight as well as the correlation of the two.

Emily Dickinson is perhaps one of the most intriguing American poets studied. The remote look in her eyes mirror her life, which she mostly spent secluded in her home in Amherst, Massachusetts. While leading an outwardly reclusive life, she unleashes the faculties of her mind in her powerful poetry. She addresses compelling themes such as death, depression, human despair, individual capability, and the art of poetry. Her feelings on these subjects emerge in her poems, but her exact thoughts are difficult to uncover since her poetry is so highly enigmatic. Likewise, the subject matter of Christianity in her poetry remains one of the most inconsistent of Dickinson’s recurring themes. Emily Dickinson posses an uncanny ability to wrestle down the perfect diction, thus creating worlds of hope, despair, faith, and endless questioning.Through her use of imagery, Dickinson displays her linguistic prowess and the intricacies of language.

     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.

Often times there was a person that people would hear about named Emily Dickinson, who exactly she was nobody knew. Now Emily Dickinson was just someone who wasn't really an outside person she would really just stay in her room all day and just write. She just wrote poems, but she never ever thought they would publish. I guess you can say it was a pastime thing since it was like occupying for her and it would pass by time within her day. Two poems that actually she never expected to become popular became popular and actually got published. The two poems were called “Before I got my eyes put out” and “We grow accustomed to the dark”.

Although the only punctuation mark that finalizes the sentence is the dot at the end, the whole poem seems to be composed of three sentences, because the characteristic dashes in Emily Dickinson poem are able to separate the poem in more. With the help of enjambments, the run-on line, the sentences run over two or more verses (Meyer 47). Since the reader automatically inserts pauses while reading a poem, it’s stanzas and verses can be separated into sentences not only through the dashes, but also the sense, meaning, and sound. Identifiable were three sentences, which all relate to the topic of piety. The first stanza is simultaneously the first sentence, which involves the topic and reasoning of the anxiety of owning a body and soul and therefore

Emily Dickinson’s poem There’s a certain Slant of Light is a powerful reflection on the pain of depression and other internal struggles. As a recluse, Dickinson most likely was familiar with these feelings and conveys them in a way we can all relate to. Although cryptic at first, this poem communicates many universal emotions as well as an insight into Dickinson’s state of mind. Stanza one opens with Dickinson referring to “a certain Slant of light, Winter Afternoon -”.

In Emily Dickinson’s lyrical poem “There’s a certain slant of light” she describes a revelation that is experienced on cold “winter afternoons.” Further she goes to say that this revelation of self “oppresses, like the Heft of Cathedral Tunes” and causes “Heavenly Hurt”, yet does not scare for it is neither exterior nor permanent. This only leaves it to be an internal feeling, and according to Dickinson that is where all the “Meanings” lie. There’s no way for this feeling to be explained, all that is known is that it is the “Seal Despair”, and an “imperial affliction”. These descriptions have a rather powerful connotation in showing the oppressive nature of his sentiment. There is an official mark of despair and an imperial affliction