Summary Of Emily Dickinson's Poem 353

Dickinson’s This is my Letter to the World raises tension between exclusion and the human conditions’ longing for belonging. Dickinson’s “letter to the world” is an extended metaphor of her deliberate attempt to establish an affinity with her society through art- her literature just like Grossman’s essay. Her vulnerability and isolation, is evident in her personal tone with “my letter” being exposed to the wider “world”. This disclosure juxtaposed with the next line “that never wrote to me” further emphasizes her reality filled with isolation. The juxtaposition encapsulates her position as an outsider, interplaying the themes of inclusion and exclusion, seen through her desire for her art to be reciprocated and appreciated by the open distant world. Furthermore, Dickinson covets for a sense of connection through the reoccurring motif of the natural world, personifying “her” as a feminine persona with a nurturing capacity emphasizes through the accumulation of endorsing imagery “tender majesty… hands I cannot see…for love of her”. Despite her lack of relationship with her environment, she elevates nature to be majestic further denigrating her own self status as her writing will still be “judged” no matter how “tenderly”. Thus Dickinson seeks a sense of belonging through nature deriving from the human condition, yet in this driving process towards inclusion is met by exclusion from her sense of identity

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.

Emily Dickinson demonstrates how identity is something she envies as reflected in poem 260. This poem talks about how an individual

Emily Dickinson, born in 1830 in Amherst, Massachusetts, is regarded as one of America’s best poets. After a poor experience at Mount Holyoke Female Seminary, where she was regarded as a “no hope,” her writing career took off in full swing. Although her family was more conservative, regular churchgoers, and socially prominent town figures, Dickinson preferred a socially reserved lifestyle that renounced the traditional values of her day (Baym, 1189-93). The iconoclastic spirit pervasive in Emily Dickinson's poetry reflects her conflict with the traditions of New England society.

“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.

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.

Emily Dickinson’s “The Soul Selects her Own Society” presents herself as absolute and her rights as unchallengeable. The poem puts forward the idea of “friendship or love” which means choosing a significant person and excluding other people. Dickinson reveals that she was shutting people from her life, but because it had been so long, they are no longer interested in taking part of her life. Dickinson’s actions imply that the ability to create and construct a world for oneself, such as choosing your own actions, provides an example of a god-like achievement. Overall, Dickson asserts the importance of “the Self” theme which is shown my just speaking and writing as a ratification of the will to explore and express “the Self” to others.

The Belle of Amherst, The Woman in White, or The Most Paradoxical of Poets…who can say which pseudonym is most becoming of the late great Emily Dickinson. By virtue of the multitudinous biographical literary works, moreover the wondrous intimacy of Dickinson’s poetry, one could surmise that as readers we comprehend her entirely: yet the most prevalent experience borne from reading Emily’s work, especially if her poems are read successively, is that we come away feeling as though we know nothing at all. Like no author before her and very few after her, Emily Dickinson divulges her hearts hidden secrets while recording what is inexorably one of the most conscientious explorations of the human consciousness ever attempted. Dickinson is known posthumously for her unusual use of form and syntax, but it was her pervasive themes of immortality, death, and madness in her poems that would canonize her as an indelible American character.

At the age of seventeen she attended a public speaking in which she was not participating. While listening, she was distraught by the speaker when he said that though he had daughters which were “the equal of any man’s, they were destined to lives of domesticity and were unsuited to careers as doctors, lawyers, preachers, bankers, or the like.” Dickinson fired off at him “in Heaven’s name, sir, what else is to be expected of such a father?” Gaining recognition in the area for doing this on other accounts in the area is what leads her to finally standing on the platform and not in the audience.

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

Power and powerlessness are prominent themes common in both Emily Dickinson’s and Phillip Larkin’s poems. The idea of whom or what is in control and how power is obtained are explored. Both poets predominantly explore the idea that power primarily belongs to a male figure. However, in Larkin’s ‘Send No Money’ the speaker is portrayed to be powerless against an abstract idea rather than a physical, human being as shown in Dickinson’s ‘754’. This shows how both poets have many similarities in the manner in which they write about power and powerlessness. Both poets explore that ideas of power and powerlessness but one aspect of their writing that cannot be ignored is the time the poems were written in and the perspective they were written from. Dickinson is writing her poems from the eyes of a woman in the 19th century. Whereas Larkin wrote his poems around a century later when the times had changed and society had evolved. His poems are of course from the viewpoint of a traditional male writing around the 1950’s and onwards. It is interesting to note that neither poet married during their lifetime. Emily Dickinson was a recluse who preferred to live a solitary life and avoided interaction with outside people. Phillip Larkin could not commit himself into a long relationship. They both experienced loneliness in life where they couldn’t experience the struggle for power in relationships meaning they experienced power in different aspects. Dickinson was a deeply religious person

Dickinson uses ambiguity to stress the difficulty of knowing and understanding certain experiences and thoughts to the reader. By being deliberately elusive, Dickinson makes the speaker out to be some sort of hero. In a

Dickinson’s poems are easily recognized by her usage of dashes, random capitalization, and no titles. Dickinson frequently uses dashes for a more dramatic tone and adding more power behind her words. For example, in the poem “Death sets a Thing significant,” Dickinson writers, “The stitches stopped -- by themselves –” (XX). In this sentence, the dashes between the words “by themselves” it forces the reader to pause and add a more dramatic tone. It also shows that she tries to add emphasis that nothing influenced the stitches stop it just stopped by itself. In most of her poems she places dashes at the end instead of common punctuation marks in most poet’s poems during her time. For instance, in the poem “ I gave myself to him” the line “ Depreciate the Vision-/ Till the Merchant buys-” demonstrates her usage of dashes to replace the common punctuations ( stanza 3, line 1-2). In addition, she would capitalize words that shouldn’t be capitalized. For instance, in the poem “ I gave myself to him” she wrote “ And took Himself, for Pay,” (Stanza 1,line 2). In this line, the capitalization of himself emphasizes that he didn’t give anything up for this marriage and that she gave up everything in her life. It also emphasizes the inequality in her marriage and society’s view of roles for females as submissive. As a matter of fact, this is also shown in the line “ She rose to His Requirement” from the poem “She Rose to His Requirement- dropt” ( stanza 1, line 1). As in this sentence by capitalizing His she made it seem like he was a higher status than her. During that time, Mount Holyoke Female semistery college adapted these techniques and it led to many believing that she adapted these trademarks because she wanted wanted to gain admission. ( “Major”) Also, Emily Dickinson never title any of her poems. Due to the fact that she never had any intention of publishing her work while she was alive, her work was only published after her death by her family (“Emily”). Dickinson’s poems are mostly filled with metaphors, imagery Almost all of her poems are lyrical which express thoughts and feelings and written in first person point of view ( “Major”). She chose to wrote her poem in a lyrical form and a first person view

The meaning and impact of Dickinson’s work hinges on her employment of a single personification which extends throughout “The Soul Selects Her Own Society”. The personification begins on the first line with “The Soul selects her own Society —”. A soul, on its own, is not something that can select anything, or even have a society. Since it is immaterial, it certainly cannot “shut the Door —” as is stated in line two. This personification continues with lines such as, “she notes the Chariots —”, “Upon her Mat —”, and “close the Valves of her attention —”. The personification of “The Soul” immediately makes the poem feel more intimate. The word “soul” infers a deeper, more authentic, and closely guarded part of oneself. By personifying a soul, having it perform actions and make decisions, it is communicated that the events of this poem are neither an intellectual nor surface level matter. The decision to select those with whom you will be close with, and subsequently shut others out, is one which is based highly on feeling, emotion, and deep personal desires. Dickinson’s decision to write “The Soul Selects Her Own Society” in the context of a soul rather than the whole person allows the reader to pick up on the intended intimacy and depth the poem intends.

Emily Dickinson is described as “outspoken” , “defying the 19th century expectation that women were to be demure and obedient to men” , although this view is not clearly evidenced through her poetry.