Why Is Emily Dickinson Considered A Docile Gentleman

The next seemingly arbitrary decision is Dickinson's capitalization. The capitalization at the beginning of the sentence must be capitalized; therefore, we'll focus on the capitalizations that lie within each sentence. In this poem, each of these words is a noun. Past this simple reading, what may we deduce from these capitalizations? Each stanza presents a different set of capitalized objects

The speaker is deduced as a woman from the first stanza’s feminine references to “Dolls” (5) and “threading” (7). Immediately, the narrator is placed in a role that stereotypes her to be a woman. Dickinson does this to

In the fourth stanza, Dickinson asks whether the lives of those who survive worth all the lives sacrificed in battle, similar to her message in the third stanza. Are our lives, “we that wait”, worthy of something so beautiful as someone’s life, the “Enormous Pearl” being destroyed in something so brutal as battle. The line “In Battle’s – horrid bowl” gives the image of a brutal and bloody turmoil that, like the curved edges of a bowl, is inescapable.

The tone seems reflective, as if the narrator is retelling the story over, having thought about it many times. There is one point when irony is used—the last stanza is full of confusing words that contradict each other and are certainly not what one would expect after reading the preceding line. I feel the rhetorical situation is the narrator telling a story, perhaps something that happened long ago, and reflecting on it. Dickinson’s use of dashes—though she uses them frequently in all poems—assists to the feeling of story-telling. There are a few occasions throughout the poem when the use of dashes gives the idea of the narrator pausing and adding in a little extra information, maybe something that helps the reader understand the situation more. I think the reader is having a one-on-one meeting with the narrator, though the reader is never formally or specifically addressed. I think it could be that the narrator has gone off on a bit of a tangent, and is perhaps talking almost to his or herself, and glances back to the reader every once in a while to make sure he or she is still paying attention.

Emily Dickinson was one of the many famous American poets whose work was published in the 19th century. Her writing style was seen as unconventional due to her use of “dashes and syntactical fragments”(81), which was later edited out by her original publishers. These fragmented statements and dashes were added to give emphasis to certain lines and subjects to get her point across. Even though Emily Dickinson was thought to be a recluse, she wrote descriptive, moving poems on death, religion, and love. Her poems continue to create gripping discussions among scholars on the meaning behind her poems.

She, growing up in a religious family, determined that religion was not the pathway for her and she would instead be the only influence on her life (Emily, no pag.). To the rest of New England, God was loving, caring, and a Father; however, her poetry reveals that to her, He was a mystical figure in the sky who oscillated back and forth from loving to harsh. Dickinson’s poetry often mocks the Bible, God, prayer, and church attendance. Her poetry’s is commonly irreverent, calling the Bible “an antique Volume – Written by faded Men At the suggestion of Holy Spectres - ” (F1577). Dickinson repeatedly mocks God calling Him “Burglar! Banker!” and sarcastically “Father!” (F39). In a short, three-lined poem, Dickinson jeers at the traditional, Christian phrase “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost—Amen.” Dickinson instead worships nature “In the name of the Bee – And of the Butterfly – And of the Breeze – Amen!” (F23). Although subtle, it reveals that she knows enough about religious ways to parody it in a satirical fashion. Dickinson again belittles the effectiveness and importance of prayer. “Of Course – I prayed – And did God Care? He cared as much as on the Air A Bird – had stamped her foot – And cried ‘Give Me’ - ” (F581). To “remain true to herself,” Dickinson belittled the importance of faithful church attendance ( Emily, no pag.). “Some keep the Sabbath going to

The narrator believes you do not have to attend church to be spiritual and that common practice can be done in a peaceful place such as the orchard in her yard. The last two lines of the poem state, “So instead of getting to Heaven, at last- / I’m going, all along” (Dickinson 639). I interpreted this as the long journey to heaven has become a huge part of her life. It is not just a look into the future, but a continuous look in the present. The symbols Dickinson uses in this poem are by far the highlight of this short piece of poetry. In the first stanza, a bobolink and orchard are used to replace things that modern churches value as sacred and holy. Those natural occurrences are used by Dickinson to show her love for nature. More examples of this are shown in the second stanza. The narrator uses her own “sexton” to call her holly time instead of a brass bell to call church service. This is important to analyze as yet another natural occurrence that highly defines the authors writing style.

However, Dickinson’s poem is very different from Whitman’s in structure and language. In “324,” the speaker explains how they observe Sabbath, in nature rather than going to a service, when saying “With a Bobolink for a Chorister — / And an Orchard, for a Dome —” (lines 4-5). Dickinson, like Whitman, provides visual imagery; of a bird instead of the Church choir and an orchard instead of the “Dome,” which represents a church. In these lines, readers can envision the beautiful nature scene that the speaker treasures. Furthermore, as Whitman also did, Dickinson uses auditory imagery as the speaker explains further how the spend their Sabbath, “And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church, / Our little Sexton — sings” (lines 8-9). Here, the sounds of the Church’s bell is what the speaker traded for the charming bird’s song in their form of worship. Like Whitman, Dickinson uses imagery to illustrate to readers her preference for nature that connects her to God and religion, unlike for many others who choose to attend church. Moreover, in contrast to Whitman’s poem, Dickinson writes in an abcb rhyme scheme where the second and fourth lines rhyme and have a meter. To demonstrate, every even-numbered line rhymes; Home” and “Dome,” “Wings” and “sings,” “long” and “along.”

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

First, she uses dashes that separate the lines in the poem. The dashes are there to cause readers to pause and slowly read the poem. The next method that is used is the rhyme scheme, which is an ABCB pattern. The rhyme scheme is very important in the fact that it still slows the reading of the poem down, while still flowing smoothly. Also, Dickinson uses strange capitalization throughout the poem. The capitalization is purposely in specific words to make readers stop and think about why the words are capitalized, making the readers slow down while

Dickinson’s use of figurative language in “Because I Could Not Stop for Death” contributes to the meaning of the poem. With the use of personification, symbolism, and examples of vivid imagery, she composes a poem which is both unique and captivating. The title and first line of the poem, “Because I Could

In the first stanza she simply states that just because one can’t see or have never seen something doesn’t mean that it can’t or doesn’t exist. That being said, Dickinson then says that she has not ever “spoken with God” or visited heaven in the third pair of lines (Dickinson 1273). The final set of lines says that she is “certain of the spot” (Dickinson 1273). This second stanza clearly confirms that she is confident of her place in heaven. Dickinson believes in all of these things even though she hasn’t observed any of them. (Benfey 25) This particular poem shows of her assurance of God and heaven.

The subject of this poem is the speaker and his/her life in the hands of The Owner. The point that the author is trying to make is that life is like a loaded gun, in that it has great potential, but cannot accomplish anything without the help of a master’s hand. The poem is very descriptive as to what is accomplished when the master takes control. I like this poem because I can relate it to the life of a Christian in the hands of God. The metaphors that Dickinson uses can be interpreted in different ways according to one’s beliefs, but I can definitely see religious connotations within this text. For example, The Owner can be seen as God, and in the fourth stanza the speaker states,

Dickinson gives Death many characteristics that help to shape our image of him. The line "He kindly stopped for me" in the first stanza, immediately gives a male gender (2). This male image gives the reader the traditional idea of the gentleman caller. This line also reveals a kind quality of death. The kind quality is important throughout this poem because it allows the speaker to

Dickinson's bout with religious turmoil is quite evident in poem 1545; The Bible is an antique Volume-, in which she seems to be attacking the Puritan radicals such as Jonathan Edward. This poem gives almost a complete overview of the Bible, speaking of Eden, Satan, Judas, David, and also Sin. This poem lets us see why and also how this strict religious upbringing may have pushed her to become the `old spinster' as some may call her, or the woman with the disease of agoraphobia.