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Poetic analysis of emily dickinson
Poetic analysis of emily dickinson
The portrayal of death in literature throughout the years
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An Unconventional Style of Poetry Emily Dickinson, famous for her life of reclusion, is also just as famous for taking an unconventional look on how to write poetry. Her style of writing and poems themselves, have greatly influenced poets since. Her poetry alone has stood the test of time and has come to be called some of the greatest and most thought provoking to come from her time period, with even some of the greatest writers becoming flummoxed at trying to understand the meaning of Dickinson’s poetry. Having made her fame in life for being a notorious recluse, Emily Dickinson found even more fame when, upon her death, her poetry was found by her sister and brother-in-law, and then published. Within these newly found poems, a new style …show more content…
The running themes of the universe and unending time are present within this work by Dickinson. The constant progression of time also stands present within this poem, and is the central theme within it. Dickinson speaks of how time continues on into the vast infiniteness. When Dickinson writes “Forever – is composed of Nows – “ (Dickinson, Forever -- is composed of Nows ) , she is describing how people can have memories about the past and think about what may happen in the future be we only experience time as it is happening to us. Humans only experience the “Now”. Although time is a constant and is constantly moving forward, humans only perceive it as a present experience and not something that is happening to themselves in the future. With every second that passes by, the present is constantly changing and is constantly made up of millions and millions of different “Nows” (Dickinson, Forever -- is composed of Nows ). Everything that seems to make up the future, the days, months, and years ahead, all flow into the present and become “Nows” (Dickinson, Forever -- is composed of Nows ). The vastness of time seems to be filled with the endless possibilities of “Nows” (Dickinson, Forever -- is composed of Nows ), and what they may hold. This just goes to show that Emily Dickinson was more than just a macabre writer she was also able to tap into the most inner thoughts of herself and describe the universe as she sees
“Although Emily Dickinson is known as one of America’s best and most beloved poets, her extraordinary talent was not recognized until after her death” (Kort 1). Dickinson was born on December 10, 1830, in Amherst, Massachusetts, where she spent most of her life with her younger sister, older brother, semi-invalid mother, and domineering father in the house that her prominent family owned. As a child, she was curious and was considered a bright student and a voracious reader. She graduated from Amherst Academy in 1847, and attended a female seminary for a year, which she quitted as she considered that “’I [she] am [was] standing alone in rebellion [against becoming an ‘established Christian’].’” (Kort 1) and was homesick. Afterwards, she excluded herself from having a social life, as she took most of the house’s domestic responsibilities, and began writing; she only left Massachusetts once. During the rest of her life, she wrote prolifically by retreating to her room as soon as she could. Her works were influenced ...
Dickinson’s Christian education affected her profoundly, and her desire for a human intuitive faith motivates and enlivens her poetry. Yet what she has faith in tends to be left undefined because she assumes that it is unknowable. There are many unknown subjects in her poetry among them: Death and the afterlife, God, nature, artistic and poetic inspiration, one’s own mind, and other human beings.
Emily Dickinson was born December 10th, 1830 in her family home on main street in Amherst, Massachusetts to her two parents Edward and Emily Norcross Dickinson. The homestead in which she was born was a family home owned by her grandparents who, soon after her sister’s birth in 1833, sold it out of the family. The Dickinson’s held residence in the home as tenants for the next seven years. Once her father’s political career took off, around the age she was nine, they moved to, and bought a new house in the same town. Dickinson was very close to her siblings, her older brother Austin and younger sister Lavinia. She had a strong attachment to her home and spent a lot of her time doing domestic duties such as baking and gardening. Dickinson also had good schooling experiences of a girl in the early nineteenth century. She started out her education in an Amherst district school, then from there she attended Amherst Academy with her sister for about seven years. At this school it is said that she was an extraordinary student with very unique writing talent. From there she attended Mount Holyoke Female Seminary for a year in 1847. this year was the longest she had spent away from home. In her youth, Dickinson displayed a social s...
Emily Dickinson was a polarizing author whose love live has intrigued readers for many years. Her catalog consists of many poems and stories but the one thing included in the majority of them is love. It is documented that she was never married but yet love is a major theme in a vast amount of her poetry. Was there a person that she truly loved but never had the chance to pursue? To better understand Emily Dickinson, one must look at her personal life, her poems, and her diction.
Recognized for experimenting with poetry, Emily Dickinson is said to be one of the greatest American poets. Her work was an amazing success even after being published four years after her death in 1890. Eleven editions of Dickinson’s work were published in less than two years. Emily Dickenson’s personal life, literary influences and romantic sufferings were the main inspirations for her poetry.
In the poem she states, “Let months dissolve in further months- And years- exhale in years (Dickinson line 7 and 8).” This quote is explaining how fast time can go bye, and if you live your life looking at what to come you’re going to miss what’s going on right now. Green doesn’t use personification like Dickinson does. For instance, Green says, “ The clock was always punishing, but I feel like I was closer to unravelling the knot (Green 200).” This meaning he felt like time had been going against him the whole time, but he had never felt so close to her.
Emily Dickinson is one of the great visionary poets of nineteenth century America. In her lifetime, she composed more poems than most modern Americans will even read in their lifetimes. Dickinson is still praised today, and she continues to be taught in schools, read for pleasure, and studied for research and criticism. Since she stayed inside her house for most of her life, and many of her poems were not discovered until after her death, Dickinson was uninvolved in the publication process of her poetry. This means that every Dickinson poem in print today is just a guess—an assumption of what the author wanted on the page. As a result, Dickinson maintains an aura of mystery as a writer. However, this mystery is often overshadowed by a more prevalent notion of Dickinson as an eccentric recluse or a madwoman. Of course, it is difficult to give one label to Dickinson and expect that label to summarize her entire life. Certainly she was a complex woman who could not accurately be described with one sentence or phrase. Her poems are unique and quite interestingly composed—just looking at them on the page is pleasurable—and it may very well prove useful to examine the author when reading her poems. Understanding Dickinson may lead to a better interpretation of the poems, a better appreciation of her life’s work. What is not useful, however, is reading her poems while looking back at the one sentence summary of Dickinson’s life.
The idea behind this word can be interpreted in a infinite amount of ways, but each description has a common thought process of something to be reached or obtained. This implies that whatever desire an individual has lies somewhere else. Not here. This thought process can lead people searching for entire lives, but forever can never be found. Eternity relates to time and time does not include the past, present, or future. A deep understanding surfaces when the idea of " forever is composed of nows" is taken literally (Dickinson 1). Dickinson 's poem describes how the imaginings of the future and regrets of the past are solely felt in the now and the time an individual spends thinking of the months coming occurs in the time presently passing. Therefore, when people spend entire lives planning a future, they end up wasting the time given in the present. The imperative concept to understand in this situation is simple: time stops for no one. When individuals " Let Months dissolve [into] further Months," simply existing and not completely living, they lack the knowledge that a replay button does not exist in life ( Dickinson 7). Each moment lived contains more importance than the last, and the fact that modern day society treats time as a given birth right and not a blessing helps to strengthen Dickinson 's emphasis on living life in the moment. People waste entire lives on unimportant desires and unnecessary worries because they expect more time. A large concern of
The quality and complex logic of Dickinson’s poem paired with her depth of subject matter led to her success; because in her lifetime, Dickinson was simply concerned with her personal poetic expansion and putting all of her intricate, open ideas on paper for her own pleasure rather than for
Dickinson unravels this thesis in the poem by explaining how time is not composed in the past, or in the future it is only composed of “nows” referring to the present time. The majority of this poem develops her idea that time is “untouchable” unless it is in the moment (O’Brien). In accordance with that line, the following sentence gives insight into her point by providing support in creating a paradox. This paradox is used in this poem to exaggerate her point in that time exists only and
Emily Dickinson lived in an era of Naturalism and Realism (1855-1910). She lived in a period of The Civil War and the Frontier. She was affected by her life and the era she lived in. She also had many deaths in her family and that’s part of the reason that she was very morbid and wrote about death.
Breaking news revealing the truth about Emily Dickinson’s life has recently been uncovered. For the past hundred-plus years literary historians believed Dickinson to be a plain and quiet type of person who did not communicate with the public for most of her life. Her romanticism poetry drew attention from fellow literary legends. After corresponding with the well-known Thomas Wentworth Higginson, who showed interest in her work but advised her not to publish it, she became defiant to publish any of her work.
As complex as the words and punctuation may seem, I chose this particular poem because of it’s underlying simplicity. What I’ve interpreted from the text is that the overall theme from this, and many of Dickinson’s other works, is illustrating the complicated and beautiful relationship between our minds and what we depict as the natural world. What Dickinson describes in the poem above is so interesting in that it actually uses these characteristics of nature to explain the capacity of the human brain; to absorb the depths of the great oceans, to grow to the wide length of the sky and to interpret the freewill given to us by
The average reader cannot help but be affected by Dickinson’s style. The capitalized words draw the reader’s attention. They highlight important key words of the poem. The dashes set apart specific words and phrases, forcing the reader to slow down while reading. The dashes compel the reader to contemplate and ponder over the lines. Thus, whether or not Dickinson had a conscious purpose in her unconventional capitalization and punctuation, they have an undeniable effect on the rhythm of the poem and the perception of the reader.
Emily Dickenson also strategically places a caesura between the word centuries and yesterday to make the reader slow down and additionally express how pain drags things on in a slow manner. Additionally, in the following line Emily begins to explain how mechanical feet go around in circles. What Dickinson is trying to make evident to the reader is that the human feet which go around doing hard labor, are feeling a constant numbness as expressed by the key word mechanical; she also adds in “go round” as if to explain how the numbness is infinite.