Emily Dickinson's Hall Literature, The American Experience

All pages cited in this blog will be from the textbook Prentice Hall Literature, The American Experience

What makes American literature American? With aspects devoted to the discussion of poetry from pages 402 and 403 and the use of free verse by Walt Whitman.

What makes American literature American? American literature whether a book or poem seeks to relate to the everyday life of the American citizen and brings an optimism, boldness and sense of adventure to a story. To do this American authors are not afraid to step outside the lines and choose their own unique way of conveying their message. The two American poets examined in this reading were not afraid to choose their own style, helping them to find success. Emily Dickinson used unique

capitalization and dashes in her writing, something she was encouraged to avoid during her writing career. Almost 70 years after her death, her work was finally published in its original verse with her weird capitalization and dashes, and “she is now acknowledged as a visionary who was far ahead of her time”(405).

Dickinson wrote many of her works as Lyric poetry, in which thoughts and feelings are expressed by a single speaker. At the beginning and throughout many of her poems she uses pronouns such as I, We, He, and My signifying a single narrator. Dickinson also uses paradox's, "a statement that seems contradictory but actually presents a truth" (407) such as "Water, is taught by thirst" (417), and slant rhyme where final stressed syllable sounds are similar but not identical to keep her poems interesting, surprising and unique. What makes Dickinson’s work American literature is the tension between sense of self, nature and society that she writes about. In a country in which individuality and a sense of fitting in with society are praised, Dickinson was able to speak of the tension created between the two. In The Soul Selects her own Society Dickinson states “The Soul selects her own Society-/Then-shuts the door-/ To her divine Majority-”(414). Dickinson references the choice that an individual selects their own soul or belief and closes it to the masses to be unmoved. Dickinson also writes of society in her poem THERE IS A SOLITUDE OF SPACE “Society shall be/ Compared with

that profounder site/ That polar privacy/ A soul admitted to itself- Finite Infinity”(416). The tension Dickinson creates in her poetry compares to American society in which the struggle between trying to fit into society or becoming oneself is still dealt with today.

The other poet from this section is Walt Whitman, who like Emily Dickinson chose a style of writing never before used by an American Poet.

Whitman used free verse in his works, allowing him to “shape every line and stanza to suit his meaning, rather than fitting his message to a form”(424). Free verse also allows Whitman's writing to sound more like regular speech and easier reading. “The wild gander leads his flock through the cool night. Ya-honk he says, and sounds it down to me like an invitation” (429). Because of Whitman's strong word choice his poems create a feel of boldness, adventure and optimism that Americans felt during his time. He writes in Leaves of Grass “America does not repel the past or what it has produced under its forms or amid other politics or the idea of castes or the old religions…. Accepts the lesson with calmness….”(426). These words show the power and boldness of America. Whitman also encases what makes America special, that she is a nation filled with others from many different nations. “Here is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations. Here is action united from strings necessarily blind to particulars and details magnificently moving in vast masses” (427). Whitman also references that although America is a nation filled with nations the those different nations unite to become one great country. In all Dickinson's and Whitman's each used their own unique style in writing their poems. Through Dickinson's references to tension in

society and Whitman's writing of optimism, adventure and boldness both authors are considered true American authors.