Impression of Emily Dickinson’s Work

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Since so much of her work has appeared for the first time in the 21^st century, Emily Dickinson seems almost a contemporary; and her unevenness, her paradoxes, and conceits are well suited to present-day conventions. But a great number of her verses are inchoative rather than finished–a fact clear enough to herself but often lost sight of in the undiscriminating enthusiasm which they have sometimes elicited.

Yet, whether complete or incomplete, whether accurately or inaccurately reproduced by editors, a substantial element in her poems provide rare ignition for the emotions or challenges the intellect by cryptic wit. Her irony often supplies a kind of caper sauce for the digestion of her moralizing, and when her paradoxes do fulminate they leave one breathless with their startling originality. But often the thyme and marjoram of form and content are not transformed into the miracle of honey.

I read all of the poems and find them to be emotional. I find some of it difficult to comprehend due to the symbolism until I reread her biography. I like her ability to put her feelings into words and symbols, but don’t like the difficulty in understanding the meaning of the symbols. Dickinson’s writing does require a lot of critical thinking and analysis to decipher the meaning.

In “Much Madness is divinest Sense” Dickinson handled the theme of madness with a lighter touch. This poem’s social satire on the “Majority” (whose numerousness is emphasized by the plural “prevail”) attacks its lack of discernment about individual behavior, as well as the fear of difference that leads it to define disagreement as insanity. The opening may be parallel to Melville’s “man’s insanity is heaven’s sense”. The “discerning Eye” that sees through society’s “Madness” is certainly the poet’s and, implicitly, belongs to certain other naysayers as well. (Dickinson 435)

“I felt a Funeral, in my Brain” articulates a state of consciousness that follows the stages of a funeral rite: the mourners tread, the service is conducted, the pallbearers carry the casket, and the church bells ring. If we follow the poem’s stages in this way, then it might depict a kind of Poe-Esque premature burial, given that the speaker describes events from inside the casket. The “knowing” that is finished in the final stanza would presumably be consciousness. (Dickinson 280)

“I heard a Fly buzz — when I died” offers Dickinson’s response to the question, What is it like to experience death? For the narrator, the final moments of life are interrupted by the mundane buzzing of a fly, demonstrating Dickinson’s unique twist on the old familiar deathbed scene. (Dickinson 465)

“Some keep the Sabbath going to Church”) Marked by its set of contrasting images that cluster around “Church” and “Home,” this poem was prominent in Dickinson circles in the nineteenth century. In the poem, the speaker celebrates a church ritual in an orchard with a bobolink as sexton, one who sings instead of tolling a bell. In this pleasant scene, “God preaches, a noted Clergyman,” (Dickinson 324) and the speaker finally claims that this setting constitutes heaven she can enjoy throughout her life rather than “getting to” the heaven of traditional religious beliefs. The poem reveals Dickinson’s delight in a natural setting, her preference for the earth and this life, her rejection of institutionalized religion and its practices, and her general distrust of ministers and their dogmatism. (Dickinson 324)

In “The Soul selects her own Society” Dickinson expressed her choice to concentrate emotional energies on an important few. This poem witnesses Dickinson’s intense individualism: her commitment to Romantic trust in the ability, nobility, sanctity, and worth of the individual, above — and often in opposition to — community, institution, doctrine, and even religious faith. (Dickinson 303)

“Because I could not stop for Death’s” haunting quality stems from its never fully articulated suspicion that Death’s courtship may never lead beyond the limbo of the grave, that is, that Death may be as sinister as “He” is suave. The “Horses Heads” remain “toward Eternity “; but, as there is no evidence that they will arrive, even that good chaperon “Immortality” may not deliver the clarity and comfort promised in Victorian accounts of Christian death or marriage with God. Dickinson makes no overt claim that death is frightening or heaven unreachable, but she effectively undercuts the apparent calm certainties of the first three stanzas through the understated “chill” of the final three. (Dickinson 712)

“The Brain — is wider than the Sky” was first published in Poems (1896) as “The Brain.” Though the subject of consciousness is introduced in stanza 1, the poem’s theme is the brain’s infinity — which it elucidates by comparing it sequentially to the sky, the sea, and God, using the lexical fields of measurement and capacity. While the first two stanzas claim the mind’s superiority to matter, the last seems to assert that the mind and the idea of God are indistinguishable. (Dickinson 632)

“I died for Beauty–but was scarce” like a number concerning immortality, possesses a sense of ambiguity. It may be that what is not expressed carries some significance. Nowhere in this poem does Emily Dickinson directly imply that we are witnessing the entering into of an immortal state. The assumption, if it is made, is in the mind of the reader. What we do have in this poem is a rather complete immersion in the material, from the sense at the beginning of an after-death condition-reassuring but essentially mortal–to the sense at the end of undisguised physical death and decay, also very much the mortal condition. The poem is manipulative and deliberately ambivalent. (Dickinson 449)

“After great pain a formal feeling comes,” has the classical finality of a Greek ode. This poem describes a woman prostrated by a shock. Dickinson repeatedly describes emotional states with uncanny accuracy. This poem gives a searching and realistic description of a state of mind. Dickinson’s curiosity explored the outstanding problems of psychologists. Thus she has several fascinating lyrics dealing frankly with questions of memory and forgetfulness. (Dickinson 341)

“Wild Nights–Wild Nights!” is perhaps the most overtly erotic of all Dickinson’s poems. Its ecstatic nature is underscored by the preponderance of accented syllables in the opening stanza, with the double stress of “Wild Nights” repeated no fewer than three times in the space of fourteen words. The “Wild Nights” themselves may be taken to signify both stormy weather and sexual passion. The first and third stanzas express the speaker’s longing for her love, whereas the second details her feeling of contentment when she is united with the lover. Nautical imagery pervades the poem, from the storms indicated by both “Wild Nights” and “the Winds” to such terms as “port”, compass”, “chart”, “rowing”, “sea” and “moor”. (Dickinson 249)

Work Cited

Dickinson, Emily (Author) & Johnson, Thomas H (Editor). The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson. New York: Little, Brown and Company; Stated First Edition, 1960.

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Impression of Emily Dickinson’s Work

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