Emily Dickinson
The Unconventional Poet
Introduction and Thesis
Poetry has been around for thousands of years in various forms. It is human nature to express one’s self. Some of the great poets, such as Edgar Allan Poe, Sylvia Plath, and Henry David Thoreau gained their fame posthumously. Emily Dickinson is another. She wrote numerous poems in her lifetime and a great majority were published after her death. Dickinson’s poems have had an incredible influence on American literature. She bends literary conventions by using unique words, unusual rhyming schemes, and harsh line breaks. She demonstrates a deep understanding of formal poetic structure despite defying the restrictions of it.
About the Author
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was born on December 10, 1830 into a well known family with strong community ties. She was born and raised in Amherst, Massachusetts.
She studied at Amherst Academy for seven years in her youth and also briefly attended Mount Holyoke Female Seminary before returning to her family home in Amherst.
In her adolescence she would go out in society, join parties. She was always a reserved woman, and in her twenties she started to withdraw from the public, eventually completely isolating herself. Neighbors thought she was highly eccentric. After her father died in 1874, Dickinson rarely left her home and was always seen wearing white.
“It was only after her death, with the publication of Poems by Emily Dickinson (1890), that the wider public became aware of her talent. Though forged within the Puritan cultural atmosphere that dominated nineteenth-century New England, Dickinson’s work is notable for its stylistic innovations, as well as its individualistic approach to themes of love, suffering, human consciousness, mortality, and God. Her varied and unorthodox rhyme schemes and her rigorous, yet unconventional use of meter represent a creative benchmark in American poetry rivaled only by the free verse of Walt Whitman.” Trudeau (2018)
Robert Frost had his own criticisms, pictured below:
About the Poetry
Dickinson’s poetry broke all the conventional and formal rules of poetry. She expressed herself using abrupt breaks, capitalization for empathsis, dashes used for a pause. Her poetry was not just read it was felt. The rebellious, unique style and structure she used only added to the poem’s power. Dickinson often wrote about love, suffering, human consciousness, mortality, and God. Her poems are deeply philosophical and emotional. “With some incredulousness he wrote to Mrs. Todd: ‘I can’t tell you how much i am enjoying these poems. There are many new to me which take my breath away and which also have form beyond most of those I’ve seen before’(Thomas Higginson)” (Edelstein 1968) Thomas Higginson was the editor who published Dickinson’s poetry after her death. While he was reading the poems he was startled to find that Dickinson had not sent her best work while they were corresponding.
Dickinson has over a thousand poems and those poems cover many themes from love to mortality. Her poetry is still a classroom staple today. These poems have influenced writers and shaped the way poetry can be written ever since.
The Legacy
Author Monteiro George claims that Robert Frost (despite his criticisms of Dickinson) was influenced by Emily Dickinson’s poetry. He describes how Frost’s poem The Birds Do Thus can be read as a response to Dickinson’s poem 301 (I reason the Earth is short). Monteiro goes on to say “When the poems are juxtaposed, Frost’s The Birds Do Thus can be read as a reply to Dickinson’s poem. Her anxiety is countered by his whimsy… When Dickinson decides…”earth is short”…Frost answers that ‘Life’s not so short’”
Dickinson experimented with unconventional writing methods to better express herself. According to the Poetry Foundation, “Dickinson created in her writing a distinctively elliptical language for expressing what was possible but not yet realized. Like the Concord Transcendentalists whose works she knew well, she saw poetry as a double-edged sword. While it liberated the individual, it as readily left him ungrounded.” Dickinson’s poetry is now in it’s 11th edition and is still widely read. Her poetry has left a resounding impact among people of all ages.
Dickinson was a trail blazer for poets. Her unorthodox poem structure, ryhming schemes, metering have all paved the way for poets to feel free to break out of the formal rules of poetry in order to better express themselves.
Works Cited
Bargeron, Eric. “Emily Dickinson.” Poetry Criticism, edited by Lawrence J. Trudeau, vol. 194, Gale, 2018. Gale Literature Criticism, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/NIWXGI946939889/LCO?u=lincclin_ecc&sid=LCO&xid=265c600b. Accessed 30 Nov. 2020.
Edelstein, Tilden G. “Article by Tilden G. Edelstein.” Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism, edited by Paula Kepos, vol. 36, Gale, 1990. Gale Literature Criticism, https://link-gale-com.db07.linccweb.org/apps/doc/DDOLSJ613129575/LCO?u=lincclin_ecc&sid=LCO&xid=5414a918. Accessed 30 Nov. 2020. Originally published in Strange Enthusiasm: A Life of Thomas Wentworth Higginson, by Tilden G. Edelstein, Yale University Press, 1968.
George, Monteiro. “Dangling Conversation.” Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism, edited by Lawrence J. Trudeau, vol. 236, Gale, 2010. Gale Literature Criticism, https://link-gale-com.db07.linccweb.org/apps/doc/IDYTVI668087138/LCO?u=lincclin_ecc&sid=LCO&xid=45570d8d. Accessed 30 Nov. 2020. Originally published in Robert Frost & The New England Renaissance, University Press of Kentucky, 1988, pp. 9–23.
Emily Dickinson. www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/emily-dickinson.
