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OP
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Ms. Dickinson was born on this day, 1830. Thoughts? Favorites? Anyone?
I remember reading that she was a recluse - would actually hole up for years at a time. What's up with that?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Chemeng, there is speculation that a disappointing love affair when she was very young drove her into withdrawing into the life of a recluse at the age of 23. Here's my favorite Dickinson poem, and a url to her literary/bio site (all her work is available there): My life closed twice before its close [cc]
MY life closed twice before its close--
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me
So huge, so hopeless to conceive
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.
Emily Dickinson (1880's-)http://www.online-literature.com/dickinson/
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veteran
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veteran
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Some time ago I mentioned Dickenson's work to an English Lit major as an example of the kind of stuff I enjoy. I got a response along the lines that she's okay if you're into that "Dylan-Thomas-rain-in-spain genre," as if I had stated a clear preference for bud and pretzels to Cabernet and Venezualan Beaver Cheese.
I guess I didn't think it was all that great, though, until I heard Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy reciting poetry to each other on some PBS program - among them ED's "Love is not All." After that, I was pretty much hooked.
k
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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the belle of amherst is one reason my daughter's name is Emily. its hard to select a single favorite, but this one comes to mind as a special one. THERE is no frigate like a book
To take us lands away,
Nor any coursers like a page
Of prancing poetry.
This traverse may the poorest take 5
Without oppress of toll;
How frugal is the chariot
That bears a human soul!
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dear FF "Venezuelan Beaver Cheese" sounds to me like a variety of smegma. Not what
I'd expect in a discussion of Emily Dickinson.
My encyclopedia devotes several paragraphs negating notion that she was reclusive.
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stranger
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stranger
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Hi, I heard often that ED had health issues, a frail constitution, that type of thing. Here's one of her excursions she did manage to make:
I STARTED early, took my dog,
And visited the sea;
The mermaids in the basement
Came out to look at me,
And frigates in the upper floor
Extended hempen hands,
Presuming me to be a mouse
Aground, upon the sands.
But no man moved me till the tide
Went past my simple shoe,
And past my apron and my belt,
And past my bodice too,
And made as he would eat me up
As wholly as a dew
Upon a dandelion’s sleeve—
And then I started too.
And he—he followed close behind;
I felt his silver heel
Upon my ankle,—then my shoes
Would overflow with pearl.
Until we met the solid town,
No man he seemed to know;
And bowing with a mighty look
At me, the sea withdrew.
I like the mood there: she started early; she took her dog..
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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a clear preference for bud and pretzels
I don't think rhyme and meter is much in favor these days.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I don't think rhyme and meter is much in favor these days.
And why should it be deemed a crime
If I should choose to use a rhyme?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Her greatest year for writing in terms of output was 1862 in which she wrote 364 poems, averaging about a poem a day. She was in her early thirties. I read that she wrote poetry till the end of her days, but the years around 1862 were the most productive by far, sometimes a year with about 60, or another with about 80 or 100.
I have an edition of the complete poems, and the lifetime total is 1775, an easy figure for a US'n to remember.
The book's upstairs, but I'll return later and type out the one about snow--charming, but haunting, too. She never uses the word snow.
It's interesting to take a look at poetic output. Sylvia Plath in her final days was turing out sometimes four poems a day. Her overall output doesn't compare to Dickinson's.
One thing I've learned about Emily: Sometimes I think I've "got" her--then I see something new and she takes me to a different level. I also enjoy her use of odd words--unashamedly at times using them. I read somewhere that she once said that the only two books you really needed were the dictionary and the Bible--but, heavens, she was extremely well-read....so, easy for her to say.
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Carpal Tunnel
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one of my favorite pieces of music is "Harmonium", by San Francisco composer John Adams, and my favorite section is "Wild Nights", on a fabulous poem by Emily Dickinson.
formerly known as etaoin...
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