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Emily Dickinson

Introduction
 Emily Dickinson has been hailed by critics as one of the most important and
original poets to emerge from the American literary tradition. However, the poet received
none of this critical acclaim during her lifetime.

The structure of her poems was not as polished as the conventional romantic verse
that was published in the leading periodicals of the day. Dickinson's poems are unique for
the era in which she wrote; they contain short lines, typically lack titles, and often use
slant rhyme as well as unconventional capitalization and punctuation. She used simple
words and images to meditate on such profound universal concepts as nature, death, and
immortality.

The poet responded to the gender-restrictive values of the mid-nineteenth-century

patriarchal society. Critics have concluded that while as a person Dickinson succumbed
to a life of social marginality and seclusion, as a poet she opened a new frontier of
feminine power and assertiveness through her transcendent and imaginative verse.

“EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION”

Dickinson was born on December 10, 1830, in Amherst, Massachusetts. Her family had deep
roots in New England. Her paternal grandfather, Samuel Dickinson, was well known as the
founder of Amherst College. Her father worked at Amherst and served as a state legislator. He
married Emily Norcross in 1828 and the couple had three children: William Austin, Emily and
Lavinia Norcross.

As a young child, Emily proved to be a bright and conscientious student. She showed a
sharp intelligence, and was able to create many original writings of rhyming stories,
delighting her fellow classmates. Emily’s father was strict and keen to bring up his
children in the proper way. Emily said of her father. “his heart was pure and terrible”. His
strictness can be shown through his censorship of reading materials; Walt Whitman for
example was considered “too inappropriate” and novels had to be smuggled into the
house. In response, Emily was highly deferential to her father and other male figures of
authority. But in her own way she loved and respected her father, even if at times, he
appeared to be aloof. At a young age, she said she wished to be the “best little girl”.
However, despite her attempts to please and be well thought of, she was also at the same
time independently minded, and quite willing to refuse the prevailing orthodoxy’s on
certain issues.

An excellent student, Dickinson was educated at Amherst Academy (now Amherst

College) for seven years and then attended Mount Holyoke Female Seminary for a year.
Though the precise reasons for Dickinson's final departure from the academy in 1848 are
unknown; theories offered say that her fragile emotional state may have played a role
and/or that her father decided to pull her from the school. Dickinson ultimately never
joined a particular church or denomination, steadfastly going against the religious norms
of the time.

“Death and Discovery”

Dickinson died of kidney disease in Amherst, Massachusetts, on May 15, 1886, at the age
of 55. She was laid to rest in her family plot at West Cemetery. The Homestead, where
Dickinson was born, is now a museum.

“POETRY”
Little of Dickinson's work was published at the time of her death, and the few works that
were published were edited and altered to adhere to conventional standards of the time.
Unfortunately, much of the power of Dickinson's unusual use of syntax and form was lost
in the alteration. After her sister's death, Lavinia discovered hundreds of poems that
Dickinson had crafted over the years. The first volume of these works was published in
1890. A full compilation, The Poems of Emily Dickinson, wasn't published until 1955,
though previous iterations had been released.

Dickinson's stature as a writer soared from the first publication of her poems in their
intended form. She is known for her poignant and compressed verse, which profoundly
influenced the direction of 20th-century poetry. The strength of her literary voice, as well
as her reclusive and eccentric life, contributes to the sense of Dickinson as an indelible
American character who continues to be discussed today.

INTERESTING FACTS
She lived in the same house for most of her life (1830)

Dickinson spent most of her life living in the Homestead, her family’s house in Amherst, Massachusetts.
The property was built for her grandparents in 1813 and then passed down to their children in, the same
year that the poet was born. She only lived elsewhere in Amherst for a 15-year period, after Homestead
was purchased by businessman David Mack—but in 1855, the family rebought the house and moved
back in, with both Dickinson.
She was an avid gardener 
Dickinson started gardening as a child and later went on to undertake botany courses at the Mount
Holyoke Female Seminary and Amherst Academy. The Homestead garden was well-known for its
beautiful assortment of flowers, many of which are detailed in letters from friends and family who had
been to visit.  Dickinson also assembled a 66-page collection of 424 pressed flowers, each one
meticulously classified and labelled. she enjoyed sending loved bunches of flowers with a written verse
Sattached, although they mostly “valued the posy more than the poetry”.
Experts are still trying to unmask her mystery “lover” (1858 – 1862)

She might not have ever married, but Dickinson’s canon includes passionate love poems and three love
letters, now known as the “Master Letters”, written between. Potential recipients Samuel Bowles, the
editor of a newspaper in Springfield, her close friend Benjamin Newton, or George Gould, who attended
school with her brother and reportedly proposed to her in the 1850s. 
She might have suffered from anxiety (1880)

Dickinson spent the last 20 years of her life in seclusion, rarely leaving her home, hiding when the
doorbell rang and often preferring to talk to visitors through a darkened door rather than face to face.
Some theories suggest that this could be as a result of extreme anxiety or a health condition that made
her uncomfortable around people. Others believe that the writer was merely focused on her poems and
preferred to stay chained to her desk. It is often also noted that Dickinson became even more reclusive
during the.
People thought that she only wore white 
The poet left strict instructions for her funeral, choosing her clothing (she was buried in White), coffin,
and even mapping out a route for the mourners to take.
A legend formed after her death that the poet only ever wore white garments. The only surviving item of
Dickinson’s clothing was also a white dress, given to the Amherst Historical Society in 2000. And also,
American author Thomas Wentworth Higginson wrote that Dickinson was dressed in white when the
pair met in 1870.

CONCLUSION
Even though Emily was really poor, her choice and passion for poetry allowed her
to be educated and spend a life as puritan obeying her father and learning about the
world around her as an isolated woman.

Emily Dickinson beliefs were mostly reflected on her poems in regards to life after death
differ significantly. In two of her books, such as "Because I Could Not Stop for Death,"
and "I Heard a Fly Buzz- When I Died,". It seems that Dickinson, too, questioned herself
of whether or not there is life after dead, and even more when she was so close to death,
could not come to a solid conclusion.

REFERENCES
Pettinger, Tejvan. “Biography of Emily Dickinson“, Oxford,
www.biographyonline.net
26 June. 2006.

Middleton, Lucy. (2018) https://www.facebook.com/readersdigestuk. 10 Interesting

facts about Emily Dickinson. https://www.readersdigest.co.uk/culture/books/10-
interesting-facts-about-emily-dickinson

Biography.com Editors “Emily Dickinson Biography, Article” April 2, 2014

https://www.biography.com/writer/emily-dickinson