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Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson. 1830-1886. Emily Dickinson: Biography. Born the second of three children in Amherst, Massachusetts Father was a lawyer and one of the wealthiest and most respected citizens in the town, as well as a conservative leader of the church

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Emily Dickinson

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  1. Emily Dickinson 1830-1886

  2. Emily Dickinson: Biography • Born the second of three children in Amherst, Massachusetts • Father was a lawyer and one of the wealthiest and most respected citizens in the town, as well as a conservative leader of the church • Dickinson grew up regularly attending services at the Congregational First Church of Christ (Congregational churches essentially followed the New England Puritan tradition) • She attended Amherst Academy, where she studied a modern curriculum of English and the sciences, as well as Latin, botany and mathematics

  3. Emily Dickinson: Biography • Except for one year at Mount Holyoke Female Seminary (1847-48) and a visit to Washington, D.C., to visit her father, she spent her entire life in Amherst • In her family library, she had access to many religious works as well as books by Emerson, other transcendentalists and current magazines • Around 1850, she begins to write verse, which she circulates among a circle of friends • Her poem “Sic transit gloria mundi” was published in the Springfield Daily Republican in 1852

  4. Emily Dickinson: Biography • She spent sociable evenings with guests such as Samuel Bowles, editor of the Springfield Daily Republican • She also enjoyed dancing, buggy rides, parlor games, and other forms of entertainment until she began to seclude herself • Around 1860, she stopped visiting with other people and became a recluse • In 1862, her poem “Safe in their alabaster chambers” appeared in the Springfield Daily Republican

  5. Emily Dickinson: Biography • Around that time, she began her correspondence with Thomas Wentworth Higginson, a local intellectual, journalist, and anti-slavery activist • She asked Higginson for advice with her poetry • Higginson had published an article entitled “Letter to a Young Contributor,“ in the Atlantic Monthly, in which he advised budding young writers • Dickinson sent him four poems, along with a letter asking “"Are you too deeply occupied to say if my Verse is alive?" • Higginson responded with much praise and gentle criticism (“surgery”), but he advised her against publishing her poetry because of its raw form and subject matter

  6. Emily Dickinson: Biography • Higginson became Dickinson’s intellectual mentor, even though he admitted feeling out of her league in poetical talent • After Dickinson’s death, Higginson collaborated with Mabel Loomis Todd in publishing volumes of her poetry • His edition was heavily edited for conventional punctuation and form, as well as content • But, his edition helped Dickinson’s poetry gain quick national prominence

  7. Emily Dickinson: Biography • While becoming more reclusive, Dickinson intensified correspondence with friends and output of poetry • She suffered from eye-trouble in 1864 and 1865 • The last 12 years she spent in self-imposed isolation in her parents’ home • Allegedly, Dickinson dressed entirely in white and communicated only indirectly with visitors and friends, from behind a folding screen or via notes and gifts in a basket she let down from her window into the garden

  8. Emily Dickinson: Biography • She spent most of these years reading and writing poetry • Her most productive period coincided with the civil war, during which she wrote about 800 poems • She called writing poetry her business, “My Business is Circumference” (after Emerson’s term for poetry) • She copied many of her poems into hand-sewn small booklets or “fascicles” and sent them as poetic gifts to family and friends

  9. Emily Dickinson: Biography • Dickinson never married, although several men played an important role in her life • Lively correspondence with Benjamin Franklin Newton on literary topics of the day • Long correspondence with Higginson, although he ultimately did not recognize the worth of her poetry • Close emotional bond to Charles Wadsworth, whom she had met on her journey home from Washington

  10. Emily Dickinson: Biography • Strained relationship to her sister-in-law, Susan Gilbert, who was apparently the object of her desire in such homoerotic poems as “Her face was in a bed of hair” • When Dickinson died in 1886 of Bright’s disease, her family and friends were surprised at the amount of work she left behind • Her sister Lavinia found 40 notebooks and loose poems in a locked box in her bedroom • The poems were unarranged and only 24 were titled

  11. Emily Dickinson, Daguerreotype by Josiah Gilbert Holland , circa February-April 1848.

  12. The Dickinson Homestead in Amherst, Massachusetts

  13. The Dickinson Homestead in Amherst, Massachusetts(garden)

  14. The Dickinson Homestead in Amherst, Massachusetts(bedroom)

  15. The Dickinson Homestead in Amherst, Massachusetts(Dress)

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