It's interesting to contrast the life of Emily Dickinson and Stephen Crane.
Crane was famous at 23, traveled the world, was a wild, worldly young man, had lots of literary friends including Henry James, H.G. Wells, Ford Maddox Ford and Joseph Conrad. Then this meteor of literary talent died at 28 in part because of the way he lived his life.
Dickinson lived in the same house her entire life. She never married and was never famous during her lifetime. Many of her friends, even her great love, she mostly corresponded with through letters. She was well-read, like Crane, but her life was one of leisure and solitude. Crane wrote novels, short stories and some poetry; Dickinson wrote letters and poems. Her poetry was short and often enigmatic, but always thoughtful and interesting. She died at 55.
Let's start with what is a very appropriate poem for this web site. "There is no frigate like a Book."(you can read this one here) Dickinson, a woman of solitude, says that the best way to travel is on the ship, Book. You can travel "Lands away." Dickinson is not talking about reading travel books, she is referring to the journey of the soul, of the mind and of the intellect. Then she says that poetry is better than a really spirited horse—think about that. What is it like to ride a spirited horse? If you've never ridden one, how about a fast roller coaster? Emily is saying that good poetry is more exciting than that. Then notice what she says: "This Traverse may the poorest take." You don't need money, or at least a lot of it, to travel this way. Anyone, even the poorest in the land can hop aboard this frigate or ride on this horse. The "Chariot/ That bears the Human soul" is "frugal." What does this mean? On one level, it means the above. It doesn't cost a lot to travel this way. However, this might also be a bit of irony on the part of Dickinson. She may be saying that on another level it does cost a lot: your time, your effort, maybe preconceptions you have about things. Traveling this way may require your soul to change, that is, to go from one place to another, you might have to mature or even change.
This is one short poem and I could even go on longer concerning it. Good poetry is dense. By "dense" I mean that it has a lot in it. You can think about it for a long time, you can continue to get a lot out of it even though you've read it many times. The same goes for novels, plays, short stories and movies.
"You'll know it—as you know 'tis Noon." (read it here)
Let's look at another poem not in your book (you can read it here) "You'll know it—as you know 'tis Noon." This is poem about intuition. Remember Wordsworth also wrote about that, particularly in regard to nature. This is a similar type of poem. Dickinson says there are some things we do not need to be told—we just know them. They don't need "terms," that is, they don't need definitions. There's a story about a ballerina being asked what her dance meant? She replied, "If I could explain it in words, I wouldn't need to dance it." Dickinson says in heaven you won't be running around asking, "Are you God? What about you? Are you God the Father? Maybe you're the Son?" No, in her view, it will be obvious. Nature speaks differently, but when she speaks you know it. It reminds me of that old commercial that you probably don't remember, but it went something like this: there's this crowded, noisy place and someone says, "E.F. Hutton says . . ." and everyone gets quiet to hear what it is. Nature speaks so loudly that words are not necessary. Have you ever been to Yosemite or the Grand Titon National Park or the Grand Canyon or just looked up at the stars on a dark night far away from a large city? What do people usually say when they're looking at something like that? Do they say, "The contour of that particular type of granite against the spectrum of light makes my eye produce something very pleasing in the synapses in my brain"? No! Usually you hear things, if you hear anything at all, like "Wow" or "Look at that!" Deep, very deep phrases, but what else are you going to say? Dickinson says to "Consult your eye," that is, don't always consult that logical, rational side of yourself, let things speak to you even though they might not be using words.
"Each life converges to some centre." (pg. 14)
This poem begins, "Each life converges to some centre." Notice the line after it: "Expressed or still . . ." What is she saying here? This has the same idea as the above poem. The centre may be something that you can explain or may not be able to. It may be "still," that is, undefinable, mysterious or not known, but, nonetheless, says Dickinson, each life is headed somewhere. And, she goes on to explain, even if we don't admit it to ourselves we probably have some idea of what it is. It might be a strong desire that we don't want to admit because we're afraid we might be laughed at or afraid that if we try to attain it (the "goal" as Dickinson calls it) we will fail. Maybe you want to be a writer or an actor or scientist or a cartoonist and deep down you know you desire it, but for some reason it may scare you. So, you adore it "with caution." With "slow diligence" even the sky can be approached and, she says, even if you don't reach your goal there's always eternity to try again. The last sentence may indicate that the goal Dickinson is talking about is not like any of the ones I've mentioned above—it may be a spiritual goal which is why she mentions the saints.
"Fate slew him . . ." (pg. 15)
Look at the poem that begins "Fate slew him . . ." What is this about? How does Fate slay him? This may be the trials of life. Maybe a death or maybe the loss of sight or maybe a series of events that would cause most people to give up. In the first stanza Fate throws everything she can at this man. She "Impaled him on her fiercest stakes" and what does he do? "He neutralized them all." How? How can you do that? He does he do that? Look at the second stanza: "when her worst was done,/And he, unmoved, regarded her . . ." He was unmoved. What does that mean? Was he just numb? Was he a man who had no feelings? I don't think so. Maybe it is the way in which he "regards" her. "Regard" is an important word in this poem because it denotes careful thought and attention about something. It's a strong gaze. So, it may be that this man considered carefully all that happened to him and all that was around him and with the conclusions he came to he was able to withstand the trials that came into his life. It might be something close to Socrates' idea of "Know thyself." Not only thyself, but the world around you.
"How happy is the little stone . . ." (pg. 21)
Why is this stone happy? It doesn't worry about careers, actually it says it doesn't "care" about careers. That word, too, is an interesting choice. "Care" as a noun, is a burdened state of mind, a mind that is agitated or worried. Care as a verb means to be concerned or interested. The stone is not worried about pressing needs or some urgency—there are no such things for a stone. Dickinson says that the stone, so small, is just as independent as the sun and like the sun fulfills an "absolute decree." What is that? It could be that the stone perfectly does exactly what it is supposed to do and it does it with "simplicity." It just rolls along down the road. So is this poem just about a stone? No. By observing the stone Dickinson is asking us to consider what we might be able to learn from it. How can we cease to worry and fret about all the responsibilities that surround us? I'm sure you've all heard about stress—stress from careers, pressure and life in general. How can one live like the stone, stress free? Part of the answer it would seem is not to care, to not take things quite so seriously. This does not mean that one does not have a career or job or problems, it means that one look at them differently. I don't know what problems you may be facing in your life, what difficulties you have, but it is possible to have a kind of disinterest about them—a healthy disinterest. It isn't that you ignore them—but you view them differently.
"Success is counted sweetest/By those who ne'er succeed." What does this mean? It is often true that the people who do not have something desire it more than the people who do have it. A poor person can be more obsessed with money than a rich one. Have you ever had the experience of wanting something and once you got it not enjoying it as much as you thought you would? Look what she says next, "To comprehend a nectar/Requires sorest need." What does this mean? You've probably heard that common phrase, "Necessity is the mother of invention" which comes from the Latin phrase "Mater artium necessitas." This is something similar. It is often our needs, our strongest needs, that enable us to discover something, to pursue something that we might not if everything in our life was going great. The poem shifts in the next two stanzas. The first stanza doesn't refer to war while the last two do. It may be that Dickinson is speaking of two kinds of success. The first stanza is a success that we can all possess, but the second and third stanza give us a taste of success from the other side—the worst kind of defeat—a defeat in war—death. And what she says is that it is only the defeated who can understand all the implications of success in war—and maybe other kinds of success. They know, in way that the winners do not, what "Victory" truly means.
I 've always liked this poem because it is a poem about making a journey—about taking a risk. The poet says that all of us "Could go from scene familiar/To an untraversed spot—" That is, we could leave the place that we are used to, the places we know and are comfortable with and travel to a not so well-traveled place, a place that is not commonly taken. Do you know that Robert Frost poem, "The Road Not Taken"? The last three lines are:"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—/I took the one less traveled by,/And that has made all the difference." This is a similar idea. Notice what Dickinson says at the end, "We who saw the launching/Never sailed the Bay!" If you stand on the shore and watch the boats leave you're never really going to see the bay. You will only have "shore" perspective of it and that is much different than going out on the bay in a boat. There is no promise here that the bay will be calm—it might turn stormy, the tide may sweep the boat out into the ocean, but the point is that you will never know unless you step into the boat. This journey can be many things: it might be confronting your fears. Are you afraid of speaking in front of people? Maybe there's something you want to do, but you are afraid to try. It might also be a spiritual journey or an intellectual one. The poet doesn't promise success, she only promises "an unpuzzled heart," that is, you'll know in a way you cannot if you never make the journey.
"Fame is a bee."
This is my favorite short poem—period. It takes something very simple—a bee and makes it into this incredible little treatise on fame. We are told that like the bee fame has a "song," "sting," and "wing." What is this saying? The song of fame may include many things. It may be the money that comes with it, the prestige, the good treatment by other people, the enjoyment of being famous and being thought important by others. But there's a "sting" too. You lose your privacy, you can't go out whenever want without being mobbed by people, you might be stalked by a demented fan or you may be unable to determine who around you is a genuine friend. It's a trade-off. Albert Einstein, the famous physicist, often wondered about his fame. Here's a poem he wrote about it:
Wherever I go and wherever I stay,
There's always a picture of me on display,
On top of the desk, or out in the hall,
Tied round a neck, or hung on the wall.
Women and men, they play a strange game,
Asking, beseeching: "Please sign your name."
For the erudite fellow they brook not a quibble,
But firmly insist on a piece of his scribble.
Sometimes, surrounded by all this good cheer,
I'm puzzled by some of the things that I hear,
And wonder, my mind for a moment not hazy,
If I and not they could really be crazy.
(This appears in Peter A. Bucky's The Private Albert Einstein — I found it in The Wilson Quarterly, Spring 2005, pg. 15)
Dickinson reminds us that fame also has a "wing." Fame is not necessarily a constant. Just because you are famous today does not mean you will be famous tomorrow. As quickly as fame may fly into you life it can also fly out of it. It seems to me to be a perfect metaphor and a great little poem.
"I'm Nobody. Who are you?" (pg. 37 or read it here)
Why does she begin the poem this way? What does she mean by "Nobody"? Nobody may simply be the person who has no fame, who is not known, who has no recognizable name. You don't have to think of this only in terms of national or international fame. Most us have our circles where certain people are more popular than others. Dickinson is mocking that whole system that tends to categorize people as either a "Nobody" or a "Somebody." In the version I've put on this site, the one I like the best, she says, "Don't tell! they'd advertise—you know." This is funny because you wouldn't advertise a pair of "Nobody's." You advertise a "Somebody." In the version in your book it says, "They'd banish us, you know." This changes the meaning. This might mean that people don't like a "Nobody." This might be a reference to society not accepting people different from the norm—so they have to get rid of them. I like the humorous version better. Then she talks about, much like the previous poem, the problems of being a "Somebody." She considers it a "dreary" prospect and compares it to being a frog attempting to explain its life before a bog. The other thing to remember is that in Dickinson's world being a "Nobody" or a "Somebody" may have little to do with your social status and everything to do with how you view yourself. You might be the greatest actress in the world and still be a "Nobody" or you might be the worst and be a "Somebody."
"Softened by Time's consummate plush . . ." (pg. 49)
This is a poem about "Loss of Innocence." That's a phrase you will hear a lot when discussing literature. Many writers write about this loss because it is a common one that people go through. You hear it a lot in songs too. What is the loss of innocence? Let's look at this poem for clues. The first stanza talks about the problems one has in childhood and how easily they "threatened childhood's citadel." A citadel is a fortress or a stronghold and in this case it is probably the happiness of a child. What kinds of problems upset children? I can think of several: not getting to play on the computer as much as they want, not getting to stay up late, not getting as much candy as they want, skins and bruises and on and on. Sometimes tears result and it seems, to the children, that they will never be happy again. That is, however, only the perspective of a child. From the vantage point of adulthood where one experiences "bleaker griefs," that is, sorrows and trials that make those childhood woes look "So easy to repair," you have a different perspective. Then you realize that childhood was not so bad, that those problems were simple compared to what one faces as an adult. I should say here, and I will, that this is not the case for all children. Some children, unfortunately, experience problems of an adult nature.
Dickinson uses many memorable phrases. Let's look at some:
"The brain is wider than the sky"(51) Our thoughts can encompass or surround or contain the universe. That is, we can think about the entire universe in our small, little heads.
"No rack can torture me/My soul's at liberty"(44) How can that be? Later in this poem she says that consciousness, that is, how we view things, how we look at them, is what makes us captive or free. Freedom and captivity are inner states of mind.
"I felt a funeral in my brain" is one of her most famous first lines (it's not in your book). What do you think of that one?
