Motifs and Symbols in Poems of Emily Dickinson - Research Paper Example

? Born in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1830, Emily Dickinson lived a comfortable life with a father who was deeply involved in affairs and politics. In fact, her father has served with the United States Congress for one term while her brother Austin was a lawyer. But it was her sister Lavinia who was the closest to her, just like her, Lavinia lived a life of single-blessedness and in practical seclusion from the outside world. It was also Lavinia who discovered the 40 volumes of poetry right after Emily’s death and brought this to the attention of her family. Emily attended seminary school for some time and was a brilliant student but decided to return home after a while. The time of Calvinism was a motivating factor during which Dickinson lived in and the theme can be perceived in a number of her poems with regard to the correlation of God and existence, particularly with the concept of immortality prevalent in religious belief (Merriman, par. 4-8). To say that Emily Dickinson lived a secluded life at the end is to state an understatement. She was a woman who had the misfortune of being alive in a time that had not suited her. She was years ahead of her contemporaries and a pillar of American poetry in such a time when women did not enjoy the respect and stature that they do today. Nevertheless, these ordeals were what compelled her to write beautiful poetry that ranged in style and scope in every direction. The themes covered by Dickinson in her poetry were a product of mental deliberation and calculated thought which can only be attributed to life as she sees it. Many works have been attributed to Dickinson and her poems are one of the most serialized among all collections. These treasures of literature and an addition to the coffer of American literary tradition cannot be dismissed as they form part of tradition. The posthumulous fame of Dickinson is also among the most intriguing and captivating factor among readers. One cannot be faulted for pondering whether or not she would have accepted all the accolades were they had been made known to her while she was still alive. In the same thought whether she would have preferred her poems to have been published keeping in mind that most of them sounded specifically for personal consumption. In which case, to have done so would have been a great lost. As Leiter so aptly puts it, “She has left scholars forever guessing at the nature of the profound emotional trauma she experienced in her late twenties or early thirties; the identity of the great love(s) of her life; the reason(s) she chose not to publish her poetry; and the reason(s) she withdrew from society. She possessed the extraordinary ability to simultaneously distance herself from and make herself intimately accessible to the reader: to reveal herself while remaining hidden” (p. x). Also among the subject for the curiosity that pervades when Emily Dickinson is the subject, as there had been many speculations about her, of who holds her heart. Because most of what we know about her are accounts of her family, a few other strangers and of course what we have read in her own hands. The latter being the primary source of a more intimate look into who she truly is. Among the persistent questions that reoccur is her love interest in which speculations range from understandable to absurd. This is another fault of history that we cannot confirm nor deny, for even her sexuality is questioned as she was a single woman in a time when marriage is almost a birthright or to put it simply, a necessity. Surely, this is an anti-feminist remark to a woman who is a feminist before we even know what a feminist is. The poems that she has imparted catapults literature and takes its reader into an exploration of self as it transports us into the world as Dickinson sees it. Then, for a brief while we are taken into her shoes as we question out own beliefs and our own world and how it transcends something beyond this moment for it is only ephemeral. Life and the afterlife are among the major themes in Dickinson’s poems. In one of the books containing her anthology, Johnson’s listed 150 poems under ‘dead’ and ‘death’ while there are also those under ‘eternity,’ ‘immortality,’ and ‘resurrection’ which also conferred death. Death was mentioned 141 times in her poems, among the top most mentioned words alongside ‘day,’ ‘sun,’ ‘heaven,’ and ‘life’ (Martin, p. 98). The concept of life after death is among the most eloquent portrayals in her poem. She used images that are integral part and parcels of religion and utilized it in her poems. Among her most famous work, ‘Because I could not Stop for Death,’ we see Dickinson as she instigates notions of doubt into the proposal of immortality after death. In this poem we see the imagery of the Grim Reaper as a suitor and not as a menacing character as we have often regarded it to be. “While sentimental fictions were designed to cover death’s fearful darkness with soft language and familiar images that render death less frightening, Dickinson’s poems often strip death of such reassuring language, highlighting instead its mystery and uncertainty” (Martin, p.100). in a number of her poems there is a struggle in her grasp for comprehending eternity. But it is perceptible that there is an acceptance of life after death that is beyond this earth. The conclusion of the poem previously mentioned emphasizes the event as a process that continues on. Biblical references is also evident in the poem but these are tuned in a way that it deviates from its traditional understanding (Leiter, p.44). There is that air of mystery that eludes her wherein this a progression to her own understanding. Because I could not stop for Death He kindly stopped for me – The Carriage held but just Ourselves – And Immortality. (Dickinson 1-4). The first stanza of the poem begins with the very title of the poem. The halt of Death to fetch His passenger was described by the adverb kindly. From the beginning the reader is eased by the persona into the idea of Death as a man. The imagery suggests a gentleman who picked up his passenger in a carriage, a person he is courting. By the fourth line there destination is revealed, ‘Immortality.’ The second stanza of the poem further confirms Death’s personification. Here, the persona of the poem gives us a narrative of her travel with Him. That she had to leave everything behind regardless of its character to make way for the journey that she is going to take with Him. There was no hurry, she confirms. The drive was slow and He was, of all the words, described as civil by the persona. Since then – ’tis Centuries – and yet Feels shorter than the Day I first surmised the Horses’ Heads Were toward Eternity – (Dickinson 21-24). The last stanza of ‘I Could not Stop for death’ reveals that the journey was unending. But even though it was, time felt shorter as centuries are equivalent to mere hours. The persona then looks back toward that fateful day when she first went with Death and how it was as though only moments had passed. The final passage is a confirmation of the destination. This is an acknowledgement that eternity as the penultimate end of their voyage. This poem reiterates that theme of metaphysics and life after death as can be analyzed from the poems of Emily Dickinson. But this is not the only one which adequately illustrates her thoughts on the subject from her widely anthologized work. Emily Dickinson could best be understood by first understanding her attitude toward death. This was a core problem for her as a philosophical concept. It was something that she could not grapple, much less solve. There are inconsistencies in her outlook in her poems. There were moments when she completely accepted the concept of immortality as the most probable possibility. But there are also times when she had resigned to accept that uncertainty is the only answer to all her queries. It was a rather dependent perhaps at her emotions or state during the time she wrote each piece. Her main objective was not to profess her account of the realities of Death for she is aware of her lack of erudition on the subject but rather to explore possibilities and engage in its ambiguity. The culture in which she lived in divulged an attempt to make the vagueness of death comforting and to even make it familiar according to the imagery they have supplanted such as heaven as a place not unlike the mental picture that we have from our childhood days. For if there is something that the idea of death does, it is the awakening in our consciousness for it is among all notions the one that none of us know for sure (Martin, p. 97). Despite this, she did not diverge from tackling the subject but pursued head on to reveal herself through poems with it as a main theme though this does not necessitate an absolute dark perception of life by the poet but only of the persona of each poem. In Dickinson’s poem “I Felt a Funeral, in my Brain,” the reader is introduced to more macabre concept of death depicted by the author. The following passage reveals a literal perception that appeals to the senses of the reader as he is transported into a scene of an account of a person who had died. This is an uninviting scene that cultivates on a funeral where the persona of the poem has the faculties of her senses except the ability to speak as silence envelopes her. It was also the engulfing sense of aloneness that menaces her that she is unaware of what is happening, or though she is aware there is nothing that she could do to ease her situation as she becomes an audience of herself. And then I heard them lift a Box And creak across my Soul With those same Boots of Lead, again, Then Space – began to toll, (9-12). “At death, “Being” may become an “Ear,” but it has no voice to tell what it hears. Death may result in hyper-self-consciousness, but nothing can be communicated. Death is a place of “I, and Silence”; the speaker “drop[s] down, and down” into death and “Finishe[s] knowing – then” (Martin, p. 104). This end of the poem gives of the nagging feeling of uncertainty as it was finished abruptly as though there is something missing. The author suggests this for it is the same exact feeling of death. It is the idea of leaving something or someone behind that yields dread at the very mention of death. It is because we are leaving something behind or someone we love and deeply care for that death is deplorable to us. It is that almost selfish thought of how much we matter and how things will be when we are gone that we despise death. The knowledge of not knowing this certain fact to the end of life gnaws on our very being. For the simple reason that Dickinson’s poetry on the subject of death is most emphatic to us is this: we will all die. In her poem, ‘This World is not Conclusion,’ she so eloquently summarizes the entirety of the truth behind death, “But positive, as Sound –/ It beckons, and it baffles –” (4-5). This is the one thing we are certain of. Death is real and it will come for us regardless of age, sex or creed because men are mortals. But could we know when or do we even want to know? This is a question best is left to chances because not even fortunetellers could foretell. This is the most persistent aspect of death. But there is also the other aspect which is prevalent in the theme of Dickinson. What happens after death? The answer obviously varies. What we believe in could be governed by religion and what sacred scriptures of whatever secular group we belong to. Christians believe in heaven while Buddhists believe in reincarnation until such time they reach nirvana. Or, one could also be like Dickinson who does not necessarily believe in what she has been told. She continued to ponder and contemplate on what it is like and how it is. This is so because Dickinson has “a mind so original and powerful that we scarcely have begun, even now, to catch up with her” (Bloom, p.1). Bibliography Bianchi, Martha Dickinson and Alfred Lee Hampson. Poems by Emily Dickinson. Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1948. Bianchi, Martha Dickinson. "Introduction." Dickinson, Emily. The Poems of Emily Dickinson. Siena: Rowland Classics, 1924. 5-8. Bloom, Harold. Emily Dickinson. New York: Chelsea House Publications, 2008. Dickinson, Emily. The Poems. Rowland Classics, 2009. Higginson, Thomas Wentworth. Emily Dickinson's Letters. October 1891. 19 April 2011 . Leiter, Sharon. Critical Companion to Emily Dickinson A Literary Reference to Her Life and Work. New York: Facts on Life, 2007. Martin, Wendy. The Cambridge Introduction to Emily Dickinson. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Merriman, C. D. Emily Dickinson Biography. 2006. 19 April 2011 . Read More