Stacy Halida
Blog #2
Emily
Dickinson
Emily Dickinson was born in 1830. She
was a very famous poet of her time, probably one of the most famous poets. She
lived with her parents most of her life except when she was away at boarding
school for less than a year. So, she did get a very little bit of a formal
education. She was very solitary most of her life because she shut herself up
in her room a lot. Only 12 of her poems were published during her lifetime; she
wrote many more than that.
Dickinson’s
poem titled #236 or “Some keep the Sabbath going to Church” has many symbols. A
few of the symbols are the bobolink which is a bird and a chorister which is a
person singing in a choir. I think that she wrote this poem because she wanted
to know what church means to herself and what church means to people of the 19th
century. I also think that she feels that she doesn’t have to go to church because
she acts “godly” all of the time. We discussed some of these ideas in class and
it helped me see how she was writing this poem more clearly.
The
poem by Dickinson titled #764 or “My life has stood a loaded gun” was the most
difficult poem to get a grasp on. I thought this because it could be
interpreted in many different ways, and in some parts it was very difficult to
understand what she was talking about. From our class discussion it helped a
little because some points were cleared up. I feel that there was definitely a
masculine character especially in the last stanza. And, in the 3rd
stanza there was happiness and then destruction.
I
feel that Dickinson’s work is overall very interesting. Emily Dickinson leaves
a lot of room for many different interpretations of her works. I think that is
very neat that someone can write a poem and people have so many of their own
ideas of what the poem could be about. I believe that people are right when
they say that Emily Dickinson on recognized as one of the world’s greatest
American poets.
I agree with a lot of the points you make in your post! I too, think Dickinson's work is interesting, and has a lot of ways to be interpreted. I haven't read any of her other works, but I think it would be interesting to see how her other poems compare-if there's a lot of common themes, etc. and if they're all as ambiguous. I agree with your take on poem #236, although I also thought that it gave off the message that a person doesn't have to go to church to worship and have a relationship with God, or another higher power.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Dickenson's poems have a tendency to be ambiguous. This might be because she herself was sort of an ambigous person, and often times in order to understand a persons work, we need to understand a little more about them. Peom #236 is about being ones own temple, and I like your observation about her many symbols to convey this idea. Poem #764 was also very difficult for me to understand. And to be honest as much as I'd like to think I'm perceptive to literary clues, I have to say I have no idea what it's saying, and would probably have to sparknote it to try and understand any of it.
ReplyDeleteI think one of Dickinson's strengths is that she offers us those symbols and images to debate about:) What are some of the masculine images and symbols in #764?
ReplyDelete