My Emily Dickenson Summary and Reviews

My Emily Dickenson
by Susan Howe

My Emily Dickenson
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Book Summary Information

Author: Susan Howe
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Published)
Format: Bargain Price
Published: 1995-01-03
ISBN: N/A
Number of pages: 144
Publisher: North Atlantic Books

Book Reviews of My Emily Dickenson

Book Review: Oddly composed, but with a few fine opals inside...
Summary: 3 Stars

I have been pretty much obsessed with Emily Dickinson since 1980, and have enjoyed reading many treatments of her life and her poems, while enduring many other books about her. She is quite a mystery, and shall always remain so, becoming the kind of woman and poet that each generation seems to need. I did not like this author's prose style, which seemed to me to have many sentence fragments and many abrupt transitions which did not seem logical. However, it does contain one of the best meditations on Emily's literary and theological influences, including the preacher Jonathan Edwards, and the Brownings, and the Brontes, and Shakespeare. For that reason, it is worth reading if you care about the Belle of Amherst at all. I found myself drawn to her poetry from high school on, but over the decades, becoming much more fascinated with her life choices and experiences. We will never know for sure how many poems are autobiographical, how many actually describe her take on the experiences of her small but intense social circle, and how many are pure fiction. What an impact she has made on the literary world, by living the life of a fairly affluent New England spinster who did not get out much. That is endlessly fascinating to me. Unfortunately it is not the thrust of this volume. My recommendation is to start with Richard Sewell's huge biography of Emily from the 1970's. It covers the life AND the poetry in a reasonable and accessible manner. Some think Emily a secular nun, some think her a deeply closeted lesbian and/or incest victim, some feel she had many love affairs but was discrete about them. Some think her insane, some believe her to be the sanest of us all. Some find her an early feminist, and others see her as an oppressed woman. This book is one fellow female poet's appreciation of Emily's talents and circumstances. Wait another year and another scholar will present a different view. Emily left us 1,776 poems, give or take a few hidden in the text of letters, and someday there will be 1,776 books about her.

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