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1、The Belle of Amherst,Emily Dickinson(1830-1886),This is my letter to the world,That never wrote to me,- The simple news that Nature told, With tender majesty. Her message is committed To hands I cannot see; For love of her, sweet countrymen,Judge tenderly of me!,Among the ranks of other such acclaim
2、ed poets as Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson is considered one of the most original 19th Century American poets.,Emily Dickenson,I. Life II. Literary Influences III. Major Subjects IV. Themes V. The Characteristics of Her Verse,VI. Style VII. Points of View VIII. Works IX. Comparison: Whitman vs. Dicki
3、nson,I. Life,born on 10 December, 1830 one of most prominent families in Amherst, Ma.,the second child of Edward Dickinson, who was a Yale graduate a successful lawyer Treasurer for Amherst College a United States Congressman,Her grandfather, Samuel Dickinson: a Dartmouth graduate an accomplished la
4、wyer one of the founders of Amherst College,He also built one of the first brick homes in Amherst on Main Street, which is now a National Historic Landmark The Homestead one of the now preserved Dickinson homes in the Emily Dickinson Historic District.,educated at Amherst Academy. At 17, began colle
5、ge at Mount Holyoke Female Seminary Became ill the spring of her first year and did not return.,Seminary seminrin. 学校,学院,Emily Dickinson Museum, Amherst,The Dickinson Homestead in Amherst,The Dickinson Homestead in Amherst (garden),The Dickinson Homestead in Amherst, Massachusetts (bedroom),The Dick
6、inson Homestead in Amherst(Dress),Religion played an important role in her life. Dickinson was terrorized by old-fashioned sermons about damnation(诅咒、下地狱) the frequency of death in that age of high infant and childhood mortality(死亡率),As her friends moved away and got married, she gradually became es
7、tranged(疏离) from the religious beliefs of her community.,known for being a recluse She didnt leave her familys homestead for any reason after the late 1860s.,always wore white often lowered snacks and treats(点心) in baskets to neighborhood children from her window, careful never to let them see her f
8、ace.,a few friends and acquaintances from day to day Best friend: Thomas Wentworth Higginson, an editor,Very few people knew Emily was secretly writing poetry. Only a few people with whom she corresponded ever saw any of her poems.,Everyone expected her to marry and raise a family like most women of
9、 her class. This all suddenly changed when she was 24.,Cast members of the ballet “Emily of Amherst” pose in the living room,Return to Amherst,retreated from all social life in Amherst within a few years always wore white, like the bride she would never be. remained in her parents house,restricted h
10、erself to household work and writing poetry sometimes sent her poems to people as gifts for valentines or birthdays, along with a pie or cookies Only a few of her poems were published in her lifetime.,Dickinson died May 15, 1886 of nephritis (kidney disease).,After her death, friends and relatives f
11、ound bundles of her poems which they edited and “corrected” and had published in installments (分期).,Posthumous Publication,In 1955, Thomas H. Johnson finally published a collection of her poems： that had not been “corrected.” the versions we read today.,II. Literary Influences,1. The Bible 2. Britis
12、h writers: Her knowledge of Shakespeare was minute (微小的) and extremely personal.,admired the works of John Keats and Elizabeth Barrett Browning but avoided the florid (华丽的) and romantic style of her time,a deeply sensitive woman soulfully explored her own spirituality, often in poignant, deeply pers
13、onal poetry - poignant lpinnt adj. 1 伤心至极的; 辛酸的 2 令 人心碎的, 深深打动人的; 强烈的, 深刻的,3. the poetry of Longfellow, Holmes, and Lowell. She identified with Hawthornes isolated, gnarled, idiosyncratic characters. - gnarled n:l a.饱经风霜的 idiosyncratic lidisilkrtik a. 不同寻常的,at times characterized as a semi-invalid (
14、病人，残疾者) a hermit a heartbroken introvert (性格内向者) a neurotic agoraphobic (焦虑不安的广场或陌生环境恐怖症患者),III. Major Subjects,Emily Dickinsons poetry comes out in bursts. The poems are short, many of them being based on a single image or symbol.,Within her little lyrics Dickinson addresses those issues that conce
15、rned the whole human beings, which include religion death immortality love nature,1800 poems, the definitive edition(选定版) of her poetry were published in 1955: The Poetry of Emily Dickinson.,Her modernity is her articulation(表述) of psychological experience skeptical desire for faith,IV. Themes,A few
16、 universal themes occupied the poet: love, nature, doubt and faith, suffering, death, immortality. these John Donne has called the great granite(坚韧的) obsessions(困扰、迷念) of humankind.,Life perhaps only those who have “loved and lost” can love.,(4) nature,A fascination(魅力) with nature consumed Emily. S
17、he summed all her lyrics as “the simple news that nature told”,she loved “natures creatures” no matter how insignificant the robin (知更鸟) the sparrow (麻雀) the bee the butterfly the rat Only the serpent gave her a chill,(5) Pain And Suffering Her last stanzas become a catalog of grief and its causes:
18、death want cold despair exile,V. Style,(1) poems without titles (2) directness, brevity, compact, severe economy of expression; highly compressed,(3) elliptical, Ambiguity of meaning and syntax shy of (缺少) being exposed she will say no more than she must suggesting either a quality of uncertainty or
19、 one of finality.,(4) capital letters and the use of dashes emphasis (5) short poems, mainly two stanzas,her poetry is sometimes brooding(沉思的) sometimes joyous and celebratory (快乐的),Nobody knows this little Rose - It might a pilgrim be Did I not take it from the ways And lift it up to thee. Only a B
20、ee will miss it - Only a Butterfly, Hastening from far journey - On its breast to lie - Only a Bird will wonder - Only a Breeze will sigh - Ah Little Rose - how easy For such as thee to die!,(6) rhetoric techniques: personification make some of abstract ideas vivid,(7) lyric highly subjective One-fi
21、fth of them begin with I - she knows no other consciousness.,(8) influence of Christian tradition: Biblical language and allusions(暗示) meter of hymns 4 beats+3 beats+4 beats+3 beats stanza of 4 lines musical device to create cadence,three labels： Regular meter Common meter Short meter (4.3.4.3) Dick
22、inson found poetic freedom within the confines of this meter.,Regular meter hymn meter and ballad meter, also known as Common meter Quatrains Alternating tetrameter (四音步句) and trimeter (三音步句),(9) new England perspectives: Puritan introspection; brevity and intensity (10) innovation in rhyme,VII. Poi
23、nts of View,1. on poetry 2. on nature 3. on death,1. on poetry,Poetry should be powerful and touching. The inspiration(灵感) of the poet came from his inner world or intensity of his emotions the past literary traditions the noble heroes,Like Emerson, she thought that only the real poet could understa
24、nd the world. Truth, virtue and beauty are all the one thing. The most dignified beauty was embodied by the active, affirmative dignity. (-Emerson),Poetry should express ideas through concrete images. It was the poets duty to express abstract ideas through vivid and fresh imagery.,She was against th
25、e restriction of the traditional doctrines and argued for the depiction of ones inner world.,2. on nature,Dickinson observed nature closely and described it vividly but never with the feeling of being lost in it.,She thought that nature was both kind and cruel, which was similar to Tennyson.,3. on d
26、eath,She wrote about nearly 600 poems on death. Her attitude toward immortality was contradictory.,VIII. Works,(1) My Life Closed Twice before Its Close (2) Because I Cant Stop for Death (3) I Heard a Fly Buzz When I died (4) Wild Nights Wild Nights,Because I could not stop for death,1. Critics View
27、 2. Stanza Format 3. Meter 4. Characters 5. Analysis and Commentary,1. Critics View,Allen Tate said, it deserves to be regarded as “one of the greatest in the English language; it is flawless to the last detail”. - Allen Tate, 1899-1979 a distinguished American poet, teacher, and critic,2. Stanza Fo
28、rmat,Each of the six stanzas has four lines. A four-line stanza is called a quatrain.,3. Meter,the 1st ,4. Characters,Narrator: She is a woman who calmly accepts death. In fact, she seems to welcome death as a suitor who she plans “marry”.,Death: The suitor who comes calling for the narrator to esco
29、rt her to eternity.,Immortality: A passenger in the carriage. Children: Boys and girls at play in a schoolyard. They symbolize early life.,5. Analysis and Commentary,It reveals Emily Dickinsons calm acceptance of death. It is surprising that she presents the experience as being no more frightening t
30、han receiving a gentleman callerin this case, her fianc.,Stanza 1,The journey to the grave begins when Death comes calling in a carriage in which Immortality is also a passenger.,Stanza 2,As the trip continues, the carriage trundles along at an easy, unhurried pace, perhaps suggesting that death has
31、 arrived in the form of a disease or debility that takes its time to kill.,Stanza 3,A review of the stages of the life of the author: Childhood the recess scene Maturity the ripe, hence, “gazing” grain the descent into death the setting sunas she passes to the other side,There, she experiences a chi
32、ll because she is not warmly dressed. In fact, her garments are more appropriate for a wedding: representing a new beginning than for a funeral: representing an end.,Her description of the grave as her “house” indicates how comfortable she feels about death. There after centuries pass, so pleasant i
33、s her new life that time seems to stand still, feeling “shorter than a Day.”,The overall theme of the poem seems to be that death is not to be feared since it is a natural part of the endless cycle of nature. Her view of death may also reflect her personality religious beliefs,As a Christian and a B
34、ible reader, she was optimistic about her ultimate fate. she appeared to see death as a friend.,Dickinsons Legacy,Along with Walt Whitman, Dickinson is one of the two giants of American poetry of the 19th century.,Frost and Dickinson,IX. Comparison: Whitman vs. Dickinson,1.Similarities 2.differences
35、,厦门大学-2004年阅读及英美文学、语言学,4. Answer ONE of the following questions on American Literature (in no less than 100 words) (8 points): A. Discuss the differences in themes between Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson.,1.Similarities,(1) Thematically, they both extolled(赞美), in their different ways, an emergent
36、America, its expansion individualism Americanness their poetry being part of “American Renaissance”,(2) Technically, they both added to the literary independence of the new nation by breaking free of the convention of the iambic pentameter exhibiting a freedom in form unknown before they were pionee
37、rs in American poetry,2. differences,(1) Whitman: seems to keep his eye on society at large Dickinson: explores the inner life of the individual,(2) Whitman: “national” Dickinson: “regional”,After a hundred years,After a hundred years Nobody knows the place， Agony that enacted there， Motionless as p
38、eace. Weeds triumphant ranged， Strangers strolled and spelled,At the lone orthography Of the elder dead. Winds of summer fields Recollect the way， Instinct picking up the key Dropped by memory.,Emily Dickinson :Previewing Questions,1. Preview “I heard a Fly buzz” and “Because I could not stop for death”. 2. What is the symbolic meaning of the fly? 3. How does she feel when dying? 4. What is the theme of the poem?,5. What do the carriage and drive symbolize? Who is “He”? What is he like? 6. What is the theme of the poem? 7. What are the features of Emilys poem?,