ipl-logo

Analysis Of Emily Dickinson's Exploration Of Death

1703 Words7 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Emily dickinson's treatment of the theme of immortality

Emily Dickinson’s exploration of death and consciousness in “Because I could not stop for Death” and “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain” reveals her skepticism about eternal life and God. Much of Emily Dickinson’s work focuses on the finality of consciousness in death and her relationship with God. Her poems ponder what it means to move from physical awareness to one that is purely metaphysical. “Because I could not stop for Death” and “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain” highlight her unique view on the transfer of consciousness between life and death by reflecting on the mind during or after passing. Dickinson’s understanding of death was limited to her own experience which left her, like many others, questioning. Most won’t have a firsthand encounter …show more content…

The relationship God has with his creations seems to perplex Dickinson. Hughes describes her views of Christian spirituality as “[alternating] between loving communion and intense alienation, inspiring elation and traumatic despair” highlighting the contrasting sides of God which Dickinson envisions (287). The Bible depicts God both as wrathful and as love itself. She struggles with knowing that God would allow her to experience such anguish in life and in death, but also be a kind savior. God has duality, much like Death the carriage driver. It is easy, then, to picture Death as a foil to God. Through God, Christians find salvation and therefore eternity, like the speaker was lead to eternity by Death. Humans are made to be in his image, an image that “transcends time and speech” (Harrison 41). The narrator and Death share their ride with “Immortality,” something the speaker and God would both have in common following her ascension to Heaven, further illustrating her contemplation of humans mirroring God. She does not mistrust God, but rather cannot visualize the sheer vastness of the eternity he shares with his followers. With no sense of the true nature of eternal life, Dickinson was left to speculate and doubt on her

Show More
Related
422 Words | 2 Pages

In “The Jilting of Granny Weatherall,” Porter uses multiple allusions to three of Emily Dickinson’s poems to show the change from total, unwavering Christian faith, to the absence of Jesus as Granny dies. In the story, Porter describes Granny stepping into a cart, whose driver Granny knew by his hands, and whose face she did not have to see, because she “knew without seeing” (Porter). This scene is almost identical to the scene in Dickinson’s “Because I could not stop for death-.” This allusion aids in conveying the Christian idea of death as Granny has come to accept it: a tranquil figure, Death, calmly and peacefully carries one’s soul to an eternity where centuries feel like days.

Read More
441 Words | 2 Pages

Throughout the poem, Dickinson describes Death as a male that keeps coming for her while she is trying to escape him. In the first two lines, she uses personification, giving Death human characteristics. “Because I could not stop for death, He kindly stopped for me,” emphasizing death as a male and how he has stopped for her at this point. In lines 9-12, Dickinson uses imagery to create a picture for the reader to emphasize what she and Death are witnessing as they are passing through the area. Imagery is used throughout the poem to illustrate what she is seeing such as children at recess and passing the Fields of Gazing Grain and watching the Sun Set as they take a walk.

Read More
932 Words | 4 Pages

Whitman and Dickinson share the theme of death in their work, while Whitman decides to speak of death in a more realistic point of view, Dickinson speaks of the theme in a more conceptual one. In Whitman’s poems, he likes to have a more empathic view of individuals and their ways of living. For example, in Whitman’s “Song of Myself”, the poet talks about not just of himself, but all human beings, and of how mankind works into the world and the life of it. Even though the poem mostly talks about life and the happiness of it, Whitman describes also that life itself has its ending, and that is the theme of death. For Dickinson, she is the complete opposite of happiness.

Read More
842 Words | 4 Pages

Death is an unknown, no one has ever died and come back to tell the tale, instead people have to imagine and come up with what they think it will be like. The poets, Emily Dickinson and William Cullen Bryant, both had very different perspectives when it came to writing about death. In Bryant’s “Thanatopsis”, the speaker emphasizes that one joins nature and should not be afraid because they will be with everyone else as equals when they die. This is different from Dickinson’s poem, “Because I could not stop for Death”, where the speaker takes a ride in a carriage with death for eternity. Whether or not these authors believed that their poems were actual representations of what happens when one dies, the poems both describe unique ideas of what

Read More
1156 Words | 5 Pages

However, her family held a strong Christian faith, pressuring her to be an outspoken and committed Christian. Despite her veneration for the Bible, she refused to be what they wanted her to be. Dickinson was her own distinctive individual, with a mind of her own. She believed that people were sinful and most humans were going to hell as she could never accept the ‘doctrine of original sin’ (Modern American Poetry 1). For Dickinson, ‘God, is alienated from His creation’ (Knapp 127).

Read More
1214 Words | 5 Pages

When Dickinson was young she thought of death as a kind, peaceful gentleman. She elaborates on this idea in her poem “Because I could not Stop for Death”, “Because I could not stop for Death/ He kindly stopped for me/ We slowly drove - He knew no haste,” Emily Dickinson uses the personification of Death in a way that bears resemblance to a classy, peaceful gentleman who is willing to slowly guide and patiently wait for a lady. Her wording also gives the connotation that she is young and in love with this gentle Death. This idea abruptly turns into hatred when she loses her parents.

Read More
975 Words | 4 Pages

In the poem “Because I could not stop for death” by Emily Dickinson, death is described as a person, and the narrator is communicating her journey with death in the afterlife. During the journey the speaker describes death as a person to accompany her during this journey. Using symbolism to show three locations that are important part of our lives. The speaker also uses imagery to show why death isn 't’ so scary.

Read More
771 Words | 4 Pages

Within her poems, Dickinson employs religion as a symbol of hope. However, Dickinson’s

Read More
1000 Words | 4 Pages

In the opening stanza the speaker states being too busy for death. Thus, death “kindly” takes the time to stop for her since she has no time to do it for herself. Death stops to pick up the speaker and take her on a ride in his horse-drawn carriage in the form of a suitor along with “immorality” being their chaperon. This “civility” that Death exhibits leads the speaker on giving up what made her busy as Dickinson states “And I had put away / My labor and my leisure too (6-7).

Read More
763 Words | 4 Pages

“Poetry is ordinary language raised to the Nth power. Poetry is bonded with ideas, nerved and blooded with emotions, all held together by the delicate, tough skin of words,”(Paul Engle). Poetry covers all spectrums of life, whether it encompasses morality, love, death, or finding ones true self. When reading poetry one may stumble across pure brilliance, words so powerful they have the ability challenge the mind. Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman have that such gift, and are nothing short of illustrious.

Read More
843 Words | 4 Pages

In “Because I could not stop for Death” Dickinson views death as a

Read More
932 Words | 4 Pages

In Dickinson’s poem, death is not as terrifying as it is believed to be by most people. She sees death as a beautiful thing, a new chapter, rather than the last chapter. In contrast, Donne personifies death as a bully who turns out not to be so tough. Death is often thought of as dark and frightening, but Dickinson describes death as a journey, and not just a single event that concludes a life.

Read More
926 Words | 4 Pages

In “Because I Could Not Stop For Death”, Emily Dickinson uses imagery and symbols to establish the cycle of life and uses examples to establish the inevitability of death. This poem describes the speaker’s journey to the afterlife with death. Dickinson uses distinct images, such as a sunset, the horses’ heads, and the carriage ride to establish the cycle of life after death. Dickinson artfully uses symbols such as a child, a field of grain, and a sunset to establish the cycle of life and its different stages. Dickinson utilizes the example of the busyness of the speaker and the death of the sun to establish the inevitability of death.

Read More
938 Words | 4 Pages

Emily Dickinson lived during a time when many would become very well acquainted with death. As such it would become a specter that was feared as it could make an appearance at any time. So looking at Dickinson 's work it seems rather interesting that taken as a collection there seems to be the tale of one character that comes to view death in a multitude of different ways throughout their life. First is the feared figure that leaves them restless, then death comes as something numbing but leaves the living to celebrate the life of the one that has passed, life as a story that is completed and finished upon death, and finally coming to see death as kind figure that takes one to a new home. this finally view is what paints death as something that is not to be feared but rather as something natural, it is the next

Read More
867 Words | 4 Pages

The Transformation that Changes our Lives The poet Emily Dickinson in her poem, I Felt a Funeral in my Brain that is the first line of the poem, not a special title that Dickinson chose. It tells about the story of the experience of the speaker in the poem who is transforming from place to another. Many readers would take this poem as an explanation of what happens after death, what the dead body feels in the funeral.

Read More

More about Analysis Of Emily Dickinson's Exploration Of Death

Related Topics

Open Document