Theme of individuality in Dickinsons poetry

Introduction:
Emily Dickinson was born into one of Amherst, Massachusetts most prominent families on
10 December 1830. Among the ranks of other such acclaimed poets as Walt Whitman, Emily
Dickinson is considered one of the most original 19th Century American poets. She is noted
for her unconventional broken rhyming meter and use of dashes and random capitalization as
well as her creative use of metaphor and overall innovative style. She was a deeply sensitive
woman who questioned the puritanical background of her Calvinist family and soulfully
explored her own spirituality, often in poignant, deeply personal poetry. She admired the
works of J ohn Keats and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, but avoided the florid and romantic
style of her time, creating poems of pure and concise imagery, at times witty and sardonic,
often boldly frank and illuminating the keen insight she had into the human condition. It is
true that Emily Dickinson's themes are universal, but her particular vantage points tend to be
very personal; she rebuilt her world inside the products of her poetic imagination. Her
pessimistic life was reflected directly to her poetry life and as a result of this fact there
occurred pessimistic, gloomy poems written by Emily Dickinson. Dickenson, in her life, did
not experience many things and this is displayed in her poems.
Emily Dickinson's unusual character and style has made her become one of the world's most
famous poets. In her poems, she expresses her feelings about religion, nature, death and love.
Her poems tell a great deal about her lifestyle, which was very secluded and withdrawn from
society. Dickinson's prosperous family expected her to live as a Christian, and someday have
a family of her own (Lit 927). Dickinson, however, rebelled against this traditional way of
life, as she developed and lived by her own personal beliefs.
Emily Dickinson is one of the most popular American poets of all time. Her poems are still
recited around the world, and she is unusual in the sense that she undertook a wide range of
experimental styles during her lifetime. She was also largely unrecognized until after her
death, with relatively few poems published during her lifetime and those that were published
being edited heavily be commercial interests. It was only after her death in 1886 that
Dickinson's reputation began to grow, and today she is generally regarded as one of the first
truly great female poets whose work has survived to the modern day.


Characteristics of Dickinsons poetry:
H
1. The poems of Emily Dickinson cover a wide range of topics. In fact her work does
not fit conveniently into any one genre. She is now regarded as an innovative, pre-
modernist poet. Fewer than a dozen of her nearly eighteen hundred poems were
published during her lifetime. Dickinson's poems are unique for the era in which she
wrote; they contain short lines, typically lack titles, and often use slant rhyme as well
as unconventional capitalization and punctuation.
2. Many of her poems deal with themes of death and immortality, two recurring topics in
letters to her friends. Emily Dickinson wrote almost 1800 poems during her life. Her
poetry was stunningly original, ignoring or working against many of the traditions and
conventions of the time. Her poems are almost all short, using the traditional hymnal
stanza of quatrains of lines alternating between four and three beats long, rhymed
abab.
3. She is a master of imagery that makes the spiritual materialize in surprising ways;
Dickinson managed manifold variations within her simple form: She used imperfect
rhymes, subtle breaks of rhythm, and idiosyncratic syntax and punctuation to create
fascinating word puzzles, which have produced greatly divergent interpretations over
the years.
4. Dickinsons intensely private poems cover a wide range of subjects and emotions. She
was fascinated with death, and many of her poems struggle with the contradictions
and seeming impossibility of an afterlife. She carries on an argument with God,
sometimes expressing faith in him and sometimes denying his existence. Many of her
poems record moments of freezing paralysis that could be death, pain, doubt, fear, or
love. She remains one of the most private, individual and cryptic voices in American
literature.

Individualism:
Individualism is the belief that the needs of each person are more important than the
needs of society or group. It is considered as actions or attitudes of a person who does
things without being concerned about what other people think. It is a strong belief in
the importance of individual and the virtue of personal independence.
Prominent theme in American poetry:
Individualism is one of the prominent themes of American literature. Many writers
made it as the central idea of their poetry. Poets like R.W. Emerson and Wallace
Stevens wrote on his individual views on religion in their poems The Problem and
Sunday Morning respectively. Walt Whitman wrote on his childhood memories in
the poem There was a child went forth Then poets like Emily Dickinson and
Sylvia Plath wrote on their individual struggles in their poems I cannot live with
you and Lady Lazarus. All these writers wrote thse poetry in different periods and
different situations with different backgrounds but their individual sufferings have
come out from this theme of individualsm.

Illustrations: I Cannot Live With You :
Introduction:
"I Cannot Live With You" is one of Emily Dickinsons great love poems, close in form
to the poetic argument of a classic Shakespearean sonnet. The poem shares the logical
sensibility of the metaphysical poets whom she admired, advancing her thoughts about
her lover, slowly, from the first declaration to the inevitable devastating conclusion.
However, unlike most sonnet arguments or "carpe diem" poems, this poem seems
designed to argue against love. The poem can be broken down into five parts. The first
explains why she cannot live with her lover, the second why she cannot die with him, the
third why she cannot rise with him, the fourth why she cannot fall with him, and the final
utterance of possibility.
Summary:
Poets personal experiences reflected in this poem but at same time Dickinson is
observing it in completely objective manner. Speaker presents different arguments in the
poem in all the five sections. She talks about her impossible relationship with her so-
called lover.
The four impossibilities are-
In section one speaker argues that it is impossible for her to live with her lover and she
provides reasons for this First she says her life with her lover would be end of her
creativity as an artist. Thats why she calls it confined life and uses the image of life
behind the shelf she thinks so because she wants to protect her individual freedom.
Next image signifies religious control over lovers life. She uses the metaphor of life as
porcelain locked up by the sexton (sexton: a church official whose duties include
maintaining church property. The sexton is the speakers lover. He is a church related
officer and hence, he has to follow the churchs discipline the speaker fears that their life
would become the church property. She is not religious so she thinks church cannot
control her personal life. Because of this she finds her life problematic with her lover. She
calls it a life locked up, not free, without passion or expression. Then she compares their
life with crockery set which are old- fashioned and cracked. Her lover is a religious
person who has to follow certain code of conduct which is not important in speakers
view. She feels if both of them live together finally their relationship will crack and break
in to pieces the problem of adjustment is troubling her because as we disused earlier she
wants to maintain he self as an artist it is necessary for her to take care of her
individualism.
Next impossibility is of dying together.
They can't die together because she has to perform the last act which the living performs
for the dead, closing his eyes. She knows he would be incapable of performing that act for
her. On the other hand, she cannot continue living once he dies; she uses metaphors of
cold ("frost" and "freeze") for death. She regards death as her "right" and a "privilege,"
thereby making death a desirable state. Nevertheless, because death would separate them,
their dying together is impossible.
The next impossible thing is resurrecting together. Grace referred to can be seen as
J esus's promise that the dead will rise from their graves to life everlasting. Her total
absorption in her beloved, his importance for her, would relegate J esus to secondary
status: her lover's face would outshine J esus's. In addition, she would be homesick unless
her beloved were near her. So resurrection together is impossible.
In fourth section there is an impossibility of facing the final judgment day together. As is
appropriate to the topic of eternity, this grouping of four stanzas is the longest in the
poem. Initially, she imagines he would be saved, because he served or tried to serve God;
she did not, implying that she would probably not be saved. One reading of "saturated
sight" is that she could see only him (that is, she cares only for or is completely absorbed
in him); consequently, she does not care for the glories of Paradise. It is surprising, even
shocking, that she describes Paradise is sordid in comparison to the joys of her
relationship with her beloved. The pairing of "sordid excellence" is both a metaphysical
touch, and a characteristic Dickinson moment of transforming an abstraction into its
opposite with an oddly chosen adjective. She will not accept heaven without him, and
she regards any separation from him as itself "hell."
In the final section the only possibility left is to live apart, a partially open door allowing
their only contact. This stanza is notably the first time she uses the word "we," capitalized
for emphasis, and creates a paradox where "meet apart" seems possible, or at least more
possible than any of the other alternatives she has rejected throughout the poem. She
claims that the door is just "ajar" but then compares it to oceans, making "ajar" as wide
open as the earth itself, and then linking it to prayer, or hope. In this amazingly deft bit of
wordplay, Dickinson reverses everything as shes saying itthe lovers are apart but
meeting; the door is ajar, like an ocean; and the speaker is somehow sustained by despair.
"Oceans" suggests a great separation physically; turning to prayer would seem to be futile
in view of her rejection of resurrection and paradise. All that is left to support them in
their love is despair.
Anylisis of the poem with respect to the theme of individuality:
Every stanza of the poem is about poets prefernce to invidualism.
a. Idea of maintaining individual freedom:
The first section is about the first impossibility of living together and it suggests poets
wish throgh speakers voice to maintain her idividual freedom through following lines:
I cannot live with You
It would be Life
And Life is over there
Behind the Shelf
The Sexton keeps the Key to
Putting up
Our Life His porcelain -
Like a Cup
Here in thse lines speaker is providing the reasons for the impossibility of living together
with her lover. She thinks there would be a life but it would be without any individual
freedom. So she calls it a life behind the shelf. She doesnt want so much confined life
where she is feeling exausted due to the lacking of any creative potential as an artist. She
thinks going into relationship will stop her poetic creativity and it can also be the reason of
loosing her individual freedom as a person. In next stanza she is giving the picture of
resricted life under the control of church she denies for such kind of life because unlike her
lover she is not religious so she doesnt want to make her life rule- bessed. There is reference
to the sexton it expresses the control. Her lover is a church related officer and hence, he has
to follow the churchs dicipline the speaker ferars that their life would become the church
property. She compaires their life withcrockery set, porelain and cup which is unusal,
old- fashioned and cracked. She feels that if both of them live together finally there
relationship will crack and break into pieces the problem of adjustment is more in case of the
speaker because she is a poet, an artist so it is obivious that she will prefer freedom and
individualism. Her lover is a religious person who has to follow certain code of conduct. Both
of them are contrastive in spirit with each other. Therefore, the speaker expresses
impossibility of living together.
Thus, we can see speakers struggle for maintaning individual freedom by denying the
relationship with her lover.
b. Looking at death as a private affair:
The second section is describing the second impossibility of dying together.

I could not die with You
For One must wait
To shut the Others Gaze down
You could not
And I Could I stand by
And see You freeze
Without my Right of Frost
Deaths privilege
After realising the fact that it is almost impossible for lover to see her dying she
then accepts the reality that they can never get death at the same time. She cannot
live if her lover is not there. So she prefers to die first. She thinks that it is her
individual decision. She is not thinking about this under any force. Rather it is her
curiosity as an artist because she has lived unhappy life. Her frustrations, lonliness
is responsible for thist. She calls death as privilege. That means death is very
special advantage or favour to her.Thus, they cannot see each other dying.
Therfore she refuses to die together.
Previlege can be taken as extremely personal or individual thing. Death therfore is
an extremely personal thing which is not sharable. As an artist the speaker
probably has great curiosity about death and related experienc because of the
problems in her life. She, therefore, is not ready to share this private affair with
her lover.
C. Place for own priorities:
In the third section speaker counts the impossibility of resurrecting together which shows
speakers priority for her personal demands.she is not intrested in resurrecting because for her
lover and his presence with her is more important. She doesnt believe in religion and its
related activities because she is more facinated by her lover that the God.

d. Clash between inner passions and religion :
In the forth section speaker counts the impossibility of facing final judgement
together which shows speakers personal views on religion.
Theyd judge Us How
For You served Heaven You know,
Or sought to
I could not
Because You saturated Sight
And I had not more Eyes
For sordid excellence
As Paradise
Facing the final judgement together is not the grand event for her. This cannot be happend
because the lover has served the god throughout his life by different ways he has tried to be
good disciple of God though his thinking action. She could not serve the god. Her life and
thinking was completely filled by his presence, therfore, she could not see anything beyond
him. Even if, bychance she gets a place in heaven, she would find it sordid- unattractive and
dirty. She is sure that she would be famous in Paradise also but she wont enjoy the stay over
there, Heaven is almost like Hell for her if her lover is not there. She is not arracted by this
concept at all. For her the outside perfection (Paradise) is less atractive than the inside
passion.
Thus, the speaker refuses to face the final judgement day with her lover because that would
be a poiint of separation for her.
In the last section she provides the solution with giving only one possibility from ker side-
getting apart.
e. self- directed approach towards love:
So We must meet apart
You there I here
With just the Door ajar
That Oceans are and Prayer
And that White Sustenance
Despair
In the last section speaker comes to certain conclusive remarks about their
relationship. Separation from each other could only be the possiblity for both of
them. They should distance themsevels. This will allow both of them to keep their
identities intact. Generally, relationships demands union, but in the speakers case
apartness becomes the only option. She further says that even if they are apart
from each other they should keep the possiblity of meeting together in future.
The image of half-close and half-open door conveys this idea. One must not close
the future possibilities of any relationship considering the present plight. It is
impossible for both of them to measure each other because of their deep and
mysterious reality like oceans. In the present stage they can only pray for that
unknown future the only support that the speaker has in this condition is that of
despair- it is a stage without any hope. She wants to be completely hopeless
about their relationship.
Thus, according to the speaker, for maintaining their own identities and priorities
she handles this affair with logical way. She is not emotional here. In a way, here
she makes choice between self and love and she chooses self because as per the
situational crisis it should be given priority in poets opinion.
Illustrations: I heard a fly buzz when I was died
Summary:
When the poem I Heard a Fly Buzz by Emily Dickinson begins the speaker is already dead
and describing her experience of dying. She describes a stillness, and silence in the room, as
in the center of a storm (hurricane). The poems speaker suggests that there is a moment of
absolute calm between the storms of life and death.
This opening of the poem leads the reader to
wonder why the fly is significant enough to be
the speakers enduring memory of the
experience of death.
In the second quartain, the metonymy eye
represents the mourners themselves. Eyes
means, quite literally, the eyes of the people who

have been crying and dying their eyes for the
loved one who is dying. The people at the death
bed are gathering firm in the understanding
that the loved one will die. Their breathing has
stopped shaking and trembling because they are
calmly waiting, certain that she will live no
longer.
In the third stanza, the speaker describes how she had completed her personal business to
prepare herself to die. She has made a last will and testament, giving keepsakes, or token
processions away to relatives and friends. When she was ready and awaiting, There
interposed a Fly. This could mean that the speaker was actually expected some other being
to come, but something else interposed.
In the last stanza, the speaker describes her last sensations before she died. The blue of line
13 may be suggestive of her longing for the eternal or immortal. But with a dash suddenly
giving a turn to the idea, the stumbling, buzzing fly comes into the scene. It comes between
her and the light, symbolically meaning that it came between her and the light of reason and
consciousness. The color blue is perhaps used ironically with the fly that is usually symbolic
of mortality, death and decay. The windows can have two possible meaning in the poem.
Perhaps the speaker is transporting the experience of the light falling to the windows. Or else,
windows is a metaphor for the eyes, such as in the sense that people description of
blindness. It might be a spiritual blindness, indicating that there is no great spiritual vision
after death but mere nothingness.
Emily Dickinson, who has confused between the belief and distrust to immortality, shows
different perspective of death. By using Flying Buzz which is trivial thing, she makes
sarcastic tone to traditional belief and rituals of death which emphasize immortality.
Anylisis of the poem with respect to the theme of individuality:
a. Objective approach towards death:
I heard a Fly buzz when I died
The Stillness in the Room
Was like the Stillness in the Air
Between the Heaves of Storm

The poem describes the scene and atmosphere at the moment when someone dies; with a
weird surprise thrown in. Poet is approaching death in realistic manner. Some
philosophical elements are also present.In the first section speaker is preparing her mind
for experiencing death. Speaker gives reference to the fly buzz while talking but it is a
trivial event at first because here focus is on the event death. Speaker says there is
stillness around her room. The word stillness is repeated twice. First refernce is ofcourse
normal situation of mournful atmosphere created around the room whereas the second
refernce is for stillness in the air it can be related to speakers inner strong thoughts
arises at the time of death. She may be thinking on her unfulfilled desire of countinuing
her writing which is still alive in her mind. Heaves of storm is refered to hilighiting the
same thing through the emotions of mourners as well as the speaker. Mourners are
mournig on the event and the speaker is still aware of her everlasting poetic creativity.
Emotional outburst is on both the side but the only difference is of expressing it.
Thus, here we come to know that individuals inner desires are more powerful than the
limitations of life.
b. Clash between own choice and religon:
I willed my Keepsakes Signed away
What portions of me be
Assignable and then it was
There interposed a Fly
Through first two lines Dickinson is opposing the Christian convention of giving up all
the attachments while dying. She says there is very less left on the part of her to complete
the assigned work the conflict is she is still attached to that. So she thinks it is her
individual choice to give up them completely or not. This is against the Christian religion;
it says that one has to give up all his/ her attachments while leaving this world. Dickinson
here is innovatively putting her ideas for maintaing her individual choice. Then the
sudden intervention by the fly is also innovative. Dickinson has probably used this to
show the disturbed thoughts in the mind of dying person while detaching from the world.
When she tries to accept the reality and makes herself ready to detach from the world then
the sudden devilish intruption distract her attention. It is suggestive of harsh reality of life.
Here the focus is shifted from speakers death event from the insect fly.
Thus, the inversion is signified in these lines. It highlighs the point that though speaker
desires for the physical death her attachments towards her loved things are still there in
greater force.
c. Anti- traditional attitude towards death:

With Blue uncertain stumbling Buzz
Between the light and me
And then the Windows failed and then
I could not see to see

In this section there is description about the fly which indicates the obstacle between life
and death line. It disturbs the speaker so much that she fails to experience the grand event.
While describing fly poet has used many images. the Blue is symbol of eternity,
stumbling buzz is a fly, came between light ( life and spiritual light of the day)
windows are signified for an inanimate object as well as the soul.
In the last line I could not see to see
The word see is repeated twice. First refernce is for physical blindness. And then the
second is for spiritual blindness with the comong of the fly the speker suggests that her
body has already started decaying. This suggests that physical death has taken place much
before than the spiritual death. By attaching this meaning to death experience the speaker
has destoyed its traditional significance. A fly is a symbol of somehting dirty and evilish
also. Bellezebub is considered as the Lord of the Flies that means a fly carries an
element of devil with it. The speaker is obviously inviting a response which suggests that
death is not only insignificant but something related to evil also.Death is not shown
terrifying here, rather Dickinson has treated it as a trivial event intrupted by the trivial,
unworthy fly.
Thus, according to Dickinson this death it is untraditional death poem.

Conclusion:
Dickinson is facinated by the term individualism because in her personal life she
always wants to give prefernce to her individual dependence and iportance rather
than society or religon.
It is her strong will to experience the thing call love. giving two different
attitudes to looking at two different poems. In I cannot live with you the subject
matter is unemotional and in I heard a fly buzz when I died it is anti- trational.
Poet is doing justice with her individuality by giving these two different
perspectives. These are her private poems where her personal experiences are
reflected. Only the diffrence though she longs for love in her life still she can
objectiwely looks at it as unemotional poem. Likewise, she always long for death
still she calls it a trivial thing. Dickenson, in her life, did not experience many
things and this is displayed in her poems. She had a life lacking of many things
like marriage, love or many similar things and this made her concentrate on only
one thing which is the end of life: death. Overall her poetry deals with states of
the mind and soul. Her individual sufferings so much affected on her mind that
her subject matters becomes philosophical as well as realistic in her practices.
Thus, Dickinsons odd placement of punctuation, unusual grammar, and
simplicity of language adds her uniquness. Her abrupt ending lines, words with
capitalization all thse distinguishes her from other writers.