DARE TO DREAM BIG!: From Social Recluse to One of America’s Greatest Poets

Imagine This: You love to write poetry, but during your lifetime you’re all but ignored and have fewer than a dozen poems published out of your almost 1800 completed works.

 You’re born December 10, 1830, in Amherst, Massachusetts, and you have an older brother Austin and a younger sister Lavinia (Vinnie). Your father is a successful attorney and very strict and your mother is quite frail and is often sick. Neither of your parents displays much emotion or affection.

 Like most Amherst families, you’re Congregationalists and follow the tenets of New England Puritanism. The Puritans  believe that spiritual purity can be achieved only by strict adherence to the values of simplicity, order, and austerity.

 Your family is not very literary minded and your father discourages you from reading any books other than books of a religious nature. He believes that reading can be a bad influence on the minds of young people.

 You attend the Amherst Academy where you study such difficult courses as Latin, geology, botany, and philosophy. Then, at sixteen, your father sends you to the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary where you’re expected to believe in God exactly as you’re instructed. You do believe in God, but you have to find your own way to believe.    

 Your school considers Christmas a pagan holiday and when you find out that you’ll be spending Christmas Day fasting and praying in your room, you leave school and return home. After the holidays, you return to school and your father writes a letter of apology for your leaving school without permission.

 In March 1849 you develop a bronchial ailment and you return home for a month to regain your health. While home, you keep up with your studies, and pass all your year-end exams when you return to school.

 In August, you return home permanently with mixed feelings. You’re happy to be home, but you feel that perhaps you failed to take advantage of all the opportunities Mount Holyoke had to offer.

 At nineteen, one of your favorite books is Jane Eyre and you develop a special bond with the heroine. You long for the high-spirited and adventurous life that Jane Eyre lived while you’re still being treated as a child, especially by your father. You’re very much a part of the active social scene at Amherst, but every time you try to become more independent, your efforts are discouraged.

 By the spring of 1853, many of your friends have left Amherst and are living independent lives which only heightens your feelings of loneliness. You spend a lot of your time writing letters to your friends and learning how to look at things the way a poet does. You write about the simple things of nature such as sunsets, flowers, and small creatures.

 While visiting Philadelphia with your sister Vinnie in 1855, you meet the famous and charismatic preacher Charles Wadsworth and you’re both attracted to each other. Although he’s married, you begin a correspondence with him that lasts until his death in 1882.

 Your life begins to change in the second half of the 1850s. You write more poetry as your social life declines. By the end of the decade, your preference for seclusion has begun to emerge and you retreat to the shelter of your house and garden.

 It’s during this difficult time in your life that you begin to write poems about the joy and pain of loving someone and being in love. And soon your poetry becomes the most important thing in your life.

 As your poetry becomes increasingly more important to you, your social circle grows smaller and smaller and your eccentricities become more pronounced. You never go anywhere anymore and you wear only white all year round.

 But your poetry pours forth at a phenomenal rate over the next decade. By the time you die on May 15, 1886, from Bright’s Disease (a kidney disorder) at age 55, you have written almost 1800 poems, but only seven have been published.

 After your death, all your poems are eventually published and you become recognized as a major American poet. You are also recognized as one of the most legendary figures in literature, renowned for your personal eccentricities as much as for your poetry.

                                                        Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

                                                              “I dwell in possibility.”

 For More about Emily Dickinson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5u-qcbvnwo

 Giving Back: Emily Dickinson was one of America’s early female poets and served as an inspiration to other poets for generations to come.

 Did You Know that most of Emily Dickinson’s poems have no titles?

 Something to Think about: Emily Dickinson is still considered an enigma today: some feel she was unable to escape the prison of her melancholy while others feel she was quite content and at peace with the secluded life she chose. Do you have any thoughts on this?

Willoughby and I hope you enjoyed this week’s true story and will be back next week for another story to inspire you to DARE TO DREAM BIG!