Emily Dickinson's Comments on English Poetry

An innovator of poetry who is neither fashionable nor kitsch.

Emily Dickinson's Poetry Creation and Its Achievements

Walt whitman (18 19-92) and Emily Dickinson (1830-86-86), who lived in the19 th century, are magnificent ghosts wandering in vilen, the modern and contemporary poetry circles in the United States and even in the world. It can be said that no contemporary American poet, no matter how postmodern or avant-garde, has grown up without his or her care, which has a great influence, just as China poets are sheltered by Li Bai and Du Fu. Stanley T.Williams said: "In the untouchable spiritual field reflected by poetry so far, they represent the farthest pioneering talent of the American mind in the19th century." [1] Some famous American anthologies of literature and poetry are often led by these two American pioneers in modern times. [2]2006 54 38+0[3] Professor Judith Johnson, an American poet who came to China to attend the American Literature Seminar, humorously called them Emily Whitman when talking about these two poets. This insightful judgment was immediately appreciated by Chinese and American scholars. These are really a pair of poetry innovators with different styles and at the same time, they are made in heaven. Stylistically, Whitman is a long river with bright sunshine, Dickinson is a small bridge with few moon stars. As we all know, he is majestic and pays more attention to the macro world, while she is meticulous and pays more attention to the micro world. As Donald Barlow Taufer said, "Whitman's poems are obtained through his constant efforts to cover everything, while Dickinson's poems are obtained through her quick and scattered insight." [5] However, she (he) and she have a distinct common ground: the pursuit of poetic art is persistent and brave, and she will never follow suit at any time. She would rather be misunderstood, satirized, ridiculed and even attacked by conservative poets, poetry critics, editors, publishers and even readers who occupy the mainstream position, but she completely broke away from the traditional poetry aesthetics. It can be seen that this is also the basic quality that any great poet in the world must have since ancient times. With this quality, her (his) poetry "transcends the times, spans time and space, and shows a spiritual dimension that spans the times." [6]

Although these two great poets have gone through uneven or bumpy creative paths, Whitman has finally been recognized by the poetry circle and won the glory that a great poet deserves, while Dickinson is not as lucky as him and has been given the cold shoulder all his life. She published only a few poems before her death, and her poetic genius was gradually discovered by the world. It was not until the middle of the 20th century that she fully established her position as a major American poet. From the secular point of view of pursuing temporary fame and fortune, this may be her misfortune, but in the long run, it is her luck. If we look at the evolution of the whole critical and academic circles' comments and research on her and her poems before her death, how lucky she is: she seems to have become a poet beyond time and space. Although she was born in the19th century, after a vigorous 20th century, she still lives in the1th century from New England to the whole United States and from the United States to the whole world.

The evolution of American academic and critical circles' evaluation of Dickinson's poems in different historical periods

Today in the 2 1 century, we should accurately grasp Emily Dickinson's poems, which are so rich and difficult to understand. It is not by our diligent intensive reading and clever understanding that we can solve the problem. We must continue to advance on the basis of the research and exploration of predecessors from generation to generation. As James Woodress said when introducing the acceptance of Dickinson's poetry criticism, "The big problem that American literature students or teachers face when studying Dickinson's poetry today is to keep up with academic and critical inquiries and investigations." [7] What's more, we China scholars who didn't grow up in the American cultural context? Therefore, before we begin to study her poems, it is more necessary for us to understand the present situation and trend of the research on Dickinson's poems in American academic circles.

From marietta mesmer's latest survey [8], we can clearly see the trend of Dickinson's comments and academic research in the whole critical and academic circles. According to the entries of academic works and papers on Dickinson's poems provided by the American Modern Language Association, there are more than 50 kinds of entries every year, with the largest number reaching 1986, reaching more than 83 kinds, including many works written in foreign languages, including Japanese, Polish, German, French, Slovenian, Russian, Spanish, Macedonian and Portuguese. Although marietta mesmer did not mention Chinese, the most widely used language in the world, Dickinson actually entered China's works and Chinese translation, but compared with Whitman's influence on China literature, she was a latecomer, almost 70 years behind him. 19 19 Mr Tian Han introduced Whitman to China for the first time, while China scholars began to introduce Dickinson in the 1980s [9]. It was not until the mid-1950s that her poetic genius was truly discovered in the United States and received widespread attention. With the in-depth study and translation of Dickinson's poems by China scholars and translators, we have reason to believe that she will have a greater and greater influence on China literature and academic circles in the new century.

From the 1960s to the end of the 20th century, the acceptance of Dickinson's poems was basically in the initial stage of critical comments in newspapers. Individual readers and female critics have a warm and positive attitude towards her poems and letters [10], while a few male literary journalists, editors and writers who dominate the field of literary criticism criticize and criticize the "irregular" form of Dickinson's poems, saying that her rhymes, rhythms and syntax are all wrong. After 1890, the criticism that belittles Dickinson basically prevailed.

However, it is particularly worth mentioning that Samuel G. Ward, an outstanding banker, an early transcendentalist, a writer, Emerson and Thoreau's close friend, has a unique eye. On June 189 1 day+10/October1kloc-0. 1823-1911) wrote a famous letter, which said: "I am as interested in Emily Dickinson as the whole world. No wonder all her six editions of poems are sold out. I think every one was sold to New Englanders. She may be world-famous or she may never leave New England. " At the end of the letter, he called Dickinson "a taciturn and expressive person" and thought that "this is why she attracted many New England charms". At that time, critics' sharp criticism of Dickinson's poems influenced Higginson, who had been pursuing traditional poetry aesthetics, so much so that he was unwilling to continue editing her Selected Poems. But Ward's letter gave him courage and confidence.

When the first edition of Emily Dickinson's Poems (1890) and the second edition of Poems edited by Higginson and Mabel loomis Todd (1898+0) appeared, although professional critics in newspapers and periodicals felt "incomprehensible, aesthetically evaluated, compared and classified" about the unusual artistic forms and themes of Dickinson's poems. Thomas Bailey aldridge (1836- 1907), a famous critic at that time, also put forward a split view on Dickinson's poems in his famous paper "About Emily Dickinson" (1892). He said that he found "a little poem" from Dickinson's Chaos of Poetry. "In order to make it worthy of flying in Heine's lyric poem" Weird Swallow ",a little modification is needed at the beginning." However, William Dean howells (1837- 1920), the most authoritative writer and critic at that time, spoke highly of Dickinson: "In Emily Dickinson's works, the United States, or more importantly, New England, has made outstanding contributions to world literature, which cannot be missed in any record of world literature." This evaluation with national pride aroused the hostile reaction of British critics. 189 1 year, a British critic named andrew lang decided that Dickinson's grammar was unreasonable, regarded it as a symbol of the uncivilized state of the United States, and ironically said:

We may be told that democracy doesn't pay attention to grammar like Europe. However, even if democracy skips the head and falls into a primitive state, I believe our barbaric successors will make their poems grammatically meaningless, even though they do so unconsciously.

The following year, an American female scholar named Alice James retorted:

When I heard that Britain declared Emily Dickinson a second-rate poet, I was relieved because they had such an ability to ignore excellent qualities.

Such a pen battle was seen in newspapers at that time, no matter whether it was praised or criticized, at least it showed that Dickinson was concerned at that time. Of course, we can't ignore Mabel loomis Todd [1 1], who is an indispensable figure in Emily Dickinson's poems. Later, he independently edited and published the third edition of Poems (the third series, 1896). Unfortunately, she and Emily's sister lavinia [12] suddenly stopped editing Dickinson's poems in 1897 because of differences in land litigation disputes, which affected the enthusiasm of critics for Dickinson's poems. It was not until Emily Dickinson's new collection of poems, The Single Hound, edited by Emily's niece Martha Dickinson Bianchi, was published in 19 14 that critics began to take an interest in her poems. Harriet Monroe, editor-in-chief of Poetry magazine at that time, regarded Dickinson as "an unconscious imagist poet who was not in the imagist team" when commenting on The Only Hunting Dog. Her view coincides with that of Elizabeth Cieply Thaci, that is, Dickinson is an "early imagist poet" [13]. Their comments undoubtedly promoted the study of Dickinson's poems and opened up a new trend in the study of Dickinson's poems. Subsequently, critics studied Dickinson's poems from different angles such as New England Transcendentalism and Puritanism. What is more striking is that more and more critics attribute her poetry to European cultural traditions, especially the metaphysical poetry tradition advocated by Eliot. Conrad Aiken (1889- 1973), a famous American poet, praised Dickinson's poem "perhaps the best English poem written by a poetess". Martin Armstrong agreed with his evaluation of her poems, but suggested deleting "maybe". The evaluative criticism of Emily Dickinson's Selected Poems edited by Aiken turned to explanatory criticism. In other words, by this time, critics no longer circle around the quality of her poems, but interpret and interpret her poems on the premise of acknowledging its Excellence.

From 1930 to 1955, the study of Dickinson's poems has further shifted from newspaper comments to academic explanations. This trend is the further poetry of Emily Dickinson (1929) and unpublished poetry of Emily Dickinson (1935) edited by Martha and Alfred Park Yungsu Hampson. This is consistent with the rise of new criticism. New criticism's critics mainly elaborate on Dickinson's single poems, rather than evaluate Dickinson as a whole. This firmly consolidated her position as a witty metaphysical poet and mystic poet. This is a high opinion of a poet. Only in China, metaphysics is ignored, because it has an idealistic color that many of us have always despised, and it seems to deviate from the realism that many of us have always attached importance to. T.S. Eliot, a great poet, benefited from john donne (1572- 1963), an English metaphysical poet in the 7th century. After his vigorous advocacy, Donne and other metaphysical poets who were neglected in the 8th century became popular in the 20th century. [14] As for mysticism, it is not a nice word in China. However, in the west, mysticism is a kind of belief, that is, to know the truth directly or communicate with God is obtained through various methods that are difficult to approach rationality, through meditation or epiphany. Dickinson's poems are always obtained through her insight into the trivial matters of ordinary people. Of course, her wonderful poems vividly describe the coming of death and the experience after death, which also makes her poems mysterious. When we write poems, we often have a mysterious experience: when you are in a state of meditation, you often confuse thoughts and feelings, reality and fantasy. Dickinson was created in such a state. Allen tate (1899- 1997), a famous new critic and poet, first saw Dickinson's artistic features. In his thesis "New England Culture and Emily Dickinson", he pointed out that she "confused her thoughts and feelings", which made Dickinson an example in new criticism's poetry criticism. Its far-reaching significance lies in that Tate abandoned the traditional criticism method closely related to the author's life and put Dickinson's poems in the context of American Protestant culture. However, there was also biographical criticism of Dickinson in this period. Its main interest is to collect Dickinson's life stories and her vague lover. For a moment, she seemed bisexual. Some people say that her boyfriend is Charles Wadsworth or Samuel Bowles; Some people say that her boyfriend is George Gould or Major Hunter; Some people say that she is a lesbian, with Susan Gilbert and Kate Scott Turner Anton. Curious people found this for this unmarried poetess between her poems and Martha's Life and Letters of Emily Dickinson (1924), and there is no conclusive evidence. Dickinson's poems and letters are always vague and confusing. It is common for a woman to have a lover, but trying to guess Dickinson's lover can at least show how much she is concerned and loved by everyone. . . . . . .