Biography of Emily Dickinson
Biography of Emily DickinsonEmily Dickinson was raised in a traditional New England home in
the mid 1800's. Her father along with the rest of the family had
become Christians and she alone decided to rebel against that and
reject the Church. She like many of her contemporaries had rejected
the traditional views in life and adopted the new transcendental
outlook. Massachusetts, the state where Emily was born and raised in,
before the transcendental period was the epicenter of religious
practice. Founded by the puritans, the feeling of the avenging had
never left the people. After all of the "Great Awakenings" and
religious revivals the people of New England began to question the
old ways. What used to be the focal point of all lives was now under
speculation and often doubted. People began to search for new
meanings in life. People like Emerson and Thoreau believed that
answers lie in the individual. Emerson set the tone for the era when
he said, "Whoso would be a [hu]man, must be a non-conformist." Emily
Dickinson believed and practiced this philosophy. When she was young
she was brought up by a stern and austere father. In her childhood
she was shy and already different from the others. Like all the
Dickinson children, male or female, Emily was sent for formal
education in Amherst Academy. After attending Amherst Academy with
conscientious thinkers such as Helen Hunt Jackson, and after reading
many of Emerson's essays, she began to develop into a free willed
person. Many of her friends had converted to Christianity, her family
was also putting enormous amount of pressure for her to convert. No
longer the submissive youngster she would not bend her will on such
issues as religion, literature and personal associations.
She maintained a correspondence with Rev. Charles Wadsworth over
a substantial period of time. Even though she rejected the Church as
a entity she never did reject or accept God. Wadsworth appealed to
her because he had an incredibly powerful mind and deep emotions.
When he left the East in 1861 Emily was scarred and expressed her
deep sorrow in three successive poems in the following years. They
were never romantically involved but their relationship was
apparently so profound that Emily's feelings for him she sealed
herself from the outside world. Her life became filled with gloom and
despair until she met Judge Otis P. Lord late in her life. Realizing
that they were well into their lives they never were married. When
Lord passed away Emily's health condition which has been hindered
since childhood worsened. In Emily's life the most important things
to her were love, religion, individuality and nature. When discussing
these themes she followed her lifestyle and broke away from
traditional forms of writing and wrote with an intense energy and
complexity never seen before and rarely seen today. She was a rarity
not only because of her poetry but because she was one of the first...
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