Was Emily Dickinson A Transcendentalist

Emily Dickinson is i of the about widely read and well known American poets. While she doesn't exactly fall into the category of the Transcendentalists, she was well-regarded by Emerson and she read his work thoughtfully (Pearce 174). In 1850 her friend Benjamin Newton gave her Emerson'due south first collection of Poems to her delight, a book including "The Sphinx," "The Trouble," "Give All to Dear," "Merlin I" and "Merlin Two," and "The Humblebee," all poems whose mode and subject seem to resonate in her poetry. After she expressed admiration of the writing of Thoreau; she may have been referring to him in "'Twas fighting for his Life he was--," (Fr1230), according to her biographer Alfred Habegger (My Wars Are Laid Away in Books). Dickinson kept her writing, also as her writerly intentions, as simple as possible. According to Roy Harvey Pearce, "she is simply and starkly concerned with being herself and accommodating her view of the globe to that concern." (174) Ironically, for wishing only to exist herself, Dickinson was following a transcendental ideal; she was existence true to herself and being an individual at all costs, as opposed to befitting to a world of followers. Keeping Dickinson's famous reclusivity in heed, one could say that in her lifetime she was neither a leader nor a follower. Dickinson never tied herself to a specific school of thought or philosophy, she was just herself. Perhaps that was transcendental.
Bryan Hileman, VCU

Some poems of Emily Dickinson seem to be transcendental, yet non quite. She appears to search for the universal truths and investigate the circumstances of the human being status: sense of life, immortality, God, faith, place of man in the universe. Emily Dickinson questions absolutes and her argumentation is multisided. The poetic technique that she uses involves making abstract physical, which creates a striking imagery like that of a hand of the wind combing the Heaven.

Ane could perceive Emerson's, i.e. transcendentalism'southward, influence in these poems merely the profound difference here is that Emily Dickinson does not take a role of a prophet, redeemer and instructor of the (American) globe. Instead, hers is the lone search for the truth; she dismisses conventional faith ("Some keep the Sabbath going to Church building--") as the easiest way toward salvation. Self-assay, self-discipline, and self-critique are the tools of her search. Her extraordinary poetic imagination acts like enzymes in chemical reactions.
Krystyna Grocholski, VCU

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Selected Criticism on Dickinson and Transcendentalism

Emily Dickinson Bibliography.
Davidson, Frank. 'This Consciousness': Emerson and Dickinson. ESQ 44 (1966), pp. 2-seven.
D'Avanzo, Mario L. "Emily Dickinson'due south and Emerson'southward 'Presentiment'." ESQ 58 (1970), pp. 157-59.
D'Avanzo, Mario L. "'Unto the White Creator': The Snow of Dickinson and Emerson." New England Quarterly 45 (1972), pp. 278-80. (
D'Avanzo, Mario Fifty. "Dickinson's 'The Reticent Volcano' and Emerson." ATQ 14 (1972), pp. 11-13.
Richmond, Lee J. "Emersonian Echos in Dickinson'due south 'These are the signs'." ATQ 29 (1976), pp. 2-3
Watters, David H. "Emerson, Dickinson, and the Atomic Cocky." Dickinson Studies32 (1977), pp. 122-34.
Diehl, Joanne Feit. "Emerson, Dickinson, and the Abyss." ELH 44:4 (1977 Winter), pp. 683-700.
Mann, John S. "Emily Dickinson, Emerson, and the Poet as Namer." New England Quarterly 51 (1978), pp. 467-88
Hagenbuchle, Roland. "Sign and Process: The Concept of Linguistic communication in Emerson and Dickinson." ESQ 25 (1979), pp. 137-55.
Attebery, Brian. "Dickinson, Emerson and the Abstract Concrete." Dickinson Studies 35 (1979), pp. 17-22.
Reiss, John. "Emily Dickinson'due south Self-Reliance," Dickinson Studies 38 (1980): 25-33.
Monteiro, George. "Dickinson'south Select Society," Dickinson Studies 39 (June 1981): 41-43.
Thomas, Jeanette M. "Emerson's Influence on Two of ED's Poems." Dickinson Studies 41 (1981 Dec.), pp. 38-42.
Kasture, P. South. "Emerson'southward Influence on ED (With Reference to Themes and Techniques)." Dickinson Studies 47 (1983 Dec.), pp. 34-35.
St. Armand, Barton Levi. Emily Dickinson and Her Civilisation: The Soul's Society. New York: Cambridge Upwardly, 1984.
Lusher, Robert M. "An Emersonian Context of Dickinson's 'The Soul selects her own Society,'" ESQ xxx (2 Quarter 1984): 111-116.
Dalke, Anne French. "Devil's Wine: A Re-examination of Emily Dickinson's #214," American Notes & Quaries 23 (January-Feb 1985): 78-fourscore.
Morris, Timothy. "The Complimentary-rhyming Poesy of Emerson and Dickinson," Essays in Literature 12 (Fall 1985): 225-240.
Salska, Agnieszka. Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson: Poesy of the Fundamental Consciousness. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 1985.
Bickman, Martin. American Romantic Psychology: Emerson, Poe, Whitman, Dickinson, Melville. Dallas: Leap, 1988.
Robinson, Douglas. "Two Dickinson Readings." Dickinson Studies 70 (1989), pp. 25-35.
Monteiro, George. "Dickinson'south Presentiment." ANQ 4:1 (1991 Jan), pp. 17-19
Greenberg, Robert 1000. Splintered Worlds: Fragmentation and the Platonic of Multifariousness in the Piece of work of Emerson, Melville, Whitman, and Dickinson. Boston: Northeastern Up, 1993.
Donnelly, Daria. "Emily Dickinson and the Romantic Comparative." Essays and Studies 51 (1998), pp. 116-39.
Wolosky, Shira. "Dickinson's Emerson: A Critique of American Identity." Emily Dickinson Journal 9:two (2000), pp. 134-41.
Buell, Lawrence. "Emersonian Anti-Mentoring: From Thoreau to Dickinson and Beyond." Michigan Quarterly Review 41:iii (2002 Summertime), pp. 347-lx.
Tufariello, Catherine. "'The Remembering Vino': Emerson's Influence on Whitman and Dickinson," pp. 162-91. In The Cambridge Companion to Ralph Waldo Emerson. 1999.