Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

Success is counted sweetest

Success is counted sweetest
By those who ne'er succeed.
To comprehend a nectar
Requires sorest need.

Not one of all the purple Host

Who took the Flag today
Can tell the definition
So clear of victory

As he defeated – dying –
On whose forbidden ear
The distant strains of triumph
Burst agonized and clear!
Grade saver:
This poem’s message, carried forth in a few different metaphors, is that those who succeed
never truly appreciate it—it is only those who fail, or who lack something, that can truly
appreciate how wonderful it would be if they did succeed. The dilemma presented by this
poem is that it is not just those who strive for longer before succeeding that can appreciate
it more, it is only those who “ne’er succeed” who can count it “sweetest” to succeed. This
means, then, that no one ever truly appreciates success to its full desert, because those who
could, once offered the chance, lose the ability to.
The next metaphor changes the scope of the poem slightly; it is no longer just about success,
but about want and desire, too. Here, for someone “To comprehend a nectar,” that is, to
truly understand all the wonderful aspects of nectar, and to be satisfied by it, not just to
scarf it down, “Requires sorest need.” That is, only the starving can truly appreciate food.
Again, we have the dilemma that as soon as one has their first bite, they are no longer
starving, and they quickly lose their ability to appreciate it.
The final two stanzas elucidate one last, more extended, metaphor. Here Dickinson has taken
us to a battlefield, and she compares the perspectives of the winning and losing sides. Not
only can the soldiers in the winning army not feel the same appreciation of victory as the
losing soldiers, but they cannot even truly understand what it is. Those soldiers left
“defeated” and “dying” on the battlefield, however, can, as they must listen to the other
side’s celebrations of their victory.

Analysis
Fame, or success, and their lack—failure—often occurs as a theme in Dickinson’s poetry.
Ironically, this poem, extolling the virtues of failure, was one of her very few poems to be
published (although after heavy editorializing). Yet while this poem’s publication may
complicate the issue, it can still be read as being largely about Dickinson’s own failure to
publish her poetry, even though she removes the poem and its failures from herself by using
only third-person narration and an distant, unemotional tone.
Although during her lifetime her poems were not published, there was something to be gained
in this ostensible failure, and that is what she explores in this poem. Beyond just liking
paradoxes, Dickinson regularly sees pain as having the positive side of adding to one’s
experience, and this is another example of that paradox. Not only can a successfully
published poet not understand the true joy of that publication, as the winning soldier cannot,
but they also lose their ability to empathize with failure generally, as the victorious soldier
strides off to loud fanfare, completely ignoring the dead and dying on the other side of the
battle field. Nor can they see the true beauty of success, and thus, they lose part of their
emotional vocabulary for their poems. In this way the experience of success may actually
lead to less truly successful poems—they may be published, but they are not as profound,
or so Dickinson seems to believe.
This can be read as a reason that Dickinson did not try harder to get her poems published,
although it is more likely that had to do with her repeated failures to do so, and the
agonizing changes editors made, even when her poems were accepted. This poem, then, is
more of a portrait of the frustrating ironies of life, rather than a single extended metaphor
for the good side of her failure to publish, for the examples in the poem show that true
happiness cannot be ultimately available, if one cannot appreciate success unless one does
not have it.
Dickinson is careful to avoid directly discussing the successes or failures of publication, just
as she is careful to keep herself out of the poem as a character or even a visible speaker.
The opening two lines deal with success directly, followed by two metaphors; starvation
and loss in battle. Of these, the battle metaphor gets by far the majority of the lines, which
seems to emphasize the fact that success often requires the failure of another.
Bachelor and master:
Success is counted sweetest is a lyric poem of Emily Dickinson’s which was one of
only seven published poems during her lifetime. It was written in 1859 and published
anonymously in 1864 in the Brooklyn Daily Union. The uses of the images of a
victorious army and one dying warrior cater the meaning that only one who has
suffered defeat can understand the true value of success.
 The poem unveils her keen consciousness of the intricate truths of human desire.

The speaker begins the poem with a message stating that those who never succeed
that really crave success the most. Those who fail count the success sweet. To
understand the sweetness of nectar, one must be thirsty. Without knowing what the
thirst is, one cannot really understand the sweetness of nectar. Then the speaker
provides us with the imagery of war. The victorious troops experience the glory of
success, but they cannot tell you any clear and precise definition of what victory is.
The one who is defeated and is on verge of death can tell you the definition of victory.
He is agonized at his own defeat, but he alone knows clearly what triumph is.

Her theme was precisely the perception of value won through deprivation. It was not
sight, she knew, that could be won out of blindness, but a full appreciation of the
miraculousness and preciousness of sight. So to 'comprehend' a nectar, to 'tell the
definition' of victory, one must suffer thirst and defeat. Generally, people tend to desire
things more intensely when they do not have them.

The poem is built upon a paradox of success and defeat, the victor and the
vanquished. While the victor experiences and basks in the glory of success, the
vanquished clearly comprehends and can tell the definition of victory. One experiences
its taste and the other knows its meaning. The imagery drawn from war is most
appropriate to the paradox and to the theme of the poem.

I taste a liquor never brewed

I taste a liquor never brewed –
From Tankards scooped in Pearl –
Not all the Frankfort Berries
Yield such an Alcohol!

Inebriate of air – am I –
And Debauchee of Dew –
Reeling – thro’ endless summer days –
From inns of molten Blue –

When “Landlords” turn the drunken Bee

Out of the Foxglove’s door –
When Butterflies – renounce their “drams” –
I shall but drink the more!

Till Seraphs swing their snowy Hats –

And Saints – to windows run –
To see the little Tippler
Leaning against the – Sun!
“I taste a liquor never brewed—” consists of four stanzas, the second and
fourth lines rhyming in each quatrain. This is a poem of visionary
experience in which the richness of a natural setting in summer is the
cause. Speaking in her own lyric voice, Dickinson describes the
exhilaration of going outdoors in summer in terms of getting drunk in a
tavern.

In the first stanza, she asserts that she is drinking an unusual kind of liquor,
one that has not been brewed but that is superior to the finest Rhine wine.
In the second stanza, she says that she has become drunk by consuming
the air and the dew of summer days. This consumption has taken place in
“inns of Molten Blue,” or under the hot summer sky. In the third stanza, she
claims that her capacity for this liquor exceeds that of the most dedicated of
summer’s drinkers, the bees and the butterflies: When they have ceased
drinking, she will continue. In the final quatrain, she affirms that she will
drink until seraphs—the six-winged angels that stand in the presence of
God—and saints as well run to Heaven’s windows to see her, “the little
Tippler/ Leaning against the—Sun—.”

The last image of the poem, which grows out of the central comparison
between drunkenness and her experiences of the summer day, humorously
conveys a spiritual expansion of the self. Through this expansion, she
comes to the notice of divine spirits, calling them away from their usual
adoration of God in order to see this smaller god who, though perhaps a
little unruly, has grown momentarily toward her true stature and
importance.

I taste a liquor never brewed is a short lyrical poem written by Emily Dickinson which
was first published in the Springfield Daily Republican on 4 May 1861. The publisher
changed the title of the poem as 'The May-Wine', but Dickinson herself never titled
the poem so it is commonly referred to by its first line.

The "liquor never brewed" has a touch of something unearthly about it. Not all the vats
upon the Rhine can produce such drink, because it is scooped in rare pearls. The
ingredients of the liquor are extraordinary. In a deeply confessional note, the poet tells
us of her addiction to drink and her sensual nature. But the drink she is addicted to is
exhilarating air and her sensual indulgence is in the dew. Tipsy with intoxication the
poet reels away her endless summer days. No edicts or edifications can bar the poet
from this indulgence, because she drinks not from earthly bars, but from the 'inns of
molten blue", meaning heavenly inns. Her intoxication, therefore, is divine. The stanza
has unusual and fresh images which are not "the worn-out counters of expression."
 When the landlords turn out the drunken bee from foxgloves in their gardens, and
when the butterfly drinks to her fill and renounces, the poet can still drink the draughts
of ecstasy. The poet continues to drink the divine intoxicant from the inexhaustible
vessel of nature, till the saints and angels in heaven grow jubilant to see the "little
tippler leaning against the sun. The ecstasy of divine intoxication is so profound that
the poet is transported to the sun when she leans against him.

The theme of the poem is indirectly presented through images, metaphors and
symbols. The poet speaks of her inebriety (drunkenness). The "liquor never brewed"
that she tastes does not belong to this world, but to her world of sensuous imagination.
She drinks to the less the exhilarating aspects of nature. The artist is intoxicated with
divine madness. The "little Tippler" in the poem is Emily Dickinson, who drinks in
ecstasy "from the inns of molten blue", with saints and angels. The poet, through fresh
and unusual images, makes us share her ecstasy. It was a reeling triumph to be a
secret drinker while in the name of Orthodox religion one can close the bars of
Amberst, but not the "inns of molten blue" where she drank with saints and was served
by angles.

There's a certain Slant of light

There's a certain Slant of light,
Winter Afternoons –
That oppresses, like the Heft
Of Cathedral Tunes –

Heavenly Hurt, it gives us –

We can find no scar,
But internal difference –
Where the Meanings, are –

None may teach it – Any –

'Tis the seal Despair –
An imperial affliction
Sent us of the Air –

When it comes, the Landscape listens –

Shadows – hold their breath –
When it goes, 'tis like the Distance
On the look of Death –
This poem focuses only on the effect of a certain kind of light that the
speaker notices on winter afternoons. It quickly becomes clear that
this is not going to be a poem extolling nature or winter light’s virtues,
for this light “oppresses.”
What kind of oppression this is, exactly, is what the rest of the poem
describes. In the first stanza it is described as “like the Heft/Of
Cathedral Tunes –,“ which is not a common simile for something
oppressive, making it clear that this light’s oppression is of a
complicated nature.
This slant of light gives a “Heavenly Hurt” to the observer of it—that is,
something that causes no outwardly visible damage (“We can find no
scar”), but instead causes a mental or spiritual change (“But internal
difference, / Where the Meanings, are –“).
This change cannot be induced through teaching (“None may teach it –
Any –“); instead, it must be experienced. Though it is “Despair,” it is an
“imperial affliction,” that is, a regal or royal affliction, that although
painful, leads to an uplifting.
It is powerful enough that even nature notices its presence (“When it
comes, the Landscape listens –“), and its departure allows for a
preternatural understanding of death (“When it goes, ‘tis like the
Distance / On the look of Death–“).
Analysis
This poem very closely describes a fairly common theme of
Dickinson’s—that of change as a fearful but illuminating process, both
painful and essential. Here this awe of change is embodied in the
“certain Slant of light” that becomes the place of departure for the
transformation. This slant of light is oppressive, but this is no simple,
purely negative oppression, it is instead oppressive like “the Heft/Of
Cathedral Tunes –.”
The choice of “heft” here, instead of “weight,” which would actually have
fit the rhyme scheme more closely, emphasizes the paradoxically
uplifting aspect of this oppression, because while “weight” gives the
reader solely an image of a downward force, “heft” implies a
movement upward, albeit a difficult one. Thus while this slant of light
is oppressive, while it creates difficulty for the speaker, the diction
makes it clear that it is also uplifting.
This makes the surprising use of the simile of the “Cathedral Tunes”
more understandable, as this seems to fit in with Dickinson’s views of
religion. Faith, religion, and God are not easy for her; instead, they
have a great difficulty, an oppressiveness, about them, and they cause
“Heavenly hurt”—the importance of the adjective here is emphasized
in the alliteration, and the flipped syntax of the line, opening with the
direct object instead of the subject. This difficulty is, however, one that
leads to greater understanding, and thus perhaps uplifts her, and in so
doing takes her closer to God.
The importance of this painful transformation becomes even clearer in
the third stanza. Here we see that its lessons cannot be taught, but
must be lived; the emphasis of “Any” at the end of the first line of this
stanza makes this very clear. And it is a “Seal of Despair – / An
imperial affliction.” The close proximity of “Seal” and “imperial” make
this experience into something that brings she who experiences it
onto another level -- into a select, almost royal group of those marked
by it.
This painful transformation has a better side to it implied throughout
the poem, a certain uplifting that makes it worthwhile, that makes
those who have lived through it members of a select club. However,
the final stanza ends this transformation, and in so doing, leaves the
day much closer to ending and the observer much closer to death, the
word with which the poem itself closes. Yet death is balanced closely
with life, as is shown by the fact that “death” rhymes with “breath,” an
obvious symbol for life, earlier in the stanza, so even this death is not
purely negative.

I felt a Funeral, in my Brain

I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,
And Mourners to and fro
Kept treading - treading - till it seemed
That Sense was breaking through -

And when they all were seated,

A Service, like a Drum -
Kept beating - beating - till I thought
My mind was going numb -
And then I heard them lift a Box
And creak across my Soul
With those same Boots of Lead, again,
Then Space - began to toll,

As all the Heavens were a Bell,

And Being, but an Ear,
And I, and Silence, some strange Race,
Wrecked, solitary, here -

And then a Plank in Reason, broke,

And I dropped down, and down -
And hit a World, at every plunge,
And Finished knowing - then –

This is one of the greatest poems of Emily imaginary. The theme of the poem is not
the funeral, real or imaginary, but an aberration of the mind, the gradual break-up of
rational powers and the final onset of madness. The theme is presented through the
medium of the funeral image. Emily Dickinson finds the funeral the saddest
experience in human life. She finds in it, therefore, appropriate symbols to evoke the
image of decay of the mind. The poem has richly symbolic vocabulary.

Through the funeral symbols, Emily Dickinson has concertized the experience of the
sick mind obsessed with its approaching disintegration. In her use of symbols and
evolving images through them and in finally communicating the experience, Emily
Dickinson was unwittingly a forerunner of modern symbolist movement in poetry.

Some ineffable experience of the madding mind is described through the images
drawn from funeral ceremony. There is no real funeral involved here. But all
emotions associated with a funeral are felt in the mind of the speaker. Possibly a
picture of sad, slow marching funeral procession is evoked in her mind. The Pall
bearers and mourners are described as treading. The whole ceremony takes place
in the theatre of the speaker’s mind. By the oppressive weight of the treading
mourners, the sense of the speaker experiences a break-up of her rational faculties.
This is the initial experience of the disintegrating mind.

When the mourners were seated there was a drum heard, perhaps, as a part of the
ceremony. Like the tread of the mourners in the first stanza, the heavy beat of the
drums and the sadness evoked by them are unbearably oppressive that the speaker
now begins to feel that her mind is becoming numb. The incessant beating of the
drum (suggested by the repetition of the beating) has nearly benumbed the
speaker's mind. This is the second stage of the dying of the rational faculty of the
speaker.

The third and final part of the funeral is burial. This stanza uses symbols drawn from
the burial process. In this stanza the air of approaching lunacy is thickened. To an
already insufferable weight of the mourners' tread and the drum beat, a box and
boots of lead are added. The boots of lead also suggest the numbness or dullness of
the soul. With the box and boots of lead cracking 'across my soul' the speaker's mind
has begun to crack, that is, the sanity of the speaker's mind is being buried by the
pall-bearers. The disintegration of the mind is nearly complete. Till now the entire
action ceremony has taken place in the brain of the speaker. Now the reference to
'space and its 'toll' suggests that the theatre of action is the external world. The
outside world seems to toll the death bells.

In a stroke of fancy, the speaker imagines the space as tolling the bell and that the
Heavens themselves are acting like bells. The heavens are like a huge bell and the
space is tolling the bell. The speaker's physical being is one gigantic ear listening to
the toll of the bell. With the toll of the bell the speaker's rational faculties are buried;
there is total lunacy now. In the midst of the sounds of the bell there is no place for
silence. Silence is alienated from the world of noise as much as the speaker is
alienated from the world of rational beings.

The presence of this stanza does not make any substantial difference in the
interpretation of the poem, On the contrary it strengthens our approach to the poem.
The plank stands for a kind of scaffolding across the open grave. Like all these
things, the plank (Reason) is broken by the weight of the mourners’ drum beats and
boots of lead and creaking box. That completes the disintegration of the speaker's
mind "then", speaker plunges into the condition of lunacy. The final word, then looks
grotesquely inappropriate here. But then the incoherence and disorderliness of
speech are an indication of the total disintegration, which the speaker has
experienced.

The use of funeral as a metaphor symbolically stands for the death of rationality.
Funeral directly implies death and also a formal event where rules and procedures
are counted. The strict rules and regulations in funeral ironically shows the gap
between the situation of sanity and insanity. In insanity there is no control and
rationality is threatened. Funeral is a process of moving from life to death that is
parallel to the speaker’s moving from sanity to insanity. The speaker is not actually
observing the funeral, but feeling it and being a part of it.

I’m Nobody! Who are you?

I’m Nobody! Who are you?

Are you – Nobody – too?
Then there’s a pair of us!
Don’t tell! they’d advertise – you know!

How dreary – to be – Somebody!

How public – like a Frog –
To tell one’s name – the livelong June –
To an admiring Bog!

This poem opens with a literally impossible declaration—that the speaker is

“Nobody.” This nobody-ness, however, quickly comes to mean that she is outside
of the public sphere; perhaps, here Dickinson is touching on her own failure to
become a published poet, and thus the fact that to most of society, she is
“Nobody.”

The speaker does not seem bitter about this—instead she asks the reader,
playfully, “Who are you?,” and offers us a chance to be in cahoots with her (“Are
you – Nobody – Too?”). In the next line, she assumes that the answer to this
question is yes, and so unites herself with the reader (“Then there’s a pair of
us!”), and her use of exclamation points shows that she is very happy to be a part
of this failed couple.

Dickinson then shows how oppressive the crowd of somebodies can be,
encouraging the reader to keep this a secret (“Don’t tell!”) because otherwise
“they’d advertise,” and the speaker and her reader would lose their ability to
stand apart from the crowd.

It then becomes abundantly clear that it is not only preferable to be a “Nobody,”

it is “dreary” to be a “Somebody.” These somebodies, these public figures who are
so unlike Dickinson, are next compared to frogs, rather pitifully, we can imagine,
croaking away to the “admiring Bog.” These public figures do not even attempt to
say anything of importance—all they do is “tell one’s name,” that is, their own
name, over and over, in an attempt to make themselves seem important.

This “admiring Bog” represents those people who allow the public figures to
think they are important, the general masses who lift them up. These masses are
not even granted the respect of having a sentient being to represent them.
Instead, they are something into which one sinks, which takes all individuality
away, and has no opinion to speak of, and certainly not one to be respected.

Analysis
“I’m Nobody! Who are you?” is an example of one of Dickinson’s more comical
poems, yet the comedy is not simply for pleasure. Rather, it contains a biting
satire of the public sphere, both of the public figures who benefit from it, and of
the masses who allow them to. Dickinson’s light tone, childish voice, and
invitation to the reader to be on her side, however, keep the sharp edge of the
satire from cutting too stingingly.

This poem mocks the pretensions of the public world, as it imagines public
figures---or perhaps, published writers—as loud bullfrogs. These frogs have
nothing of import to say; instead, they advertise their own names, over and over,
selling themselves for the purpose of maintaining their fame, but not having any
substance behind it. This especially makes it seem like this poem is speaking
towards Dickinson’s lack of publication, as even when she did publish, she did so
anonymously, avoiding the prospect of telling her name.

The frogs are not the only ones at fault, however. Their audience—closely tied to
them through rhyme—is “an admiring Bog,” with all of its members having
joined into the whole, losing all individuality or identity. And indeed, this whole
is a swamp, something that sucks one in, or sucks in all they are told, but puts
forward no opinion or judgment of its own. This audience thus is spared the
dreariness of being “somebody,” for they have no identity, but they become
worthless, for they are without opinion, and only serve to listen to and support
the public figures.

This public sphere is not only unpleasant in itself, but it is also tries to impose
itself on those “nobodies,” like the speaker and ostensibly the reader, who do
their best to avoid it. The speaker fears that even telling anyone that there is now
“a pair of us,” that is, nobodies, outsiders, will lead to their very identities being
advertised, and thus taken from them, for they will no longer be able to be the
anonymous, free-thinking nobodies that they have chosen to be.

In the world of this poem, then, the public sphere is about advertised or self-
advertised identities: people marketing their names and their existence. This
marketing becomes the only way for anyone to enter the public sphere. Talent
itself is inconsequential, and thus for someone like Dickinson, or, ostensibly, the
reader, who desires to think and to perform with meaning, rather than just
maintaining their own fame, participation or recognition in this public world is
impossible.

The Soul selects her own Society (1862)

The Soul selects her own Society —
Then — shuts the Door —
To her divine Majority —
Present no more —

Unmoved — she notes the Chariots — pausing —

At her low Gate —
Unmoved — an Emperor be kneeling
Upon her Mat —

I've known her — from an ample nation —

Choose One —
Then — close the Valves of her attention —
Like Stone —

The speaker in these lines cherishes her privacy and her intentional striving to live a spiritual
life.

First Quatrain: The Independent Soul

The first line of the first quatrain finds the speaker making revealing and momentous
announcement: "The Soul selects her own Society." The vital force of life energy,
known as the soul, has the ability to understand what it needs, what belongs to it,
and how to choose the true from the false.
After the soul makes its selections, it bars intruders from distracting it from its
necessary duties and engagements.
The speaker engages a royalty metaphor to compare her activities to that of a king's
court. She commands the atmosphere of others that she will accept no more, as her
limit for her soul's society has been met. She now is in full possession of "her divine
Majority."
Like a king's court that has welcomed all of the guests to his audience, he places a
halt to the entrance of further guests. This speaker's "divine Majority," however, is
populated only by what her own soul has selected.
Interestingly, it is likely that this speaker's selection consists of only of meditation, a
few books, a personal item or two, thoughts, prayer, and her own writings—not
people at all, except for a beloved friend or two, who may be welcomed into her
sacred, soul-inspired court.
Second Quatrain: No Intrusion into the Sanctuary
This speaker remains adamant that she will rebuff anyone, regardless of station, who
may wish to intrude upon her sanctuary of quiet reflection. Even those who come by
fancy carriage and unload at her door will not be accepted for an audience. She has
chosen and she remains insistent in keeping her privacy.
The grace and solitude that her soul's selection have made will not be broken even
for an "Emperor," who might come calling. No kneeling emperor would even motivate
her to forsake her own quiet sanctuary to accept audience with him.
Heads of state would hardly make a satisfactory visitor for one whose interests are
only in the spiritual world and not the political.
Third Quatrain: Soul is Sole Discriminating Force
The speaker now makes quite clear that her own soul has completed all the
dismissing through selection that makes her soul a discriminating force for seeking
the Will of the Divine Spirit.
This speaker has intimately affirmed with her own soul an uncompromising stance
that allows her to remain brave and secure in her choices for the way she lives her
life. She will "close the Valves" of her own stone-like attention to outside forces and
place that concentration where it belongs—upon inward forces of reality.
Through her own experience of selecting her soul's companions, this speaker can
place herself inside a divine culture where she can experience eternal bliss.
Without engagement with ordinary humanity, her soul can return to its divine state,
where she can commune with her Divine Creator, enjoying the blessed company that
she loves more than anything this world could ever offer.

Spark notes commentary:

Whereas “I’m Nobody! Who are you?” takes a playful tone to the idea of
reclusiveness and privacy, the tone of “The Soul selects her own Society—
” is quieter, grander, and more ominous. The idea that “The Soul selects
her own Society” (that people choose a few companions who matter to
them and exclude everyone else from their inner consciousness) conjures
up images of a solemn ceremony with the ritual closing of the door, the
chariots, the emperor, and the ponderous Valves of the Soul’s attention.
Essentially, the middle stanza functions to emphasize the Soul’s stonily
uncompromising attitude toward anyone trying to enter into her Society
once the metaphorical door is shut—even chariots, even an emperor,
cannot persuade her. The third stanza then illustrates the severity of the
Soul’s exclusiveness—even from “an ample nation” of people, she easily
settles on one single person to include, summarily and unhesitatingly
locking out everyone else. The concluding stanza, with its emphasis on the
“One” who is chosen, gives “The Soul selects her own Society—” the feel
of a tragic love poem, although we need not reduce our understanding of
the poem to see its theme as merely romantic. The poem is an excellent
example of Dickinson’s tightly focused skills with metaphor and imagery;
cycling through her regal list of door, divine Majority, chariots, emperor,
mat, ample nation, and stony valves of attention, Dickinson continually
surprises the reader with her vivid and unexpected series of images, each
of which furthers the somber mood of the poem.
 After great pain, a formal feeling comes
After great pain, a formal feeling comes –
The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs –
The stiff Heart questions ‘was it He, that bore,’
And ‘Yesterday, or Centuries before’?

The Feet, mechanical, go round –

A Wooden way
Of Ground, or Air, or Ought –
Regardless grown,
A Quartz contentment, like a stone –

This is the Hour of Lead –

Remembered, if outlived,
As Freezing persons, recollect the Snow –
First – Chill – then Stupor – then the letting go –

Bachelor and master:

The poem After Great Pain, a Formal Feeling comes from Emily Dickinson is acclaimed as the
greatest piece on pain and death, and which marks the highest measure of excellence in its
artistic achievement. While it underlines the broad theme of pain and misery as the inevitable
part of human existence, lie compares implicitly "the after effects of pain to the slow numbing
process of freezing to death".

The poem is in three well-defined and yet organically cohesive stages with their intricate
patterning of structure, images and ideas. In the first stanza, the funeral motif is emphasized
through the images of tombs and ceremony. In the second stage, the hard and solid images of
"wood", "quartz" and "stone" symbolize the benumbed consciousness. In the third stage the
leaden image of benumbed consciousness has given place to the image of frozenness and
desolation. The unifying force behind all these apparently diversified images is the sense of pain,
a shock or a trauma. Thus, the poem is the greatest poem on pain.

The poetess describes the fragile emotional equilibrium that settles heavily over a survivor of
recent trauma or profound grief. It is Dickinson’s most popular poem about suffering. The pain
must be psychological, for there is no real damage to the body and no pursuit of healing. The
“formal feeling” suggests the protagonist’s withdrawal from the World, a withdrawal which implies
a criticism of those who have made her to suffer. A funeral goes on inside her, with the nerves
acting both as mourners and as a tombstone.
After the great pain, the heart feels so dead and alienated from itself that is wondering whether it
is really the one that suffered, and also if the crushing blow came recently or centuries earlier.
She feels that even time has dissolved. In the second stanza, the protagonist walks in a circle as
an expression of frustration because she has nowhere to go. The poem dramatizes a state of
emotional shock that serves as a protection against pain. “Quartz contentment” is one of Emily
Dickson most brilliant metaphors, combing heaviness, density and earthiness with the idea of
contentment. Dickinson has been very successful in arousing the sense of numbness of body
and mind, followed by a great pain. Legs move mechanically. This denotes that all human
behavior becomes mechanical. There is no sensation, no acuteness of feeling. “Go round”
further strengthens the idea of numbness. There is no change or the desire to change Legs
move in circle mechanically. It means life has lost its ambition or fails to attempt to achieve its
ambition. “Go round, or Air, or ought” suggests that life becomes aimless and careless. “A
wooden-way” is a transferred epithet. This has been used to indicate that life is not independent.
It is dependent on others without caring its own success and development. “A quartz
contentment, live stone” is a beautiful expression of artificial life and false situation. The simile
like ‘stone’ shows how after a great pain man’s desires are killed or destroyed seeking no
change.

In the last stanza the poetess recollects that the time of great pain has been over and the image
that is left impressed upon her mind is that of “freezing persons recollecting the snow.” The
expression is very beautiful and gives a realistic of the feelings followed by severe pain.
“Freezing Man” who in the beginning felt ‘Chill’ has reached the state of stupor by shunning all
the sensations and is now collecting snow. Thus the freezing man collecting snow suggests that
the time of pain is now over and man has become sensation less like lead and the past has
become just a memory. “The hour of lead” here is another brilliant metaphor, in which time sense
and body fuse into something heavy, dull, immovable object. This figure of speech implies that
such protection requires a terrible sacrifice. Such suffering may prove total, but if it does not, it
will make the victim ever remember the painful process. The last line is particularly effective in its
combination of shock, the growing intensity of pain and final relief. The frequent heavy pauses
within the lines and the mixture of slant and full rhymes all contribute to the poem’s formal
slowness. The poem reads heavy and slow due to its improvisational nature.

Summary

The speaker notes that following great pain, “a formal feeling” often sets in,
during which the “Nerves” are solemn and “ceremonious, like Tombs.” The
heart questions whether it ever really endured such pain and whether it
was really so recent (“The stiff Heart questions was it He, that bore, / And
Yesterday, or Centuries before?”). The feet continue to plod mechanically,
with a wooden way, and the heart feels a stone-like contentment. This, the
speaker says, is “the Hour of Lead,” and if the person experiencing it
survives this Hour, he or she will remember it in the same way that
“Freezing persons” remember the snow: “First—Chill—then Stupor—then
the letting go—.”

Commentary
Perhaps Emily Dickinson’s greatest achievement as a poet is the record
she left of her own inwardness; because of her extraordinary powers of
self-observation and her extraordinary willingness to map her own feelings
as accurately and honestly as she could, Dickinson has bequeathed us a
multitude of hard, intense, and subtle poems, detailing complicated feelings
rarely described by other poets. And yet, encountering these feelings in the
compression chamber of a Dickinson poem, one recognizes them instantly.
“After great pain, a formal feeling comes” describes the fragile emotional
equilibrium that settles heavily over a survivor of recent trauma or profound
grief.

Dickinson’s descriptive words lend a funereal feel to the poem: The

emotion following pain is “formal,” one’s nerves feel like “Tombs,” one’s
heart is stiff and disbelieving. The feet’s “Wooden way” evokes a wooden
casket, and the final “like a stone” recalls a headstone. The speaker
emphasizes the fragile state of a person experiencing the “formal feeling”
by never referring to such people as whole human beings, detailing their
bodies in objectified fragments (“The stiff Heart,” “The Feet, mechanical,”
etc).

There's been a death in the opposite house

There's been a Death, in the Opposite House

As lately as Today
I know it, by the numb look
Such Houses have—always

The Neighbors rustle in and out

The Doctor—drives away
A Window opens like a Pod
Abrupt—mechanically

Somebody flings a Mattress out

The Children hurry by
They wonder if it died—on that
I used to—when a Boy

The Minister—goes stiffly in

As if the House were His
And He owned all the Mourners—now
And little Boys—besides

And then the Milliner—and the Man

Of the Appalling Trade
To take the measure of the House

There'll be that Dark Parade

Of Tassels—and of Coaches—soon
It's easy as a Sign
The Intuition of the News
In just a Country Town

Theme
Death is a natural occurrence. Yet, it is a sad event for those who lose a
loved one (the people are numb with grief).
Tone
 Although the theme of this poem is death, it does not have a sad and
mournful tone. The persona tells us of the goings on in a matter-of-fact
manner to convey the idea that death is a natural occurrence. The present
tense is used to convey the idea that death is an everyday occurrence.

Dickinson's sharp eye for detail makes this poem as vivid a slice of life as any Norman
Rockwell painting. Various local characters make an appearance as the poet watches
from her window. Neighbors come and go, some probably carrying casseroles or flowers
as they do today. The doctor, his labors over, drives away in his no doubt important-
looking carriage. Some servant throws open a window and "flings" out a mattress and of
course the local children will be telling each other that just hours ago someone died on
it.
My favorite is the minister. This is his moment and he makes an appropriate
entrance – "As if the House were His / And He owned all the Mourners – now – / and
little Boys – besides." Very droll, and no doubt the children scattered at his approach.
Dickinson casts herself in this role, looking back to when she was a boy. It's a playful
persona and boys had more freedom to run about than girls, so no wonder Dickinson
adopts that vantage.

The milliner arrives to take measurements for an appropriate burial hat. At last the
undertaker, he "Of the Appalling Trade", arrives to determine the size of the casket – the
body's "House". Once the corpse is housed it will begin its "Dark Parade" as black-garbed
mourners, the hearse and coaches full of mourners – many with black horses – head to
the cemetery.
Who needs the Internet to find out what's going on? In a small town everyone knows
what's going on.

Dickinson's observations are emotionally detached. She has nothing to say about the
family or the deceased, no speculations, no formulations of grief or sympathy. She is
simply recounting what happens on a day of death. Nothing is conventionally pleasant;
even the house has a "numb" look. The window from which the mattress is flung opens
abruptly and "mechanically". The minister and undertaker are not sympathetic
characters, and of course the funeral procession is "Dark".
Even so, the poem is a pleasure to read. We feel the vicarious thrill of watching great
drama enfold while ensconced in our own room. We can giggle at the minister, shudder
at the undertaker, and nod knowingly at the familiarity of the scene. It is, perhaps, this
very familiarity that allows life to go on smoothly all around.

In 1863, the year Dickinson wrote this poem, there would have been more funerals than
usual because of young men who came home wounded from the war and didn't survive.
But I don't think Dickinson is making a large point here.

Publication – is the Auction

Publication – is the Auction

Of the Mind of Man –
Poverty – be justifying
For so foul a thing

Possibly – but We – would rather

From Our Garret go
White – unto the White Creator –
Than invest – Our Snow –

Thought belong to Him who gave it –

Then – to Him Who bear
It's Corporeal illustration – sell
The Royal Air –

In the Parcel – Be the Merchant

Of the Heavenly Grace –
But reduce no Human Spirit
To Disgrace of Price –

In this poem, Dickinson is criticizing the idea of publication. She is bitter towards this
because she had a very difficult time having her poems published. The poem begins with
the lines:
Publication-is the Auction
Of the Mind of Man-
In this intoduction, I think Dickinson is saying that it is a demeaning situation for the
Mind of the Man to be up for sale. I feel that she is saying it is putting ones identity for
sale, because that is what poetry is to poets. In her poem, Dickinson also says:
Poverty-be justifying
which I think is saying it is better to be poor, than to be sold. Sold of course meaning
have your work be published. Dickinson is repeatedly demeaning publication because
she is bitter towards it because of the sitution she is in. She wrote many poems, and only
a few became published during her life, which is why this is a sensitive subject and gave
her fuel for this poem!

Here is a poem analysis of Emily Dickinson’s poem Publication is the Auction. Emily
Dickinson lived the majority of her life as a recluse. She seldom allowed anyone into her
presence, and even when she was in need of a doctor, only allowed him to observe her from
a distance (Cite). She was considered strange by many who knew her most closely, and her
 poems suggest likewise. She wrote about matters most did not venture to talk about, and
she seemed to live in fear of being noticed. This is the reason that most of her words
remained unpublished until after her death. It would seem that she regretted those works
which were published while she was alive. Somehow, she felt that they had less value to her
once the world took notice of them. This specific poem is about Dickinson’s feelings toward
her own works. It gives insight into her character and values. It can allow the reader to begin
to understand Dickinson’s views on privacy, and why she held it in such high esteem. She
was an introvert, to say the least, and her expressions were made through her private
writings rather than to another living human being.

Dickinson’s poems fit none of the conventions of 19th century poetry. They were too
short; their punctuation was odd. The ones published during her lifetime were heavily
edited. No wonder she had such a dim view of publication. To Emily Dickinson, to allow
an editor or an audience of any kind to critique her work, meant allowing them to
critique her very soul. She did not believe that anyone else had the right to say whether
her poems were good or bad. They were simply her thoughts. She did not even take
credit for her own thoughts as having conceived of them herself, but rather gave credit
to God, claiming that He was the one who put the thoughts there in the first place. She
even goes so far as to suggest that to make money off of these thoughts that God had
given her, would be an act of defiance against Him. She even compares it to prostitution,
claiming that it would be no less immoral to sell her body than it is to sell her thoughts.

This poem gives significant insight into Dickinson, and why she refused to let others
read her poetry. She felt as though the thoughts she wrote down on paper were given to
her by God, and meant to be kept to herself.

Because I could not stop for Death

Because I could not stop for Death –
He kindly stopped for me –
The Carriage held but just Ourselves –
And Immortality.

We slowly drove – He knew no haste

And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For His Civility –

We passed the School, where Children strove

At Recess – in the Ring –
We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –
We passed the Setting Sun –

Or rather – He passed Us –
The Dews drew quivering and Chill –
For only Gossamer, my Gown –
My Tippet – only Tulle –

We paused before a House that seemed

A Swelling of the Ground –
The Roof was scarcely visible –
The Cornice – in the Ground –

Since then – 'tis Centuries – and yet

Feels shorter than the Day
I first surmised the Horses' Heads
Were toward Eternity –
In this poem, Dickinson’s speaker is communicating from beyond the grave, describing
her journey with Death, personified, from life to afterlife. In the opening stanza, the
speaker is too busy for Death (“Because I could not stop for Death—“), so Death—
“kindly”—takes the time to do what she cannot, and stops for her.
This “civility” that Death exhibits in taking time out for her leads her to give up on those
things that had made her so busy—“And I had put away/My labor and my leisure too”—
so they can just enjoy this carriage ride (“We slowly drove – He knew no haste”).
In the third stanza we see reminders of the world that the speaker is passing from, with
children playing and fields of grain. Her place in the world shifts between this stanza and
the next; in the third stanza, “We passed the Setting Sun—,” but at the opening of the
fourth stanza, she corrects this—“Or rather – He passed Us –“—because she has stopped
being an active agent, and is only now a part of the landscape.
In this stanza, after the realization of her new place in the world, her death also becomes
suddenly very physical, as “The Dews drew quivering and chill—,” and she explains that
her dress is only gossamer, and her “Tippet,” a kind of cape usually made out of fur, is
“only Tulle.”
After this moment of seeing the coldness of her death, the carriage pauses at her new
“House.” The description of the house—“A Swelling of the Ground—“—makes it clear
that this is no cottage, but instead a grave. Yet they only “pause” at this house, because
although it is ostensibly her home, it is really only a resting place as she travels to
eternity.
The final stanza shows a glimpse of this immortality, made most clear in the first two
lines, where she says that although it has been centuries since she has died, it feels no
longer than a day. It is not just any day that she compares it to, however—it is the very
day of her death, when she saw “the Horses’ Heads” that were pulling her towards this
eternity.
Analysis
Dickinson’s poems deal with death again and again, and it is never quite the same in any
poem. In “Because I could not stop for Death—,” we see death personified. He is no
frightening, or even intimidating, reaper, but rather a courteous and gentle guide,
leading her to eternity. The speaker feels no fear when Death picks her up in his carriage,
she just sees it as an act of kindness, as she was too busy to find time for him.
It is this kindness, this individual attention to her—it is emphasized in the first stanza
that the carriage holds just the two of them, doubly so because of the internal rhyme in
“held” and “ourselves”—that leads the speaker to so easily give up on her life and what it
contained. This is explicitly stated, as it is “For His Civility” that she puts away her
“labor” and her “leisure,” which is Dickinson using metonymy to represent another
alliterative word—her life.
Indeed, the next stanza shows the life is not so great, as this quiet, slow carriage ride is
contrasted with what she sees as they go. A school scene of children playing, which could
be emotional, is instead only an example of the difficulty of life—although the children
are playing “At Recess,” the verb she uses is “strove,” emphasizing the labors of
existence. The use of anaphora with “We passed” also emphasizes the tiring
repetitiveness of mundane routine.
The next stanza moves to present a more conventional vision of death—things become
cold and more sinister, the speaker’s dress is not thick enough to warm or protect her.
Yet it quickly becomes clear that though this part of death—the coldness, and the next
stanza’s image of the grave as home—may not be ideal, it is worth it, for it leads to the
final stanza, which ends with immortality. Additionally, the use of alliteration in this
stanza that emphasizes the material trappings—“gossamer” “gown” and “tippet” “tulle”—
makes the stanza as a whole less sinister.
That immorality is the goal is hinted at in the first stanza, where “Immortality” is the
only other occupant of the carriage, yet it is only in the final stanza that we see that the
speaker has obtained it. Time suddenly loses its meaning; hundreds of years feel no
different than a day. Because time is gone, the speaker can still feel with relish that
moment of realization, that death was not just death, but immortality, for she “surmised
the Horses’ Heads/Were toward Eternity –.” By ending with “Eternity –,” the poem itself
enacts this eternity, trailing out into the infinite.