The last leaf
Acknowledgements
I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to Mr. Qi Liang, my supervisor, not only for his illuminating instructions and invaluable suggestions to the completion of this paper, but more importantly, for his rigorous scholarship and professional conscientiousness.
I am also indebted to all my teachers in USTS, whose wonderful lectures on different subjects pave me the way for the fundamental and essential academic competence. I owe my sincere gratitude to my classmates and friends who offered inspiring advices and generous help for this paper.
My appreciation should also go to my beloved parents who gave me unselfish and persistent support during my four years’ university life.
摘 要
国内外关于艾米莉·狄金森的研究不计其数，但从生态批评角度出发的研究还为数不多。生态批评旨在探讨文学与自然环境之间的关系，发现文学作品中的生态意蕴，以唤醒当代人的生态意识。美国女诗人狄金森一生创作了1775首诗歌，其中约500首与自然有关。从生态角度对其自然诗展开细读，不难发现其中蕴含着诗人对自然的热爱和关心，尊重和敬畏，以及诗人诗意地栖居的理念。在日益恶化的环境面前，狄金森自然诗中蕴含的生态思想为保护环境以及建立和谐的人与自然关系提供了线索。
关键词：艾米莉·狄金森；自然诗；生态批评；生态思想
Abstract
Among the numerous studies of Emily Dickinson in China and abroad, there has been few from the perspective of ecocriticism. Ecocriticism aims at exploring the link between literature and natural environment to find out the ecological wisdom in literary works so as to awaken the ecological consciousness of contemporaries. American poetess Emily Dickinson composed 1775 poem during her lifetime, of which nature poems accounting for about 500. By reading her nature poems from ecological approach, it is not difficult to discern her concern and love for nature, her respect and reverence for nature, and her idea of poetical dwelling on earth. In view of the current deteriorating environmental conditions, the ecological thoughts implied in Dickinson’s nature poems are a hint for protecting environment and maintaining a harmonious relationship between human beings and nature.
Keywords: Emily Dickinson; nature poems; ecocriticism; ecological thoughts
Contents
An Ecological Reading of Emily Dickinson’s Nature Poems
Introduction
A word is dead
When it is said,
Some say.
I say it just
Begins to live
That day. (Poem 1212) [1]
This poem seems to be Emily Dickinson’s prophecy of all her poems. Her poems, upon “being said”, are not “dead”. On the contrary, her poems are still being read today and will continue to be appreciated.
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) is commonly recognized as one of the greatest poets in American literature. She emerged as a powerful and persistent figure in American culture. As a woman poet, Dickinson has been depicted as singular and enigmatic and even eccentric. Often, Dickinson is pictured as a young woman in white, restrained in the upper room of her home, isolated not only from her neighbors and friends, but also from the historical and cultural events taking place outside her door. Maybe it is because of her long time solitude that she reflected upon poetry and found poetry the most effective expression of her thoughts. Her poems talk most perceptibly of “the Heaven of God,” “the starkest Madness,” or the “Infinite” rather than of worldly events. She has been viewed as agoraphobic, deeply afraid of her surroundings, and as a peculiar spinster. Meanwhile, Dickinson is widely acknowledged as one of the founders of American poetry and innovative pre-modernist poet as well as a rebellious and courageous woman (Martin 2004:1).
One of the most often quoted facts of Emily Dickinson’s life is that scarcely any of her poems were published in her lifetime but won appreciation and recognition after her death. Although she wrote to the writer and editor, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, to ask his opinion of her poetry, she did not openly seek publication, and most of the poems published during her lifetime were submitted by Dickinson’s friends, not by the poet herself. In 1858, she began to record poems in folded pages hand-bound with string, often called fascicles. In this way, she collected and organized, and some say self-published, her poems. Although Dickinson asked her sister Lavinia, to destroy the poems upon her death, Lavinia sought instead to organize, or reorganize them for publication. The result of Lavinia’s effort was a volume of 115 poems which appeared in 1890. Later came out two more volumes of poetry and two volumes of letters. The year 1914 witnessed more Dickinson’s poems coming to light, which secured her place in the history of American Literature.
Dickinson’s poetry is a clear display of her thoughts. The theme of her poems covers nature, love, death and immortality. Her poems are also characterized visually by dashes of varying lengths, unusual capitalization, the placement of poems on the page, and her insertion of variant word choices. The theme, form of her poems and even her life itself draw attention of researchers from home and abroad. Since her poems were first published posthumously in 1890, critical responses to Emily Dickinson’s work have been both plentiful and unremitting, steadily gathering force with every new version of her collected poem and each poem newly discovered in her letters and manuscripts. Chronologically, Dickinson research can be roughly divided into three phases (LIU Xiaohui 2007: 28).
The first phase began with Todd and Higginson’s co-effort to publish Dickinson’s first series of poems in 1890. With eight different versions of her poems published between 1890 and 1945, more interest was shown in her life story rather than her poems. Thus Emily Dickinson’s collection of her letters was published to satisfy reader’s interest in Dickinson’s life experience, which was a substitute of her biography served as “a window into the soul”(Earle 1999: 5) of Dickinson. However this was still not enough to satisfy the curiosity of readers, therefore many biographies based on groundless facts were published, in which Dickinson was painted as a heart-broken woman who chose to escape from sentimental love. What worth mentioning here is that there were some critics who did recognize her. A good example is George Frisbie Wicher’s This Was a Poet, which for the first time focused on the cultural significance of Dickinson’s poems. Due to the attention of more and more critics and scholars to Emily Dickinson’s poems and letters, her classic position in American literature was gradually established.
The second phase started in 1950 when all her copyright was bought by Harvard University. With the publication of the complete works of the poet, including three volumes of poems and three volumes of letters, the former versions were becoming obsolete, thus Emily Dickinson was “rediscovered” (CHANG Yaoxin1997:135). The research on Dickinson’s biography thrived between 1950s and 1970s. This period also saw the flourishing of Freudian theory and feminist trend, in which the interpretation of Emily Dickinson’s sex consciousness and feminine awareness became the focus of critics.
The climax of Dickinson scholarship came, when the Emily Dickinson International Society was founded in 1988. It marked the beginning of the third phase dominated by new criticism, in which Dickinson’s reputation continued to grow and no one would doubt her greatness. Harold Bloom spoke highly of Dickinson in saying, “Except for Shakespeare, Dickinson manifests more cognitive originality than any other Western poets since Dante” (Bloom 1985: 207). With the influence of theories as Reader-Response criticism and Deconstruction, many well-known critics turned to examine Dickinson’s manuscripts. Howe held (1993: 206) that “her calligraphy influences her meaning,” and that much can be done on the research of Dickinson’s manuscript.
In the last decade of 20th century, as the environmental crisis became worse and worse, more and more scholars attempted to investigate the relationship between human beings and nature. They turned to “green” perspective like nature writing and eco-critical analysis, and without any doubt, Dickinson’s nature poems became the subject of some critics.
It could be seen from the above analysis that with the flourishing of various critical theories, the research on Dickinson and her poems has stretched into more and more branches. It could be said that every reader has his/her own Dickinson.
In china, the research on Dickinson was a little bit later than that abroad. The translation of her poems, introduction of Emily Dickinson’s life and interpretation of her pomes came into being from the 80s of last century.
From the mid-1980s, several Chinese versions of Emily Dickinson’s poems appeared，thanks to the endeavor of scholars like Jiang Feng, Zhang Yun, Guan Tianxi, and Wu Juntao. Li Hengchun contributed to the translation of Dickinson’s biography. All their efforts are useful to let more and more Chinese readers be familiar with Dickinson, and lay solid foundation for the research on Dickinson and her poems. The achievement of the research is mainly literature criticisms on Dickinson written by teachers from institutions of higher learning published in periodicals or journals. These literature criticisms mainly focus on— the riddles of Dickinson including her reclusiveness, singleness, personal emotions and religious views; the theme of her poems consisting of love, nature, death and immortality; as well as the art of her poems made up of imagery, irregular grammar and meter (LIU Baoan 2004: 154-156).
Compared with the multi-perspective research on Dickinson in the United States and other countries, studies on Dickinson in China are quite inadequate. There are still plenty of room in the study of Dickinson’s letters and biography, and the present research scope still needs to be expanded.
It is known to all that nature poems are an important part and parcel of all Dickinson’s poems, accounting for nearly one third of her total 1775 poems. The ideas embodied in her nature poems are rather abundant and bear possibilities of different interpretation due to the ever developing literary theories and the large number of her nature poems.
Nowadays, ecocriticism has been brought into focus due to the gradually accelerating deterioration of natural environment and increasingly strong desire for a low carbon life. It is one of the most recent interdisciplinary fields that has emerged in literary and cultural studies. Ecocriticism started in the 1970s, developed in the 1990s and is still enjoying its blooming development. Emphasizing the link between the literary texts and the natural environment, ecocriticism is developed against the background of the severe environmental crisis and the promotion of global environment movement.
Ecocriticism is a kind of literary criticism, exploring the relationship between literature and nature under the guidance of ecologism, especially ecological holism. It aims to reveal the ecological ideas reflected in literary works, dig the cultural roots of such ecological ideas, and also investigate the ecological esthetic and artistic expression of literature (WANG Nuo 2011:47). ZHAO Yifan (2006: 487) points out that ecocriticism tries to study the relationship between human and nature by reading works about nature and environment, at the same time advocates appreciating literary works from the ecological perspective, thus building human’s strong ecological awareness and suffering consciousness. Ecocriticism offers a way of studying literature from environmental perspective. As Coupe argues, the aims of ecocriticism lie in responsibilities to protect our ecological environment: Ecocriticism was initially understood to be synchronous with the aims of earthcare. Its goal was to contribute to “the struggle to preserve the ‘biotic community’ ” (qtd in Buell 2005: 24).
It is gratified to see that in time of environment crisis, researchers are tracing back to writers and poets of earlier times for ecological ideas. Although Emily Dickinson is a poetess living in the 19th century, who did not witness the destruction and damage of nature by human’ over developing and over exploitation of earth and nature, she created numerous poems which contained ample ecological concern and ideas. In her more than 500 poems on nature, her deep love for and careful observation of nature are given a full display. Her brief and enigmatic description of flowers, birds, insects, and her detailed description of the sunrise, the sunset and the changes of four seasons all bear witness to her keen observation and sharp wisdom.
Through going over Dickinson’s nature poems and her biographies along with the support of the theory of ecocriticism, this paper attempts to analyze her nature poems eco-critically and to reveal the ecological ideas reflected in her nature poems. Since we are confronted with the deterioration of natural environment, it is hoped that the ecological reading of Emily Dickinson’s nature poems might help to draw our attention to environmental issues and to the protection of nature, arouse our ecological awareness, and cultivate our sense of environmental responsibility to construct a green, harmonious and enduring man-nature relation.
1. Origin of Dickinson’s Ecological Thoughts
Dickinson’s view towards nature is complicated and even contradictive: on the one hand, she is in favor of nature and treats nature as one of her friends, composing beautiful poems on nature with her bold imagination; on the other hand, she spears no effort to exaggerate the mysterious and devastating power of nature (HE Yuxi 2009: 183; FU Liu 2000:107). Such contradiction is commonplace in her poems. The two types of religions present in her life, Puritanism and Transcendentalism, have great influence over her poetry. Puritanism allows Dickinson to remain grounded in her faith of God, while Transcendentalism permits her to recluse herself from limiting conceptions of humanity which enables her to view herself as an individual with an identity. As Thomas Johnson (1976: 81) puts it “the two intellectual forces that shaped her thinking were the puritans into which she was born, and romantic and transcendental doctrines that were in the New England of her youth.” Puritanism and Transcendentalism are two cornerstones of Dickinson’s mind, so it is necessary to examine her relation to religion in order to understand the complexities of her thoughts.
1.1 Influence of Puritanism
One of the major religious influences of Emily Dickinson’s life is Puritanism. While Puritanism emphasizes human goodness because of a belief that something of God exists in everyone, it also recognizes the presence of evil in all humans. American Puritanism, a dominant factor in American life, was one of the most enduring influences in American thought and literature.
Dickinson was born in a traditional Calvinist family. Perhaps from the beginning, a steak of Puritanism had been potential and deep inside her. Her parents wanted her to be admitted into Calvinism by means of baptism, so they had her baptized when she was a baby. Her father, considered an old Puritan, influenced her in every small way. The school she went to at ten was strongly Congregational. Though she refused to observe its religious custom, Dickinson stayed there for six years. Two years in the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary, a school famous for its Puritan tradition, left some unhappy memory to Dickinson. Because she refused to fast before Christmas as she was asked to, she was sent back home (LIU Shoulan 2006: 11).
Although all Dickinson’s family members were transformed to Calvinism, she remained unchristian all her life. She did not follow her family’s religious step, which does not mean she was not affected by it. She was frequently taken by her parents to join “the daily morning devotions, church attendance twice on Sunday with all members of the family present, frequently reading of the Bible” (Johnson 1976: 81). Some of her poems did show a touch of nobility to the direct influence of the Bible, as she wrote a lot about God, the Garden of Eden and religious ritual in her poems.
Puritans dreamed of living under a perfect order and worked with unbeatable courage and confident hope toward building a new Garden of Eden in America. And Garden of Eden, as Puritans see it, is the place where man could live the way he should. As to nature, Puritans believed that nature indicated the omnipresent existence of God. They attempted to prove that they were God’s chosen people blessed by God on this earth as in Heaven, so they made every effort to make the world an ideal place to live in.
Dickinson composed many poems about the real Garden of Eden. Whatever in her eyes – mountains, charming seasons, trees, flowers, birds and insects, can be the objects of her writing. She enjoyed just being alive in the wonderful world and paid respect to everything alive in the natural world. She seems to maintain that not only humans but also those non-human life forms are chosen and blessed by God. Thus, all that present in this natural world deserves respect and each has its right to live in the Garden. It is obvious that the optimism of Puritanism has exerted a great influence on her view of nature. In her poems, Garden of Eden exists in the real world.
She was, however, fully aware of the differences between man’s real life and ideal life. She loved God but she could not understand him. She dreamed of living in Garden of Eden but she raised weird questions about the scene in Eden like in poem 215: What is - "Paradise" –/Who live there –/Are they "Farmers" –/Do they "hoe" –/Do they know that this is "Amherst" –/And that I – am coming – too –.
Her complicated attitude towards God and religion lies in that she wanted to be free from their influence but at the same time she discovered that the magic power of religion was irresistible. She doubted the real existence of God and its omnipotence, yet she would turn to God for help and comfort when she was faced with difficulties and confusions. It is worth mentioning here that her skeptical spirit is not a betrayal, but an inheritance of puritan tradition, that is a spirit of taking a serious attitude toward life and persistently seeking truth. Though she was born in the atmosphere of Puritanism, received education in schools of the puritan tradition, and was surrounded by disciples of God, Dickinson could not be regarded simply as a Puritan poetess. But doubtlessly Puritanism can be considered as the origin of her ecological thoughts.
1.2 Influence of Transcendentalism
Transcendentalism prevailed in the 19th century of New England, with Emerson as its spokesman. His book entitled Nature appeared in 1836, which made a tremendous impact on the intellectual life of America. “Philosophically considered,” the book says, “the Universe is composed of Nature and Soul” (Emerson 1979: 4). Emerson pronounced the fundamental premise about nature in Transcendentalism, that is, Nature is not simply the Not-Me but also the universal mind whose signs or symbols can be read by individual with his eyes, heart and mind.
Transcendentalism, as a way of knowing, believes that individual can intuitively receive higher truth otherwise unavailable through common methods of knowing, thus transcending the limits of rationalism (TONG Ming 2008: 90). More specifically, the visible world, if intuited with imagination, offers endless clues about the invisible world whose truths stand eternally behind the factual world perceived by the senses. Transcendentalism inspired a whole generation of famous American authors like Thoreau, Whitman and Dickinson.
Transcendentalists lay emphasis on the spirit, or the Oversoul, and regard it as the most important thing in the universe. It exists in nature and man alike. Nature, in the eye of Transcendentalists, is symbolic of the Spirit or God, filled with God’s overwhelming presence. Nature could exercise a healthy and curative influence on human mind. By going back to nature and sinking oneself into its influence, one can be spiritually whole.
Influenced by Transcendentalism, Dickinson observed nature carefully and employed intuition to understand what nature is. She used her own way to perceive the outside world, comparing nature as Heaven, eulogizing its harmony, and appreciating the pleasure brought by nature. She believes that human and nonhuman are an interdependent wholeness, a unity in which all species are equal and should coexist harmoniously.
Nature may be simple, yet we “have no art to say” (Poem 668) what it is. This viewpoint makes Dickinson different from other Transcendentalists, for she goes further, doubting man’s capability of understanding the real connotation of nature. It is obvious that Dickinson did not accept ideas of Transcendentalism mechanically. Pleasure is not always the mood of her nature poems. There are times when she felt desperation and unhappiness like in Poem 1624 in which the happy flower is beheaded by frost. In her poems, nature is sometimes pleasant but at times cruel, and both kinds of feeling are expressed by Dickinson’s intuition over nature. All these are the result of Dickinson’s practice of Transcendentalism and her bold courage to go over the doctrines of transcendentalism.
To sum up, Dickinson’s view of nature is influenced by both Puritanism and Transcendentalism. The conflicts between the two beliefs enable Dickinson to find her own worldview and distinguish herself in poetry. She is an ecological thinker in a modern sense and her ecological thoughts can be further demonstrated after an attentive reading of her poems.
2. Ecological Thoughts Reflected in Dickinson’s Nature Poems
"Nature" is what we see –
The Hill– the Afternoon–
Squirre1–Eclipse – the Bumble bee–
Nay – Nature is Heaven –
Nature is what we hear–
The Bobolink –the Sea–
Thunder – the Cricket–-
Nay–Nature is Harmony–
Nature is what we know–
Yet have no art to say–
So impotent Our Wisdom is
To her Simplicity. (Poem 668)
This poem explains what nature is in the eye of Dickinson. Nature is what we see such as the hill, the afternoon, the Squirrel, the Eclipse, and the Bumble bee. Nature is what we hear such as the Bobolink, the Sea, Thunder and the Cricket. Dickinson’s choice of the objects in this poem is not random or arbitrary. As a healthy, balanced ecosystem, including human and nonhuman inhabitants, must maintain diversity, those objects are carefully chosen to reflect nature’s multiple dimension. And the focus on the diversity of nature renders Dickinson’s poem one about ecology because “Ecology as a discipline means, fundamentally, the study of the environment in its interanimating relationships, its change and conservation, with humanity regarded as a part of the planetary ecosystem” (Murphy 1995: 4).
Nature is one of Dickinson’s favorite subjects, on which she wrote about 500 poems. By using nature poems, this paper refers to poems about natural world, to be exact, poems describing the natural sceneries and living things in nature. Dickinson’s insightful sensibility, perceptive observation and unique language skills make her nature poems interesting and worth reading. Under the guidance of ecocriticism, this part of the paper attempts to make a tentative investigation of the ecological connotations embodied in Dickinson’s nature poems.
2.1 Affection and Admiration for Nature
For most of her life, Dickinson spent much of her time secluded within her family’s home, writing poetry and helping to run the household. Everything in nature such as changing seasons, sunrise and sunset, flowers, birds and insects became her intimate friends and her listeners. Nature, as in her own words, is “the gentlest mother” who is “impatient of no child.”
Nature – the Gentlest Mother is,
Impatient of no Child–
The feeblest – or the waywardest-
Her Admonition mild–
In Forest – and the Hill–
By Traveller – be heard–
Restraining Rampant Squirrel–
Or too impetuous Bird–
How fair Her Conversation–
A Summer Afternoon–
Her Household – Her Assembly –
And when the Sun go down–
Her Voice among the Aisles
Incite the timid prayer
Of the minutest Cricket–
The most unworthy Flower–
When all the Children sleep-
She turns as long away
As will suffice to light Her lamps –
Then bending from the Sky–
With infinite Affection –
And infiniter Care –
Her Golden finger on Her lip –
Wills Silence – Everywhere– (Poem 790)
In this poem, nature is personified as the gentlest mother who gives infinite affection, and care to her creations, personified as children. She is infinitely patient with her children, cautioning even the “feeblest” and the “waywardest” in a “mild” way. As human travelers pass through forests or ride by hillsides, they may hear this gentle Mother “Restraining Rampant Squirrel,” or quieting a “too impetuous Bird.” The poetess defines natural behavior of the animals in terms of the disciplining methods employed by the “Gentlest Mother,” and intuits from the animals’ behavior the tenderness with which this natural Mother guides and guards her children. Then the poetess reports that the Mother’s “Conversation” is utterly “fair.” Relating to the beautiful, peaceful occasion of “a Summer Afternoon,” Dickinson proclaims the measured ways in which the Mother keeps “Her Household,” as she brings together all aspects of her being, or “Her Assembly.” The poem then situates the gentle Mother “among the Aisles” where the Mother brings forth “the timid prayer” from the “the minutest Cricket” and “The most unworthy Flower.” Moving to the end of the day, “when all the Children sleep,” the Mother quietly withdraws to “light Her lamps,” which would of course be the moon and stars. And “with infinite Affection / And Infiniter Care,” the mother raises her “Golden finger” to her lips and makes the sign that calls for “silence” as the night enfolds her children “Everywhere” allowing them to sleep peacefully in the stillness she confers on them.
By regarding nature as a gentle mother, we might say Dickinson considered herself one of nature’s children. She had a strong affection and admiration for what her mother offered: the four seasons, the sun, the sea, the lightening, the wind, and even the dew, and she expressed love for all her siblings, that is, inhabitants in nature.
Love for nature exists in the basis and center of ecoliterature, as many nature writers write about and sang for the beauty and wonders of nature. Everything in nature seems to be inspiration for Dickinson and her observation and description of them are often unique.
The changing four seasons takes up quite a proportion in Dickinson’s poems, inspiring men’s affection and imagination with the changing sceneries of seasons. She is so excited on hearing the notice of spring’s coming that she takes “a Rosy Chair” (Poem 1310). Spring helps her out of gloom and brings her a colorful world, so she could not wait to embrace it as she wrote “I cannot meet the Spring unmoved –” (Poem 1051). Dickinson sensitively catches the beam of “Light Exists in Spring / Not present on the Year” (Poem 812). So she sincerely compliments the spring filled with fresh mud: “We like March. / His Shoes are Purple –/ He is new and high – / Makes he Mud for Dog and Peddler – / Makes he Forests dry” (Poem 1213). As to summer, Dickinson does not directly depict its glory, however, the passing of it makes her depressed which can be felt in Poem 1540: “As imperceptibly as Grief / The Summer lapsed away –.” Autumn presents in mature images, and Dickinson cheerfully and delightedly sings for its harvest as shown in Poem 1407 — “A Field of Stubble, lying sere / beneath the second Sun – / Its Toils to Brindled People thrust – / Its Triumphs – to the Bin– .” Also there are poems picturing winter, like in Poem 1252: “Like Brooms of Steel / The Snow and Wind / Had swept the Winter Street –,” in which a picture of winter is displayed vividly. Sometimes winter gives us a feeling of depression as is revealed in Poem 258 “There’s a certain Slant of light, / Winter Afternoons – / That oppresses, like the Heft / Of Cathedral Tunes –” These are the paintings of four seasons in Dickinson’s poems. Bright spring, noisy summer, joyful autumn and gloomy winter are vivid in her perceptive observation due to her pure and sincere love for nature.
Apart from the wonderful seasons, sunrise and sunset also catches Dickinson’s attention. In Poem 318, Dickinson tells us “how the Sun rose” with the tone of delight. As her room faced the west, Dickinson observed more sunsets in her seclusion. Sometimes sunrise is compared to “Housewife’’ (Poem 219), while sometimes it is seen as a pirate who does the “plunder” and “buried” gold. There are times when she experiences the delicate change occurring in the sunrise like in Poem 291. Only with a heart filled with love and care for nature can Dickinson delicately seize the different ecstatic moments of nature.
Dickinson also loves the creatures of nature, and she often portrays with vividness and delicateness the creatures that are called “The pretty people in the Woods” (Poem 111) like bees, butterflies, and birds especially robins [2]. Even the unwelcome creatures that are disliked by common people dwell in Dickinson’s poems. In Poem 111, she addresses the snake “A narrow Fellow in the Grass;” in Poem 1575, she thinks the bat’s “eccentricities” are beneficent; in Poem 1138, she describes in detail how a spider makes its net and deems “Spider as an Artist” with “surprising Merit” (Poem 1275). Besides animals, flowers and plants can be detected in Dickinson’s poem as she also takes fancy for them. She sings for strawberries quality of being “punctual” and “bold” (Poem 1332); she sings for the elegance and nobility (Poem 675) of the “Little Rose” (Poem 35), expressing her affection for nature through the beauty of “A sepal, petal, and a thorn” of a rose; she also sings for the “Clover’s simple Fame” (Poem 1232).
It could be concluded that what presents in her nature poems demonstrates the diversity of nature. As a leading conservationist, Bert Holldobler holds, biodiversity is the necessary ingredient of the continuance of the world as we know it (qtd in Love 2003: 57). It is the wonder of nature that creatures of different shapes, sizes, habits, and characteristics are living together, and Dickinson pays equal and due attention to each of them as she loves and admires nature deeply and wholeheartedly. “If I can stop one Heart from breaking / I shall not live in vain / If I can ease one Life the Aching / Or cool one Pain/ Or help one fainting Robin / Unto his Nest again / I shall not live in vain” (Poem 919). To Dickinson her fulfillment in life is closely connected with the well-being of other creatures. Nature plays an important role in her life for the inspiration it gives, and the affection and admiration for nature makes her concerned about the well-being of the inhabitants of nature.
2.2 Respect and Reverence for Nature
The issue of relationship between humans and nature is one of the fundamental ones discussed by ecocritics. As far as the residents are concerned, nature is nothing but a resource offering living or development circumstances. They attempt to achieve the huge development at all costs, giving their priority to their own benefits rather than the due privileges of nonhuman things. This idea is in accord with the definition of Anthropocentrism: the assumption or view that the interests of humans are of higher priority than those nonhumans (Buell 2005: 134).
The idea that nature is created for the sake of humans has been deeply rooted in the western countries since the ancient times. Aristotle’s teleology and Christian theology all maintain that nature is made for humans and humans are given the right to dominate other living creatures. Though Dickinson never wrote against anthropocentrism directly some of her poems are proof of her doubt about the idea that man has right to conquer nature. The following poem is an example of her attitude:
I robbed the Woods –
The trusting Woods.
The unsuspecting Trees
Brought out their Burs and mosses
My fantasy to please.
I scanned their trinkets curious -
1 grasped – I bore away –-
What will the solemn Hemlock –
What will the Oak tree say? (Poem 41)
In this poem, the poetess feels deeply guilty after “robbing” the woods of their “Burs and mosses,” and feels sorry for that she has failed to live up to the “The trusting Woods” and “The unsuspecting Woods.” Those woods had once given her esthetic perception and delight, but “I” picked their “trinkets.” To ecologists, trees exist for their own value. They live solely for the sake of their own survival and prosperity rather than for the human beings’ convenience. Therefore, in Dickinson’s eyes, woods deserve our respect, and instead of being as resources “robbed” by humans, woods should be treated as human beings’ friends.
Similar ideas can be discovered in the following poem:
A Bird came down the Walk –
He did not know I saw –
He bit an Angleworm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw,
And then he drank a Dew
From a convenient Grass –
And then hopped sidewise to the Wall
To let a Beetle pass –
He glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all around-
They looked like frightened Beads, I thought–
He stirred his Velvet Head
Like one in danger, Cautious,
I offered him a Crumb
And he unrolled his feathers
And rowed him softer home –
Than Oars divide the Ocean,
Too silver for a seam –
Or Butterflies, off Banks of Noon
Leap, plashless as they swim.
In this poem, human is just an onlooker to the existence of a bird. The bird came down the walk, bit an angleworm in halves and swallowed it raw, then drank a dew from a nearby grass, and made way for a beetle. But when “I” turned up and gave it a crumb, the bird just unrolled its feathers and flied away. It is obvious that the bird lives for its own sake, totally ignoring humans’ being friendly to it or wanting to get close to it. Without any doubt, opposite to the arrogance of man-centered view, Dickinson wants to express such an ecological idea that, humans are just a part of the nature and share the common nature with other creatures.
So instead of endeavoring to conquering nature and changing it into humans’ ideal image, humans should learn to become mature enough to think of ourselves as only a tiny part of a vast and incredible universe, and learn to respect nonhuman things.
Ecoholism, as WANG Nuo (2011: 258) points out, is the core of ecoliterature. Ecological obligations refer to humans’ responsibility to the whole nature; the return to nature means going back to the eco-world, reconfirming human’s position in nature, recovering and reconstructing the harmonious, stable, and tight bond with nature as well as its elements. The concept of ecoholism suggests that humans are not isolated from or superior to nature. Rather, human is only a part and parcel of nature. In other words, humans are actually in an equal position with other living things in front of the creator – nature.
The Bee is not afraid of me.
I know the Butterfly
The pretty people in the Woods
Receive me cordially –
The Brooks laugh louder when I come –
The Breezes madder play,
Wherefore mine eye thy silver mists,
Wherefore, Oh Summer 's Day? (Poem 111)
This poem tells that Bee is not afraid of the poetess, as she and the butterfly are friends and the butterfly treats her cordially. The brooks and breezes are also the poetess’s acquaintances. The bee, butterfly, brooks, breezes, and silver mist of summer all possess human beings’ feelings. The poetess seems to enjoy the companionship of the nonhuman beings and the harmonious relationship between those non-humans and herself.
In the following poem she thinks she should dress herself up in order to keep in harmony with nature:
The morns are meeker than they were –
The nuts are getting brown –
The berry 's cheek is plumper –
The Rose is out of town.
The Maple wears a gayer scarf –
The field a scarlet gown –
Lest I should be old fashioned
I 'll put a trinket on. (Poem 12)
Between the lines, an appreciation of new phenomena can be sensed. The morns, the nuts, the berry, the maple, and the field all take on a new look and become newly fashioned. She wants to emerge into them to be a part of the new fashioned group so that she intimates them and puts on a trinket.
From the analysis above, a conclusion can be safely drawn that humans are a part of nature rather than the core of nature, and humans and other living creatures can coexist harmoniously. And as a critical member of nature, humans are supposed to obey the principles that nature works by. Nature is not what humans perceive it but what it is supposed to be. So respect and awe should be paid to every tiny living creature.
“Reverence for life” was first spoke of by the German philosopher Albert Schweitzer in his ecological ethic ideas. He insisted that the deeper we look into nature, the more we recognize that all life is a mystery and that we are united with all life that is in nature. A man is truly ethical in Schweitzer’s eyes only when life – plants, animal, and his fellow man – is sacred to him. Poem 668 “‘Nature’ is what we see –” concludes that nature is inexpressible. Although everyone knows what nature is, words fall short before the task of explaining it. Nature is simple yet, nevertheless, it is a hidden mystery, and human wisdom is incapable of understanding it. “Our Wisdom,” capitalized for emphasis, is “impotent” when it comes to understanding nature despite its “Simplicity,” also capitalized for emphasis. Despite the simplicity of nature, it remains a mystery containing many secrets and hidden knowledge, and we should respect and reverence it.
2.3 Poetical Dwelling
Living a poetical life is as well one of the ideas and goals of ecocriticism. “Poetical Dwelling on Earth” originally appeared in the poem of the German poet Friedrich Holderlin. The original lines go like this: “Full of merits, yet poetically, man / Dwells on this earth.” Later, the expression “poetically man dwells” became well-known through the interpretation and evaluation of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), a famous German philosopher in the field of existentialism. It has three aspects of connotation: preservation, freedom, and harmony, which means that “all the natural entities on earth including human beings exist together freely, peacefully, and harmoniously” (Chen Maolin 2009: 2). In order to achieve the balanced and harmonious relationship between nature and humans, human being should dwell poetically on earth (LU Shuyuan 2000: 208).
Before this idea becoming well-known, Dickinson had already practiced her poetical dwelling in both her life and her poems. She lived in seclusion all her life, cultivating “another sky” as is shown in Poem 2: “There is another sky, / Even serene and fair, / And there is another sunshine, / Though it be darkness there;” and “Here is a little forest, / whose leaf is ever green; / Here is a brighter garden, / where not a frost has been; In its unfading flowers / I hear the bright bee hum.”
As in “The Soul selects her own society” (Poem 303), Dickinson chosen to live close to nature, in which she indulged in the taste of the “liquor never brewed” (Poem 214), the companionship of all kinds of creatures, and the wonderful sceneries that nature offers. Like Thoreau who built his own ideal world near the pond Walden, Emily Dickinson realized her poetical living by a simple way of getting close to nature and keeping in harmony with all the nonhumans. Perhaps, to dwell poetically on earth is not so difficult, and what we really need is “revery” and some imagination:
To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee,
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.
All in all, Dickinson’s nature poems imply her wisdom in ecology, and only by loving and venerating nature can human beings dwell on earth poetically and live a peaceful and harmonious life.
Conclusion
Despite the fact that Emily Dickinson in a strict sense did not really compose what eco-critics called “Ecological Writing,” nor did she called on people to protect nature and the ecosystem directly, yet this is not and should not be an impediment for us to read her nature poems in ecological perspective, for her poems are abundant in ecological wisdom.
Setting Dickinson in the framework of ecocriticism, this paper has explored her ecological thoughts embodied in her nature poems. Born in a tradition of Puritanism and influenced greatly by Transcendentalism, Dickinson shaped her own worldview and composed numerous poems full of wisdom and spiritual inspiration for the whole world. Dickinson is a lover of nature, which can be proved by her poems about the beauty, wonders, and diversity of nature and her concern for nature. Meanwhile, she expresses her opinions on the relationship between nature and man, and in her eyes, all creatures are equal on earth and man is a part and parcel of nature. Nature is simple, but its simplicity cannot be explained by human wisdom, so reverence and respect should be paid to nature and all the creatures in it. Dickinson’s poetical dwelling on earth inspires us that it is possible to build one’s ideal place in the mind by getting close to nature.
Under the circumstance of the deterioration of ecosystem, the attempt to analyze the ecological ideas in Dickinson’s nature poem is highly significant and meaningful. Dickinson’s ecological wisdom reminds us of respecting, protecting and caring for nature and provides a blueprint for human beings to develop a low carbon economy of sustainable development, and live a poetic life by reconsidering the relationship between nature and human beings. It is sincerely hoped that the ecological reading of Emily Dickinson’s nature poems can draw our attention to the world which is faced with many environmental issues and inspire us to strive for a harmonious coexistence of man and nature.
Notes:
[1] The poems cited in this paper are all from The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson.
[2] For further information about Robins, see Poem 23, 153,182,250,285,348,450,690,864,919.
References
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[5] Howe, S. The Birth-Mark: Using the Wildness in American Literary History [M]. Hanover: Wesleyan University Press, 1993.
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[11] Tong Ming. A History of American Literature [M]. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, 2008.
[12] CHANG Yaoxin （常耀信）. 美国文学简史 [M]. 天津：南开大学出版社，1997.
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[14] FU Liu（傅柳）. 神秘瑰丽的大自然的歌手——艾米莉·狄金森自然诗作初探 [J]. 南京师大学报（社会科学版），2000，(4), 107-110.
[15] HE Yuxi（何昱熹）. 艾米莉·狄金森自然诗中蕴含的矛盾及成因 [J]. 世界文学评论，2009，(2)，183-186.
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[19] LU Shuyuan （鲁枢元）. 生态文艺学 [M]. 西安：陕西人民教育出版社，2000.
[20] WANG Nuo（王诺）. 欧美生态文学 [M]. 北京：北京大学出版社，2011.
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References: [1] Bloom, H. Modern Critical Views: Emily Dickinson [M]. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1985. [2] Buell, L. The Future of Environmental Criticism: environmental crisis and literary imagination [M]. Malden: MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2005. [3] Earle R. Epistolary Selves: Letters and Letter-writers [M]. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing Ltd, 1999. [4] Emerson, R. W. The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson [M] New York: AMS Press, 1979. [5] Howe, S. The Birth-Mark: Using the Wildness in American Literary History [M]. Hanover: Wesleyan University Press, 1993. [6] Johnson, T. H. Emily Dickinson: An Interpretative Biography [M]. New York: Atheneum New York, 1976. [7] Johnson, T. H. The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson [M]. Little, Brown and Company, 1961. [8] Love, G. A. Practical Ecocriticism: Literature, Biology, and the Environment [M]. Charlottesville, VA: University if Virginia Press, 2003. [9] Martin, W [10] Murphy, P. D. Literature, Nature, And Other –Ecofeminist Critiques [M].Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995. [11] Tong Ming
I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to Mr. Qi Liang, my supervisor, not only for his illuminating instructions and invaluable suggestions to the completion of this paper, but more importantly, for his rigorous scholarship and professional conscientiousness.
I am also indebted to all my teachers in USTS, whose wonderful lectures on different subjects pave me the way for the fundamental and essential academic competence. I owe my sincere gratitude to my classmates and friends who offered inspiring advices and generous help for this paper.
My appreciation should also go to my beloved parents who gave me unselfish and persistent support during my four years’ university life.
摘 要
国内外关于艾米莉·狄金森的研究不计其数，但从生态批评角度出发的研究还为数不多。生态批评旨在探讨文学与自然环境之间的关系，发现文学作品中的生态意蕴，以唤醒当代人的生态意识。美国女诗人狄金森一生创作了1775首诗歌，其中约500首与自然有关。从生态角度对其自然诗展开细读，不难发现其中蕴含着诗人对自然的热爱和关心，尊重和敬畏，以及诗人诗意地栖居的理念。在日益恶化的环境面前，狄金森自然诗中蕴含的生态思想为保护环境以及建立和谐的人与自然关系提供了线索。
关键词：艾米莉·狄金森；自然诗；生态批评；生态思想
Abstract
Among the numerous studies of Emily Dickinson in China and abroad, there has been few from the perspective of ecocriticism. Ecocriticism aims at exploring the link between literature and natural environment to find out the ecological wisdom in literary works so as to awaken the ecological consciousness of contemporaries. American poetess Emily Dickinson composed 1775 poem during her lifetime, of which nature poems accounting for about 500. By reading her nature poems from ecological approach, it is not difficult to discern her concern and love for nature, her respect and reverence for nature, and her idea of poetical dwelling on earth. In view of the current deteriorating environmental conditions, the ecological thoughts implied in Dickinson’s nature poems are a hint for protecting environment and maintaining a harmonious relationship between human beings and nature.
Keywords: Emily Dickinson; nature poems; ecocriticism; ecological thoughts
Contents
An Ecological Reading of Emily Dickinson’s Nature Poems
Introduction
A word is dead
When it is said,
Some say.
I say it just
Begins to live
That day. (Poem 1212) [1]
This poem seems to be Emily Dickinson’s prophecy of all her poems. Her poems, upon “being said”, are not “dead”. On the contrary, her poems are still being read today and will continue to be appreciated.
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) is commonly recognized as one of the greatest poets in American literature. She emerged as a powerful and persistent figure in American culture. As a woman poet, Dickinson has been depicted as singular and enigmatic and even eccentric. Often, Dickinson is pictured as a young woman in white, restrained in the upper room of her home, isolated not only from her neighbors and friends, but also from the historical and cultural events taking place outside her door. Maybe it is because of her long time solitude that she reflected upon poetry and found poetry the most effective expression of her thoughts. Her poems talk most perceptibly of “the Heaven of God,” “the starkest Madness,” or the “Infinite” rather than of worldly events. She has been viewed as agoraphobic, deeply afraid of her surroundings, and as a peculiar spinster. Meanwhile, Dickinson is widely acknowledged as one of the founders of American poetry and innovative pre-modernist poet as well as a rebellious and courageous woman (Martin 2004:1).
One of the most often quoted facts of Emily Dickinson’s life is that scarcely any of her poems were published in her lifetime but won appreciation and recognition after her death. Although she wrote to the writer and editor, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, to ask his opinion of her poetry, she did not openly seek publication, and most of the poems published during her lifetime were submitted by Dickinson’s friends, not by the poet herself. In 1858, she began to record poems in folded pages hand-bound with string, often called fascicles. In this way, she collected and organized, and some say self-published, her poems. Although Dickinson asked her sister Lavinia, to destroy the poems upon her death, Lavinia sought instead to organize, or reorganize them for publication. The result of Lavinia’s effort was a volume of 115 poems which appeared in 1890. Later came out two more volumes of poetry and two volumes of letters. The year 1914 witnessed more Dickinson’s poems coming to light, which secured her place in the history of American Literature.
Dickinson’s poetry is a clear display of her thoughts. The theme of her poems covers nature, love, death and immortality. Her poems are also characterized visually by dashes of varying lengths, unusual capitalization, the placement of poems on the page, and her insertion of variant word choices. The theme, form of her poems and even her life itself draw attention of researchers from home and abroad. Since her poems were first published posthumously in 1890, critical responses to Emily Dickinson’s work have been both plentiful and unremitting, steadily gathering force with every new version of her collected poem and each poem newly discovered in her letters and manuscripts. Chronologically, Dickinson research can be roughly divided into three phases (LIU Xiaohui 2007: 28).
The first phase began with Todd and Higginson’s co-effort to publish Dickinson’s first series of poems in 1890. With eight different versions of her poems published between 1890 and 1945, more interest was shown in her life story rather than her poems. Thus Emily Dickinson’s collection of her letters was published to satisfy reader’s interest in Dickinson’s life experience, which was a substitute of her biography served as “a window into the soul”(Earle 1999: 5) of Dickinson. However this was still not enough to satisfy the curiosity of readers, therefore many biographies based on groundless facts were published, in which Dickinson was painted as a heart-broken woman who chose to escape from sentimental love. What worth mentioning here is that there were some critics who did recognize her. A good example is George Frisbie Wicher’s This Was a Poet, which for the first time focused on the cultural significance of Dickinson’s poems. Due to the attention of more and more critics and scholars to Emily Dickinson’s poems and letters, her classic position in American literature was gradually established.
The second phase started in 1950 when all her copyright was bought by Harvard University. With the publication of the complete works of the poet, including three volumes of poems and three volumes of letters, the former versions were becoming obsolete, thus Emily Dickinson was “rediscovered” (CHANG Yaoxin1997:135). The research on Dickinson’s biography thrived between 1950s and 1970s. This period also saw the flourishing of Freudian theory and feminist trend, in which the interpretation of Emily Dickinson’s sex consciousness and feminine awareness became the focus of critics.
The climax of Dickinson scholarship came, when the Emily Dickinson International Society was founded in 1988. It marked the beginning of the third phase dominated by new criticism, in which Dickinson’s reputation continued to grow and no one would doubt her greatness. Harold Bloom spoke highly of Dickinson in saying, “Except for Shakespeare, Dickinson manifests more cognitive originality than any other Western poets since Dante” (Bloom 1985: 207). With the influence of theories as Reader-Response criticism and Deconstruction, many well-known critics turned to examine Dickinson’s manuscripts. Howe held (1993: 206) that “her calligraphy influences her meaning,” and that much can be done on the research of Dickinson’s manuscript.
In the last decade of 20th century, as the environmental crisis became worse and worse, more and more scholars attempted to investigate the relationship between human beings and nature. They turned to “green” perspective like nature writing and eco-critical analysis, and without any doubt, Dickinson’s nature poems became the subject of some critics.
It could be seen from the above analysis that with the flourishing of various critical theories, the research on Dickinson and her poems has stretched into more and more branches. It could be said that every reader has his/her own Dickinson.
In china, the research on Dickinson was a little bit later than that abroad. The translation of her poems, introduction of Emily Dickinson’s life and interpretation of her pomes came into being from the 80s of last century.
From the mid-1980s, several Chinese versions of Emily Dickinson’s poems appeared，thanks to the endeavor of scholars like Jiang Feng, Zhang Yun, Guan Tianxi, and Wu Juntao. Li Hengchun contributed to the translation of Dickinson’s biography. All their efforts are useful to let more and more Chinese readers be familiar with Dickinson, and lay solid foundation for the research on Dickinson and her poems. The achievement of the research is mainly literature criticisms on Dickinson written by teachers from institutions of higher learning published in periodicals or journals. These literature criticisms mainly focus on— the riddles of Dickinson including her reclusiveness, singleness, personal emotions and religious views; the theme of her poems consisting of love, nature, death and immortality; as well as the art of her poems made up of imagery, irregular grammar and meter (LIU Baoan 2004: 154-156).
Compared with the multi-perspective research on Dickinson in the United States and other countries, studies on Dickinson in China are quite inadequate. There are still plenty of room in the study of Dickinson’s letters and biography, and the present research scope still needs to be expanded.
It is known to all that nature poems are an important part and parcel of all Dickinson’s poems, accounting for nearly one third of her total 1775 poems. The ideas embodied in her nature poems are rather abundant and bear possibilities of different interpretation due to the ever developing literary theories and the large number of her nature poems.
Nowadays, ecocriticism has been brought into focus due to the gradually accelerating deterioration of natural environment and increasingly strong desire for a low carbon life. It is one of the most recent interdisciplinary fields that has emerged in literary and cultural studies. Ecocriticism started in the 1970s, developed in the 1990s and is still enjoying its blooming development. Emphasizing the link between the literary texts and the natural environment, ecocriticism is developed against the background of the severe environmental crisis and the promotion of global environment movement.
Ecocriticism is a kind of literary criticism, exploring the relationship between literature and nature under the guidance of ecologism, especially ecological holism. It aims to reveal the ecological ideas reflected in literary works, dig the cultural roots of such ecological ideas, and also investigate the ecological esthetic and artistic expression of literature (WANG Nuo 2011:47). ZHAO Yifan (2006: 487) points out that ecocriticism tries to study the relationship between human and nature by reading works about nature and environment, at the same time advocates appreciating literary works from the ecological perspective, thus building human’s strong ecological awareness and suffering consciousness. Ecocriticism offers a way of studying literature from environmental perspective. As Coupe argues, the aims of ecocriticism lie in responsibilities to protect our ecological environment: Ecocriticism was initially understood to be synchronous with the aims of earthcare. Its goal was to contribute to “the struggle to preserve the ‘biotic community’ ” (qtd in Buell 2005: 24).
It is gratified to see that in time of environment crisis, researchers are tracing back to writers and poets of earlier times for ecological ideas. Although Emily Dickinson is a poetess living in the 19th century, who did not witness the destruction and damage of nature by human’ over developing and over exploitation of earth and nature, she created numerous poems which contained ample ecological concern and ideas. In her more than 500 poems on nature, her deep love for and careful observation of nature are given a full display. Her brief and enigmatic description of flowers, birds, insects, and her detailed description of the sunrise, the sunset and the changes of four seasons all bear witness to her keen observation and sharp wisdom.
Through going over Dickinson’s nature poems and her biographies along with the support of the theory of ecocriticism, this paper attempts to analyze her nature poems eco-critically and to reveal the ecological ideas reflected in her nature poems. Since we are confronted with the deterioration of natural environment, it is hoped that the ecological reading of Emily Dickinson’s nature poems might help to draw our attention to environmental issues and to the protection of nature, arouse our ecological awareness, and cultivate our sense of environmental responsibility to construct a green, harmonious and enduring man-nature relation.
1. Origin of Dickinson’s Ecological Thoughts
Dickinson’s view towards nature is complicated and even contradictive: on the one hand, she is in favor of nature and treats nature as one of her friends, composing beautiful poems on nature with her bold imagination; on the other hand, she spears no effort to exaggerate the mysterious and devastating power of nature (HE Yuxi 2009: 183; FU Liu 2000:107). Such contradiction is commonplace in her poems. The two types of religions present in her life, Puritanism and Transcendentalism, have great influence over her poetry. Puritanism allows Dickinson to remain grounded in her faith of God, while Transcendentalism permits her to recluse herself from limiting conceptions of humanity which enables her to view herself as an individual with an identity. As Thomas Johnson (1976: 81) puts it “the two intellectual forces that shaped her thinking were the puritans into which she was born, and romantic and transcendental doctrines that were in the New England of her youth.” Puritanism and Transcendentalism are two cornerstones of Dickinson’s mind, so it is necessary to examine her relation to religion in order to understand the complexities of her thoughts.
1.1 Influence of Puritanism
One of the major religious influences of Emily Dickinson’s life is Puritanism. While Puritanism emphasizes human goodness because of a belief that something of God exists in everyone, it also recognizes the presence of evil in all humans. American Puritanism, a dominant factor in American life, was one of the most enduring influences in American thought and literature.
Dickinson was born in a traditional Calvinist family. Perhaps from the beginning, a steak of Puritanism had been potential and deep inside her. Her parents wanted her to be admitted into Calvinism by means of baptism, so they had her baptized when she was a baby. Her father, considered an old Puritan, influenced her in every small way. The school she went to at ten was strongly Congregational. Though she refused to observe its religious custom, Dickinson stayed there for six years. Two years in the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary, a school famous for its Puritan tradition, left some unhappy memory to Dickinson. Because she refused to fast before Christmas as she was asked to, she was sent back home (LIU Shoulan 2006: 11).
Although all Dickinson’s family members were transformed to Calvinism, she remained unchristian all her life. She did not follow her family’s religious step, which does not mean she was not affected by it. She was frequently taken by her parents to join “the daily morning devotions, church attendance twice on Sunday with all members of the family present, frequently reading of the Bible” (Johnson 1976: 81). Some of her poems did show a touch of nobility to the direct influence of the Bible, as she wrote a lot about God, the Garden of Eden and religious ritual in her poems.
Puritans dreamed of living under a perfect order and worked with unbeatable courage and confident hope toward building a new Garden of Eden in America. And Garden of Eden, as Puritans see it, is the place where man could live the way he should. As to nature, Puritans believed that nature indicated the omnipresent existence of God. They attempted to prove that they were God’s chosen people blessed by God on this earth as in Heaven, so they made every effort to make the world an ideal place to live in.
Dickinson composed many poems about the real Garden of Eden. Whatever in her eyes – mountains, charming seasons, trees, flowers, birds and insects, can be the objects of her writing. She enjoyed just being alive in the wonderful world and paid respect to everything alive in the natural world. She seems to maintain that not only humans but also those non-human life forms are chosen and blessed by God. Thus, all that present in this natural world deserves respect and each has its right to live in the Garden. It is obvious that the optimism of Puritanism has exerted a great influence on her view of nature. In her poems, Garden of Eden exists in the real world.
She was, however, fully aware of the differences between man’s real life and ideal life. She loved God but she could not understand him. She dreamed of living in Garden of Eden but she raised weird questions about the scene in Eden like in poem 215: What is - "Paradise" –/Who live there –/Are they "Farmers" –/Do they "hoe" –/Do they know that this is "Amherst" –/And that I – am coming – too –.
Her complicated attitude towards God and religion lies in that she wanted to be free from their influence but at the same time she discovered that the magic power of religion was irresistible. She doubted the real existence of God and its omnipotence, yet she would turn to God for help and comfort when she was faced with difficulties and confusions. It is worth mentioning here that her skeptical spirit is not a betrayal, but an inheritance of puritan tradition, that is a spirit of taking a serious attitude toward life and persistently seeking truth. Though she was born in the atmosphere of Puritanism, received education in schools of the puritan tradition, and was surrounded by disciples of God, Dickinson could not be regarded simply as a Puritan poetess. But doubtlessly Puritanism can be considered as the origin of her ecological thoughts.
1.2 Influence of Transcendentalism
Transcendentalism prevailed in the 19th century of New England, with Emerson as its spokesman. His book entitled Nature appeared in 1836, which made a tremendous impact on the intellectual life of America. “Philosophically considered,” the book says, “the Universe is composed of Nature and Soul” (Emerson 1979: 4). Emerson pronounced the fundamental premise about nature in Transcendentalism, that is, Nature is not simply the Not-Me but also the universal mind whose signs or symbols can be read by individual with his eyes, heart and mind.
Transcendentalism, as a way of knowing, believes that individual can intuitively receive higher truth otherwise unavailable through common methods of knowing, thus transcending the limits of rationalism (TONG Ming 2008: 90). More specifically, the visible world, if intuited with imagination, offers endless clues about the invisible world whose truths stand eternally behind the factual world perceived by the senses. Transcendentalism inspired a whole generation of famous American authors like Thoreau, Whitman and Dickinson.
Transcendentalists lay emphasis on the spirit, or the Oversoul, and regard it as the most important thing in the universe. It exists in nature and man alike. Nature, in the eye of Transcendentalists, is symbolic of the Spirit or God, filled with God’s overwhelming presence. Nature could exercise a healthy and curative influence on human mind. By going back to nature and sinking oneself into its influence, one can be spiritually whole.
Influenced by Transcendentalism, Dickinson observed nature carefully and employed intuition to understand what nature is. She used her own way to perceive the outside world, comparing nature as Heaven, eulogizing its harmony, and appreciating the pleasure brought by nature. She believes that human and nonhuman are an interdependent wholeness, a unity in which all species are equal and should coexist harmoniously.
Nature may be simple, yet we “have no art to say” (Poem 668) what it is. This viewpoint makes Dickinson different from other Transcendentalists, for she goes further, doubting man’s capability of understanding the real connotation of nature. It is obvious that Dickinson did not accept ideas of Transcendentalism mechanically. Pleasure is not always the mood of her nature poems. There are times when she felt desperation and unhappiness like in Poem 1624 in which the happy flower is beheaded by frost. In her poems, nature is sometimes pleasant but at times cruel, and both kinds of feeling are expressed by Dickinson’s intuition over nature. All these are the result of Dickinson’s practice of Transcendentalism and her bold courage to go over the doctrines of transcendentalism.
To sum up, Dickinson’s view of nature is influenced by both Puritanism and Transcendentalism. The conflicts between the two beliefs enable Dickinson to find her own worldview and distinguish herself in poetry. She is an ecological thinker in a modern sense and her ecological thoughts can be further demonstrated after an attentive reading of her poems.
2. Ecological Thoughts Reflected in Dickinson’s Nature Poems
"Nature" is what we see –
The Hill– the Afternoon–
Squirre1–Eclipse – the Bumble bee–
Nay – Nature is Heaven –
Nature is what we hear–
The Bobolink –the Sea–
Thunder – the Cricket–-
Nay–Nature is Harmony–
Nature is what we know–
Yet have no art to say–
So impotent Our Wisdom is
To her Simplicity. (Poem 668)
This poem explains what nature is in the eye of Dickinson. Nature is what we see such as the hill, the afternoon, the Squirrel, the Eclipse, and the Bumble bee. Nature is what we hear such as the Bobolink, the Sea, Thunder and the Cricket. Dickinson’s choice of the objects in this poem is not random or arbitrary. As a healthy, balanced ecosystem, including human and nonhuman inhabitants, must maintain diversity, those objects are carefully chosen to reflect nature’s multiple dimension. And the focus on the diversity of nature renders Dickinson’s poem one about ecology because “Ecology as a discipline means, fundamentally, the study of the environment in its interanimating relationships, its change and conservation, with humanity regarded as a part of the planetary ecosystem” (Murphy 1995: 4).
Nature is one of Dickinson’s favorite subjects, on which she wrote about 500 poems. By using nature poems, this paper refers to poems about natural world, to be exact, poems describing the natural sceneries and living things in nature. Dickinson’s insightful sensibility, perceptive observation and unique language skills make her nature poems interesting and worth reading. Under the guidance of ecocriticism, this part of the paper attempts to make a tentative investigation of the ecological connotations embodied in Dickinson’s nature poems.
2.1 Affection and Admiration for Nature
For most of her life, Dickinson spent much of her time secluded within her family’s home, writing poetry and helping to run the household. Everything in nature such as changing seasons, sunrise and sunset, flowers, birds and insects became her intimate friends and her listeners. Nature, as in her own words, is “the gentlest mother” who is “impatient of no child.”
Nature – the Gentlest Mother is,
Impatient of no Child–
The feeblest – or the waywardest-
Her Admonition mild–
In Forest – and the Hill–
By Traveller – be heard–
Restraining Rampant Squirrel–
Or too impetuous Bird–
How fair Her Conversation–
A Summer Afternoon–
Her Household – Her Assembly –
And when the Sun go down–
Her Voice among the Aisles
Incite the timid prayer
Of the minutest Cricket–
The most unworthy Flower–
When all the Children sleep-
She turns as long away
As will suffice to light Her lamps –
Then bending from the Sky–
With infinite Affection –
And infiniter Care –
Her Golden finger on Her lip –
Wills Silence – Everywhere– (Poem 790)
In this poem, nature is personified as the gentlest mother who gives infinite affection, and care to her creations, personified as children. She is infinitely patient with her children, cautioning even the “feeblest” and the “waywardest” in a “mild” way. As human travelers pass through forests or ride by hillsides, they may hear this gentle Mother “Restraining Rampant Squirrel,” or quieting a “too impetuous Bird.” The poetess defines natural behavior of the animals in terms of the disciplining methods employed by the “Gentlest Mother,” and intuits from the animals’ behavior the tenderness with which this natural Mother guides and guards her children. Then the poetess reports that the Mother’s “Conversation” is utterly “fair.” Relating to the beautiful, peaceful occasion of “a Summer Afternoon,” Dickinson proclaims the measured ways in which the Mother keeps “Her Household,” as she brings together all aspects of her being, or “Her Assembly.” The poem then situates the gentle Mother “among the Aisles” where the Mother brings forth “the timid prayer” from the “the minutest Cricket” and “The most unworthy Flower.” Moving to the end of the day, “when all the Children sleep,” the Mother quietly withdraws to “light Her lamps,” which would of course be the moon and stars. And “with infinite Affection / And Infiniter Care,” the mother raises her “Golden finger” to her lips and makes the sign that calls for “silence” as the night enfolds her children “Everywhere” allowing them to sleep peacefully in the stillness she confers on them.
By regarding nature as a gentle mother, we might say Dickinson considered herself one of nature’s children. She had a strong affection and admiration for what her mother offered: the four seasons, the sun, the sea, the lightening, the wind, and even the dew, and she expressed love for all her siblings, that is, inhabitants in nature.
Love for nature exists in the basis and center of ecoliterature, as many nature writers write about and sang for the beauty and wonders of nature. Everything in nature seems to be inspiration for Dickinson and her observation and description of them are often unique.
The changing four seasons takes up quite a proportion in Dickinson’s poems, inspiring men’s affection and imagination with the changing sceneries of seasons. She is so excited on hearing the notice of spring’s coming that she takes “a Rosy Chair” (Poem 1310). Spring helps her out of gloom and brings her a colorful world, so she could not wait to embrace it as she wrote “I cannot meet the Spring unmoved –” (Poem 1051). Dickinson sensitively catches the beam of “Light Exists in Spring / Not present on the Year” (Poem 812). So she sincerely compliments the spring filled with fresh mud: “We like March. / His Shoes are Purple –/ He is new and high – / Makes he Mud for Dog and Peddler – / Makes he Forests dry” (Poem 1213). As to summer, Dickinson does not directly depict its glory, however, the passing of it makes her depressed which can be felt in Poem 1540: “As imperceptibly as Grief / The Summer lapsed away –.” Autumn presents in mature images, and Dickinson cheerfully and delightedly sings for its harvest as shown in Poem 1407 — “A Field of Stubble, lying sere / beneath the second Sun – / Its Toils to Brindled People thrust – / Its Triumphs – to the Bin– .” Also there are poems picturing winter, like in Poem 1252: “Like Brooms of Steel / The Snow and Wind / Had swept the Winter Street –,” in which a picture of winter is displayed vividly. Sometimes winter gives us a feeling of depression as is revealed in Poem 258 “There’s a certain Slant of light, / Winter Afternoons – / That oppresses, like the Heft / Of Cathedral Tunes –” These are the paintings of four seasons in Dickinson’s poems. Bright spring, noisy summer, joyful autumn and gloomy winter are vivid in her perceptive observation due to her pure and sincere love for nature.
Apart from the wonderful seasons, sunrise and sunset also catches Dickinson’s attention. In Poem 318, Dickinson tells us “how the Sun rose” with the tone of delight. As her room faced the west, Dickinson observed more sunsets in her seclusion. Sometimes sunrise is compared to “Housewife’’ (Poem 219), while sometimes it is seen as a pirate who does the “plunder” and “buried” gold. There are times when she experiences the delicate change occurring in the sunrise like in Poem 291. Only with a heart filled with love and care for nature can Dickinson delicately seize the different ecstatic moments of nature.
Dickinson also loves the creatures of nature, and she often portrays with vividness and delicateness the creatures that are called “The pretty people in the Woods” (Poem 111) like bees, butterflies, and birds especially robins [2]. Even the unwelcome creatures that are disliked by common people dwell in Dickinson’s poems. In Poem 111, she addresses the snake “A narrow Fellow in the Grass;” in Poem 1575, she thinks the bat’s “eccentricities” are beneficent; in Poem 1138, she describes in detail how a spider makes its net and deems “Spider as an Artist” with “surprising Merit” (Poem 1275). Besides animals, flowers and plants can be detected in Dickinson’s poem as she also takes fancy for them. She sings for strawberries quality of being “punctual” and “bold” (Poem 1332); she sings for the elegance and nobility (Poem 675) of the “Little Rose” (Poem 35), expressing her affection for nature through the beauty of “A sepal, petal, and a thorn” of a rose; she also sings for the “Clover’s simple Fame” (Poem 1232).
It could be concluded that what presents in her nature poems demonstrates the diversity of nature. As a leading conservationist, Bert Holldobler holds, biodiversity is the necessary ingredient of the continuance of the world as we know it (qtd in Love 2003: 57). It is the wonder of nature that creatures of different shapes, sizes, habits, and characteristics are living together, and Dickinson pays equal and due attention to each of them as she loves and admires nature deeply and wholeheartedly. “If I can stop one Heart from breaking / I shall not live in vain / If I can ease one Life the Aching / Or cool one Pain/ Or help one fainting Robin / Unto his Nest again / I shall not live in vain” (Poem 919). To Dickinson her fulfillment in life is closely connected with the well-being of other creatures. Nature plays an important role in her life for the inspiration it gives, and the affection and admiration for nature makes her concerned about the well-being of the inhabitants of nature.
2.2 Respect and Reverence for Nature
The issue of relationship between humans and nature is one of the fundamental ones discussed by ecocritics. As far as the residents are concerned, nature is nothing but a resource offering living or development circumstances. They attempt to achieve the huge development at all costs, giving their priority to their own benefits rather than the due privileges of nonhuman things. This idea is in accord with the definition of Anthropocentrism: the assumption or view that the interests of humans are of higher priority than those nonhumans (Buell 2005: 134).
The idea that nature is created for the sake of humans has been deeply rooted in the western countries since the ancient times. Aristotle’s teleology and Christian theology all maintain that nature is made for humans and humans are given the right to dominate other living creatures. Though Dickinson never wrote against anthropocentrism directly some of her poems are proof of her doubt about the idea that man has right to conquer nature. The following poem is an example of her attitude:
I robbed the Woods –
The trusting Woods.
The unsuspecting Trees
Brought out their Burs and mosses
My fantasy to please.
I scanned their trinkets curious -
1 grasped – I bore away –-
What will the solemn Hemlock –
What will the Oak tree say? (Poem 41)
In this poem, the poetess feels deeply guilty after “robbing” the woods of their “Burs and mosses,” and feels sorry for that she has failed to live up to the “The trusting Woods” and “The unsuspecting Woods.” Those woods had once given her esthetic perception and delight, but “I” picked their “trinkets.” To ecologists, trees exist for their own value. They live solely for the sake of their own survival and prosperity rather than for the human beings’ convenience. Therefore, in Dickinson’s eyes, woods deserve our respect, and instead of being as resources “robbed” by humans, woods should be treated as human beings’ friends.
Similar ideas can be discovered in the following poem:
A Bird came down the Walk –
He did not know I saw –
He bit an Angleworm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw,
And then he drank a Dew
From a convenient Grass –
And then hopped sidewise to the Wall
To let a Beetle pass –
He glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all around-
They looked like frightened Beads, I thought–
He stirred his Velvet Head
Like one in danger, Cautious,
I offered him a Crumb
And he unrolled his feathers
And rowed him softer home –
Than Oars divide the Ocean,
Too silver for a seam –
Or Butterflies, off Banks of Noon
Leap, plashless as they swim.
In this poem, human is just an onlooker to the existence of a bird. The bird came down the walk, bit an angleworm in halves and swallowed it raw, then drank a dew from a nearby grass, and made way for a beetle. But when “I” turned up and gave it a crumb, the bird just unrolled its feathers and flied away. It is obvious that the bird lives for its own sake, totally ignoring humans’ being friendly to it or wanting to get close to it. Without any doubt, opposite to the arrogance of man-centered view, Dickinson wants to express such an ecological idea that, humans are just a part of the nature and share the common nature with other creatures.
So instead of endeavoring to conquering nature and changing it into humans’ ideal image, humans should learn to become mature enough to think of ourselves as only a tiny part of a vast and incredible universe, and learn to respect nonhuman things.
Ecoholism, as WANG Nuo (2011: 258) points out, is the core of ecoliterature. Ecological obligations refer to humans’ responsibility to the whole nature; the return to nature means going back to the eco-world, reconfirming human’s position in nature, recovering and reconstructing the harmonious, stable, and tight bond with nature as well as its elements. The concept of ecoholism suggests that humans are not isolated from or superior to nature. Rather, human is only a part and parcel of nature. In other words, humans are actually in an equal position with other living things in front of the creator – nature.
The Bee is not afraid of me.
I know the Butterfly
The pretty people in the Woods
Receive me cordially –
The Brooks laugh louder when I come –
The Breezes madder play,
Wherefore mine eye thy silver mists,
Wherefore, Oh Summer 's Day? (Poem 111)
This poem tells that Bee is not afraid of the poetess, as she and the butterfly are friends and the butterfly treats her cordially. The brooks and breezes are also the poetess’s acquaintances. The bee, butterfly, brooks, breezes, and silver mist of summer all possess human beings’ feelings. The poetess seems to enjoy the companionship of the nonhuman beings and the harmonious relationship between those non-humans and herself.
In the following poem she thinks she should dress herself up in order to keep in harmony with nature:
The morns are meeker than they were –
The nuts are getting brown –
The berry 's cheek is plumper –
The Rose is out of town.
The Maple wears a gayer scarf –
The field a scarlet gown –
Lest I should be old fashioned
I 'll put a trinket on. (Poem 12)
Between the lines, an appreciation of new phenomena can be sensed. The morns, the nuts, the berry, the maple, and the field all take on a new look and become newly fashioned. She wants to emerge into them to be a part of the new fashioned group so that she intimates them and puts on a trinket.
From the analysis above, a conclusion can be safely drawn that humans are a part of nature rather than the core of nature, and humans and other living creatures can coexist harmoniously. And as a critical member of nature, humans are supposed to obey the principles that nature works by. Nature is not what humans perceive it but what it is supposed to be. So respect and awe should be paid to every tiny living creature.
“Reverence for life” was first spoke of by the German philosopher Albert Schweitzer in his ecological ethic ideas. He insisted that the deeper we look into nature, the more we recognize that all life is a mystery and that we are united with all life that is in nature. A man is truly ethical in Schweitzer’s eyes only when life – plants, animal, and his fellow man – is sacred to him. Poem 668 “‘Nature’ is what we see –” concludes that nature is inexpressible. Although everyone knows what nature is, words fall short before the task of explaining it. Nature is simple yet, nevertheless, it is a hidden mystery, and human wisdom is incapable of understanding it. “Our Wisdom,” capitalized for emphasis, is “impotent” when it comes to understanding nature despite its “Simplicity,” also capitalized for emphasis. Despite the simplicity of nature, it remains a mystery containing many secrets and hidden knowledge, and we should respect and reverence it.
2.3 Poetical Dwelling
Living a poetical life is as well one of the ideas and goals of ecocriticism. “Poetical Dwelling on Earth” originally appeared in the poem of the German poet Friedrich Holderlin. The original lines go like this: “Full of merits, yet poetically, man / Dwells on this earth.” Later, the expression “poetically man dwells” became well-known through the interpretation and evaluation of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), a famous German philosopher in the field of existentialism. It has three aspects of connotation: preservation, freedom, and harmony, which means that “all the natural entities on earth including human beings exist together freely, peacefully, and harmoniously” (Chen Maolin 2009: 2). In order to achieve the balanced and harmonious relationship between nature and humans, human being should dwell poetically on earth (LU Shuyuan 2000: 208).
Before this idea becoming well-known, Dickinson had already practiced her poetical dwelling in both her life and her poems. She lived in seclusion all her life, cultivating “another sky” as is shown in Poem 2: “There is another sky, / Even serene and fair, / And there is another sunshine, / Though it be darkness there;” and “Here is a little forest, / whose leaf is ever green; / Here is a brighter garden, / where not a frost has been; In its unfading flowers / I hear the bright bee hum.”
As in “The Soul selects her own society” (Poem 303), Dickinson chosen to live close to nature, in which she indulged in the taste of the “liquor never brewed” (Poem 214), the companionship of all kinds of creatures, and the wonderful sceneries that nature offers. Like Thoreau who built his own ideal world near the pond Walden, Emily Dickinson realized her poetical living by a simple way of getting close to nature and keeping in harmony with all the nonhumans. Perhaps, to dwell poetically on earth is not so difficult, and what we really need is “revery” and some imagination:
To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee,
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.
All in all, Dickinson’s nature poems imply her wisdom in ecology, and only by loving and venerating nature can human beings dwell on earth poetically and live a peaceful and harmonious life.
Conclusion
Despite the fact that Emily Dickinson in a strict sense did not really compose what eco-critics called “Ecological Writing,” nor did she called on people to protect nature and the ecosystem directly, yet this is not and should not be an impediment for us to read her nature poems in ecological perspective, for her poems are abundant in ecological wisdom.
Setting Dickinson in the framework of ecocriticism, this paper has explored her ecological thoughts embodied in her nature poems. Born in a tradition of Puritanism and influenced greatly by Transcendentalism, Dickinson shaped her own worldview and composed numerous poems full of wisdom and spiritual inspiration for the whole world. Dickinson is a lover of nature, which can be proved by her poems about the beauty, wonders, and diversity of nature and her concern for nature. Meanwhile, she expresses her opinions on the relationship between nature and man, and in her eyes, all creatures are equal on earth and man is a part and parcel of nature. Nature is simple, but its simplicity cannot be explained by human wisdom, so reverence and respect should be paid to nature and all the creatures in it. Dickinson’s poetical dwelling on earth inspires us that it is possible to build one’s ideal place in the mind by getting close to nature.
Under the circumstance of the deterioration of ecosystem, the attempt to analyze the ecological ideas in Dickinson’s nature poem is highly significant and meaningful. Dickinson’s ecological wisdom reminds us of respecting, protecting and caring for nature and provides a blueprint for human beings to develop a low carbon economy of sustainable development, and live a poetic life by reconsidering the relationship between nature and human beings. It is sincerely hoped that the ecological reading of Emily Dickinson’s nature poems can draw our attention to the world which is faced with many environmental issues and inspire us to strive for a harmonious coexistence of man and nature.
Notes:
[1] The poems cited in this paper are all from The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson.
[2] For further information about Robins, see Poem 23, 153,182,250,285,348,450,690,864,919.
References
[1] Bloom, H. Modern Critical Views: Emily Dickinson [M]. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1985.
[2] Buell, L. The Future of Environmental Criticism: environmental crisis and literary imagination [M]. Malden: MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2005.
[3] Earle R. Epistolary Selves: Letters and Letter-writers [M]. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing Ltd, 1999.
[4] Emerson, R. W. The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson [M] New York: AMS Press, 1979.
[5] Howe, S. The Birth-Mark: Using the Wildness in American Literary History [M]. Hanover: Wesleyan University Press, 1993.
[6] Johnson, T. H. Emily Dickinson: An Interpretative Biography [M]. New York: Atheneum New York, 1976.
[7] Johnson, T. H. The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson [M]. Little, Brown and Company, 1961.
[8] Love, G. A. Practical Ecocriticism: Literature, Biology, and the Environment [M]. Charlottesville, VA: University if Virginia Press, 2003.
[9] Martin, W. The Cambridge Companion to Emily Dickinson [M]. Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 2004.
[10] Murphy, P. D. Literature, Nature, And Other –Ecofeminist Critiques [M].Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995.
[11] Tong Ming. A History of American Literature [M]. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, 2008.
[12] CHANG Yaoxin （常耀信）. 美国文学简史 [M]. 天津：南开大学出版社，1997.
[13] CHEN Maolin（陈茂林）. 诗意栖居：亨利·大卫·梭罗的生态批评 [M]. 浙江：浙江大学出版社，2009.
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