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Emily DickinsonA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Transcendentalism was a 19th-century literary movement that coincided with Emily Dickinson poetry production. Scholars define Transcendentalism as “an American literary, philosophical, religious, and political movement of the early nineteenth century, centered around Ralph Waldo Emerson” ("Transcendentalism." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2003). Dickinson herself was not considered a Transcendentalist, though her work is couched within and inspired by other Transcendentalist authors such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Margaret Fuller. Transcendentalists often critiqued society and wrote against conformity. Some academics have argued that Dickinson’s work contains hints of Transcendentalism throughout a selection of her poems, declaring,
She appears to search for the universal truths and investigate the circumstances of the human condition: sense of life, immortality, God, faith, place of man in the universe. Emily Dickinson questions absolutes and her argumentation is multisided. The poetic technique that she uses involves making abstract concrete” ("Transcendental Legacy in Literature." American Transcendentalism Web).
Some could argue that “To make a prairie” features some of these themes. The reverie espoused in the poem represents self-reliance and innovation (“Self-reliance” being the name of one of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s most famous essays). Also, the discussion of industry and creating a place for oneself attempts to answer the question of purpose and belonging.
By Emily Dickinson
A Bird, came down the Walk
Emily Dickinson
A Clock stopped—
Emily Dickinson
A narrow Fellow in the Grass (1096)
Emily Dickinson
Because I Could Not Stop for Death
Emily Dickinson
"Faith" is a fine invention
Emily Dickinson
Fame Is a Fickle Food (1702)
Emily Dickinson
Hope is a strange invention
Emily Dickinson
"Hope" Is the Thing with Feathers
Emily Dickinson
I Can Wade Grief
Emily Dickinson
I Felt a Cleaving in my Mind
Emily Dickinson
I Felt a Funeral, in My Brain
Emily Dickinson
If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking
Emily Dickinson
If I should die
Emily Dickinson
If you were coming in the fall
Emily Dickinson
I heard a Fly buzz — when I died
Emily Dickinson
I'm Nobody! Who Are You?
Emily Dickinson
Much Madness is divinest Sense—
Emily Dickinson
Success Is Counted Sweetest
Emily Dickinson
Tell all the truth but tell it slant
Emily Dickinson
The Only News I Know
Emily Dickinson