Understanding Dickinson and Religion

The Norton editors’ introduction to Emily Dickinson is paramount to contextualizing Dickinson’s writing and understanding the unique perspective from which she writes. I would even argue it is one of the most important and telling introductions we’ve read this semester. Interpreting her poetry on its own is difficult, but I (and most readers, I imagine) would find her poetry nearly impossible to decipher without some understanding of Dickinson herself.

Poem 202 in important to consider in the context of Dickinson’s educational experience and rejection of religion. The intro explains that Dickinson joined a group of “no hopes” at Mount Holyoke Female Seminary School, an institution whose mission was to instill religious devotion in young women. Dickinson explained in a letter that it was her refusal “to conform to the conventional expectations of her evangelical culture that helped liberate her to think on her own” and to reflect more on life (Intro, pg. 1660). In a short, four-line stanza, poem 202 provides a comparison between modern technology and religion as ways of seeing into the world. She also seems to mock religion as an experience for “Gentlemen,” which may explain her rejection of her all-female religious education. She describes religious faith as “a fine invention,” suggesting it is something that men discover and introduce into their lives in a somewhat unnatural or forced manner (1). Perhaps Dickinson’s liberation comes from her ability to separate herself from religion through her identity as a woman. Dickinson describes microscopes as “prudent” and implies that they are only used “In an Emergency” (3,4). It’s interesting that she compares these two ways of seeing because religion provides a large-scope view of the world, while a microscope is a scientific and precise means of examine a microcosm, such as a single cell or particle. I wonder, are these two comparable ways of viewing of the world?

While Dickinson’s rejection of religion liberated her thinking and eventually led her to experimental stylistic use of dashes and short lines, poem 202 uses iambic trimester and an ABCB scheme in which “see” and “Emergency” rhyme. Was this adherence to a more traditional structure an intentional decision that reflects the poem’s subject about religion, or does it reveal that Dickinson adhered to more traditional form before fully discovering her own unique poetic style?