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Emily Dickinson at Large

ENGL 386.301
instructor(s):
TR 10:30-12

America’s greatest writer of extremity, Emily Dickinson roamed the universe like a devil hungry for souls. Doing so, while remaining, for the most part, at home in Amherst, Massachusetts was a neat trick. To this day, the scary magnificence of her achievement remains unencompassed. Indeed, even some of the most basic questions about her writing (how much of it is poetry?) have never been satisfactorily answered. And we have yet to take the full measure of her disinhibited contact with the sheer unsparingness of things: God, nature, time, language, idealism, markets, the unconscious. In this seminar, our intensive focus on Dickinson’s writings will be complemented by our research on the world she inhabited, from the most intimate scenes of composition and friendship to the cataclysms that shaped the era. We’ll also explore the history of her reception and edition up to the present moment, from her own correspondence and early publications to the latest variorum edition, the new web-based archives, and the cutting edge of criticism.

fulfills requirements