Riddle of America, The - Waldorf Research Institute

Emily DickinsonbyThornton WilderGerard Manley Hopkins wrote to Robert Bridges,“To return to compositionfor a moment: what I want there to be more intelligible, smoother,and less singular, is an audience.” And again: “There is a point with me inmatters of any size when I must absolutely have encouragement as muchas crops rain; afterwards I am independent.” Father Hopkins’ verses firstreached print twenty-six years after his death.Emily Dickinson’s closest friends included two men, each of whom,as editor, read hundreds, perhaps thousands, of poems a year with a viewtoward publication in periodicals; and a third, her mentor Colonel Higginson,was in a position strongly to urge their publication; yet none venturedto publish one of hers. Dr. Holland felt that her verses were “too ethereal,”Colonel Higginson that they were too irregular. The Colonel could be verysevere; she quotes back to him—with an air of docile gratitude and contrition—somewords he had written: “Such being the majesty of the art youpresume to practice, you can at least take time before you dishonor it.”Had she been accorded an audience, would her verses have been“more intelligible, smoother, and less singular”? Not only did she write sometwo thousand poems, the greater part of which were seen by no other eyesthan her own, but she so arranged it that most of these poems—if they weresomeday to be read by others—would not appear to lay claim to literaryevaluation. She left them ostentatiously “unfinished,” unready for print.From time to time, she seems to have started upon the task of preparingdefinitive copies, only to have flagged in the endeavor or to have shrunkfrom the presumption.217