Ashley Broom Dr. Ellis English 391 1 March 2016 Sacred Sarcasm and Skepticism: Emily Dickinson’s Disbelief of Heaven Throughout her life, Emily Dickinson struggled with believing in the existence of Heaven, and wrote many poems on doubt and skepticism of an afterlife. She grew up in a religious bubble where people were constantly telling her how they experienced their faith, and the feelings they had that were associated with things like prayer and death. A good portion of Dickinson’s poetry that talks about Heaven or an afterlife showcases her feelings of indifference and doubt. The Spirit just did not move her so to speak, and throughout her life she questioned what everyone else was feeling and many of her poems reflect the doubts she had.
…show more content…
So if one were to look at line five from the deeper and more emotional perspective, then the line would mean “yes, dying and going to Heaven is valuable but so is life and living!” When read this way, it adds to the sarcasm of the last three lines of the second stanza. In line six she says, “’Tis just the price of Breath-”, and this statement alone evokes a sarcastic response, but just like the previous line there is a deeper and more emotional meaning. According to the lexicon, the word “price” can be substituted for the word “loss” in one definition, and “breath” can be substituted for the word “existence.” So when reading into the emotional aspect of the line, Dickinson is saying, “Sure, the journey to Heaven is costly; you only have to pay by losing your existence.” By emphasizing the word “Breath” she further enforces the idea of the word also meaning existence, because by emphasizing it she is making breath the most important word of the line and stylistically giving it a sarcastic …show more content…
In “Heaven is so far of the Mind,” Dickinson takes a more skeptical approach to the belief of Heaven instead of the sarcastic approach she took in the first poem. When Dickenson uses “Mind,” in the first couple of lines of this poem, she gives the word two possible meanings. According to the lexicon, mind can mean the literal mind in the sense of “reason or thought” or it can also be taken to mean “imagination.” With this in mind, one can interpret the first two lines of the poem in two different ways: Heaven is too much for the brain to comprehend or Heaven is a high thought of the imagination and if the imagination were taken away then there would be nothing left. Knowing Dickinson, she probably leaned toward the idea of the mind being more like the imagination, and therefore, Heaven would be a figment of that great and expansive
So if one were to look at line five from the deeper and more emotional perspective, then the line would mean “yes, dying and going to Heaven is valuable but so is life and living!” When read this way, it adds to the sarcasm of the last three lines of the second stanza. In line six she says, “’Tis just the price of Breath-”, and this statement alone evokes a sarcastic response, but just like the previous line there is a deeper and more emotional meaning. According to the lexicon, the word “price” can be substituted for the word “loss” in one definition, and “breath” can be substituted for the word “existence.” So when reading into the emotional aspect of the line, Dickinson is saying, “Sure, the journey to Heaven is costly; you only have to pay by losing your existence.” By emphasizing the word “Breath” she further enforces the idea of the word also meaning existence, because by emphasizing it she is making breath the most important word of the line and stylistically giving it a sarcastic …show more content…
In “Heaven is so far of the Mind,” Dickinson takes a more skeptical approach to the belief of Heaven instead of the sarcastic approach she took in the first poem. When Dickenson uses “Mind,” in the first couple of lines of this poem, she gives the word two possible meanings. According to the lexicon, mind can mean the literal mind in the sense of “reason or thought” or it can also be taken to mean “imagination.” With this in mind, one can interpret the first two lines of the poem in two different ways: Heaven is too much for the brain to comprehend or Heaven is a high thought of the imagination and if the imagination were taken away then there would be nothing left. Knowing Dickinson, she probably leaned toward the idea of the mind being more like the imagination, and therefore, Heaven would be a figment of that great and expansive