1. A brief biography

3.  Born: Amherst, MA  Grandfather-one of the founders of Amherst College  Edward (father)- lawyer and treasurer of the college, very proper, religious, served as U.S. congressman from MA for a brief time  Emily (mother)- known for fine cooking  Austin (brother)- three years older than Emily, very bright, became a lawyer and treasurer of Amherst College  Lavinia (Vinnie, sister)- outspoken, witty, very pretty

4. I’m nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there’s a pair of us- don’t tell! They’d banish us, you know. How dreary to be somebody! How public, like a frog To tell your name the livelong day To an admiring bog!

6. Emily loved school, but was too shy to go alone. She tutored Vinnie until she was ready to attend Amherst Academy with her.

7.  Began to write when in her teens, with little family support.  Attended Mount Holyoke Seminary for one year, then returned home due to homesickness.  Corresponded with Austin while away.  Learned of Benjamin Newton, their father’s law student, through Austin’s letters.

8.  Ben shared liberal books with the Dickinson children.  Emily and Ben discussed the books and their friendship deepened.  Mr. Dickinson disapproved of the books’ contents, feeling they contained too many liberal ideas.  Ben hid the books in the bushes by the house and Emily or Austin would collect them with- out their father’s knowledge.

9.  When Ben left Amherst he and Emily wrote to each other.  Ben was a strong supporter of Emily’s writing. “All can write autographs, but few paragraphs…”  Ben died at an early age. Emily was shocked and grieved for a long time.  She began to write poems about death and continued to for the rest of her life.  She imagines her own death in the following poem:

10. I have not told my garden yet, Lest that should conquer me; I have not quite the strength now To break it to the bee. I will not name it in the street, For shops would stare, that I, So shy, so very ignorant, Should have the face to die. The hillsides must not know it, Where I have rambled so, Nor tell the loving forests The day that I shall go, Nor lisp it at the table, Nor heedless by the way Hint that within the riddle One will walk to-day!

11.  Neither Emily nor Vinnie married.  Austin married and built a house next to the family home.  Emily spent evenings playing piano and reading.  By 40, she rarely left home and dressed only in white.  Austin’s wife supported Emily’s writing, but didn’t know how many poems she had written.

12.  Emily taught herself to write poetry.  Only six poems were published while she was alive.  Almost all were written in iambic meter, a short syllable followed by a long one.  Many poems have four line stanzas.  Lines 1 & 3 have 8 syllables.  Lines 2 & 4 have 6 syllables.  Last words in lines 2 & 4 often rhyme.

13. The bee is not afraid of me, I know the butterfly, The pretty people in the woods Receive me cordially. The brooks laugh louder when I come, The breezes madder play. Wherefore, mine eyes, thy silver mists? Wherefore, O summer’s day?

14. A fuzzy fellow without feet Yet doth exceeding run! Of velvet is his countenance And his complexion dun. Sometimes he dwelleth in the grass, Sometimes upon a bough From which he doth descend in plush Upon the passer-by.

15. She sweeps with many-colored brooms, And leaves the shreds behind; Oh, housewife in the evening west, Come back, and dust the pond! You dropped a purple raveling in, You dropped an amber thread; And now you’ve littered all the East With duds of emerald! And still she plies her spotted brooms, And still the aprons fly, Till brooms fade softly into stars- And then I come away.

16.  Died at 55 years old from Bright’s Disease (kidney failure).  Upon Emily’s death, Vinnie found a box of hand- bound books, containing 879 poems.  Later, more poems were discovered-over 1,700 total.  Emily wrote about ordinary things in life and made them seem extraordinary.  Emily once wrote in a letter, “To live is so startling it leaves little time for anything else.”

17.  Poetry for Young People-Emily Dickinson  Edited by Frances Schoonmaker Bolin  Illustrated by Chi Chung  Scholastic Inc.  New York  Magnolia Editions Limited  Copyright 1994