Emily Dickinson

(source)

You have to get a million streaming services. The trick is to get free trials and watch all the good shows quickly. On Apple TV, Dickinson is the weird ahistorical show to gobble up, 3 seasons. 

Emily Dickinson lived 1830-1886. She published a few poems but mostly wrote for her sister-in-law and others. 

The internet has created needy babies (me) who want to be fed. There is no webpage that has the poem featured in each episode. I could make millions if I created that and then monetized my site. Actually there's a wiki, and 

S3E2 has a page. What a find, it does exist. Not about poems, more like candid photos of the actresses getting dressed.

Alena Smith created this show. "Smith was drawn to the idea of “achieving the impossible within extreme confinement,” as Dickinson did, reinventing American verse from her bedroom. “Frustration has been a powerful engine of my career thus far and of this project. And it's definitely part of the character of Emily Dickinson,” she adds."

There are modern sentiments injected into the show, hip hop music, and whatnot. It's ahistorical. They look at the camera and talk. It's an ahistorical drama. Still, it's fun.

The Thoreau episode makes him about to be a dilettante fop, that's certainly one view of him, not mine. I like the naturalist, the poet, the essay writer, the revolutionary. I don't agree that we should only fix ourselves, we could also fix society too. I don't dislike New York. The pull of Puritanism isn't as strong for me, but if I'm honest, there is a weird undertow pull. Seeing clay feet is a sign of maturity to me, not just idealizing and denigrating, the good and the bad. We are all mixtures.

I've read through Dickinson's poems more than one, tried to read one book on the Gothic nature of her poetry, own a biography I neglect, and really really enjoy this show. She swam in the same New England waters as Thoreau. She was born a little later.

I don't know if they ever met or read each other. I doubt Thoreau read Emily's poems. I'll update as I learn.

Thomas Wentworth Higginson was a mentor to Dickinson.

“ Dickinson’s poems and letters mention roses, lilacs, peonies, sweet williams, daisies, foxgloves, poppies, nasturtiums and zinnias.” (Source)




Previous posts:

Dickinson




Links:

Wild Nights With Emily review in Vox.




Poems:

The way Hope builds his House
It is not with a sill –
Nor Rafter – has that Edifice
But only Pinnacle –

Abode in as supreme
This superficies
As if it were of Ledges smit
Or mortised with the Laws –





All the letters I can write
Are not fair as this—
Syllables of Velvet—
Sentences of Plush,
Depths of Ruby, undrained,
Hid, Lip, for Thee—
Play it were a Humming Bird—
And just sipped—me—






I started Early – Took my Dog –

And visited the Sea –

The Mermaids in the Basement

Came out to look at me –



And Frigates – in the Upper Floor

Extended Hempen Hands –

Presuming Me to be a Mouse –

Aground – opon the Sands –



But no Man moved Me – till the Tide

Went past my simple Shoe –

And past my Apron – and my Belt

And past my Boddice – too –



And made as He would eat me up –

As wholly as a Dew

Opon a Dandelion's Sleeve –

And then – I started – too –



And He – He followed – close behind –

I felt His Silver Heel

Opon my Ancle – Then My Shoes

Would overflow with Pearl –



Until We met the Solid Town –

No One He seemed to know –

And bowing – with a Mighty look –



At me – The Sea withdrew –