"He buys me books,
but begs me not to read them, because he fears they joggle the
mind.
I would like to learn. Could you tell me how to grow, or is it
unconveyed, like melody or witchcraft?"
Emily Dickinson |
Quotation to the left is from
Selected
Poems and Letters of Emily Dickinson,
Robert N. Linscott, Editor. New York: Anchor Doubleday, 1959.
p. 7.
The text is a modern reprint
of the 1959 book, and pretty easily available. The quotation
is from a letter to Thomas Wentworth Higginson, who was a Unitarian
clergyman who wrote a letter to Atlantic Monthly, encouraging
young American writers; apparently, he encouraged one particular
writer. Shortly after he wrote his letter to the magazine, he
began corresponding (at her initiation) with Dickinson, who asked
him to "say if my verse is alive."
The book is quite a treasure,
and no one who seriously admires Dickinson should skip it. |