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Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman

Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman. Transitional Poets. What does Transition Mean?. A transit from one stage to another A movement or development from one form to another A change in style. Romanticism. Nature The Individual Intuition rather than Reason Creativity. Realism.

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Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman

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  1. Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman Transitional Poets

  2. What does Transition Mean? • A transit from one stage to another • A movement or development from one form to another • A change in style

  3. Romanticism • Nature • The Individual • Intuition rather than Reason • Creativity

  4. Realism • Focus on the common, average man • Extreme Detail • Class (social groups) becomes important • Pessimistic, Negative • Materialism

  5. Emily Dickinson • Reclusive • Published only a handful of poems • Left instructions for her poems to be destroyed

  6. Dickinson is Unconventional • Use of dashes • Capitalization • First edition “corrected her forms,” but Johnson’s version in 1955 restored the original elements

  7. Techniques • Slant rhyme: final sounds are similar but not identical • Paradox: a statement that seems contradictory but is actually true • Ballad Stanza: stanza of four lines, rhyme scheme of abcb

  8. Because I Could Not Stop for Death • P. 524 • Who is he in line 2? What is this? • Describe him. • In lines 9-12, what do School, Fields, Setting Sun suggest? • Elliptical phrasing in lines 15, 16 • Last stanza, how long has it been? Suggests?

  9. I Heard a Fly Buzz-When I Died • P. 531 • Slant rhyme? • Would you think to include the buzzing of a fly in a poem from a dying person’s point of view? • What does the inclusion suggest about death?

  10. My Life Closed Twice Before Its Close • P. 529 • Paradox • What tells us about Heaven and Hell? • What is the final close? • How did her life close twice before? • Explain the paradox on 415.

  11. Walt Whitman • Poetry broke every poetic tradition of rhyme and meter. • Leaves of Grass abandoned traditional poetic devices and forms. • While critics panned him, Emerson admired him. Why?

  12. Leaves of Grass • Life’s work • Continuously revised (9 editions) • 12 poems (first edition) • 383 poems (death-bed edition)

  13. Transcendental Focus • Poetry conveys belief in democracy, equality, spiritual unity, and the potential of the human spirit. • Captures the diversity of the American people. • Conveys energy and intensity of all forms of life.

  14. American Epic: Leaves of Grass • Expresses national ideals. • Epic theme: All people of all times connected by shared experience of life. • ALL people are the hero of this epic.

  15. Techniques • Free Verse: irregular meter and line length sounds like natural speech. Every line shaped to suit poet’s meaning. • Catalogues (Lists) create a colorful parade of images that suggest each element is of equal worth. • Anaphora: repetition of phrases with similar structure or meaning (at the beginning of the phrase) (p. 425) • Onomatopoeia (grunting, gab, yawp)

  16. Selections • Page 508, Excerpts from Leaves of Grass • Look for catalogues, anaphora, diction, and onomatopoeia • Page, “When I Heard the Learned Astronomer” • What is the message? • Whose message is this?

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