It's an overall feeling. The poems commonly attributed to her practically scream "Hoax!!"
Whilst trying to fight off this naturally occuring phenomenon, a little whisper starts tickling my ear . . . "Fraud, fraud, fraud . . ."
Definitely the biggest hoax in literary history . . . that I've encountered so far, anyway.
“As Kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame . . .”
Why disqualify the rush? I'm tabled. I'm tabled.
Ok I just worked out the perfect way to settle this debate, and what's more to stay completely in character with the general character of the discussion:
Wilfred, you're a Hoax!!!
You're a Hoax ShoutGrace!!!!!
That feel good eh?
It didn't do much for me . . . but I hope it was good for you.
It's still an honor to be in the same hoaxish class as Dickinson . . . maybe I'll turn into a really famous hoax and have people remember my alleged poetry long after I've departed.
“As Kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame . . .”
Why disqualify the rush? I'm tabled. I'm tabled.
Well let me say Shoutgrace’s empty claim of Emily Dickinson as being a hoax is less believable than Thomas Higginson’s recount of correspondences with Emily Dickinson.Originally Posted by ShoutGrace
Just a thought...I think the author of this thread just doesn't have anything better to do... and that he/she just wants to get some attention, that's all. It is indeed attention-catching if you suddenly out-of-the-blue claim that someone notoriously famous is a hoax, especially someone who a lot of people admire.
Poor guy!Maybe we should just all say "Hi!" to him just to make his day.
Please do not personalise your arguments.Just a thought...I think the author of this thread just doesn't have anything better to do... and that he/she just wants to get some attention, that's all. It is indeed attention-catching if you suddenly out-of-the-blue claim that someone notoriously famous is a hoax, especially someone who a lot of people admire.
Poor guy!
~
"It is not that I am mad; it is only that my head is different from yours.”
~
I guess "Wilfred" did find better things to do: Last Activity: 01-31-2004 10:52 PM
Blame it on ShoutGrace for resurrecting this 'gem' of a 2+ yr old topic
Oh and Emily was very much a real person according to the most comprehensive genealogical site in the world http://www.familysearch.org/
Pics of her gravestones on findagrave.com "called back on 15 May 1886"
I would have to concur with Logos...I have no reason to suspect or believe that Emily was anything but the real deal, and she was a heck of a good poet to say the least.
Here is an interesting little ditty. It is an exerpt available through "Project Muse."
Mitchell, Domhnall 1962- "Emily Dickinson, Ralph Franklin, and the Diplomacy of Translation"
The Emily Dickinson Journal - Volume 8, Number 2, Fall 1999, pp. 39-54
The Johns Hopkins University Press
Excerpt
On June 3rd, 1996, the Jones Library in Amherst, Massachusetts paid $24,150 to Sotheby's for an "unpublished poetical manuscript" by Emily Dickinson which was discovered afterwards to have been counterfeited by Mark Hofmann, the Utah forger and double murderer. Before this knowledge became public, however, and especially during the period when funds were being raised to make a bid on behalf of the Library, the appearance of a rare autograph poem generated considerable excitement. The discovery was additionally timely given the increasing levels of attention being paid to Dickinson manuscripts generally. Briefly stated, the assumption in many recent critical works is that studying Dickinson in any standard typographic edition is effectively to read her in translation, at one remove from her actual practices. More specifically, it has been claimed that line arrangements, the shape of words and letters, and the particular angle of dashes, are all potentially integral to any given poem's meaning, making a graphic contribution to its contents. 1 For people working on characteristics of Dickinson's poetry in manuscript form, then, the newly found lyric seemed to provide a novel opportunity for assessing the status of such characteristics.
Presupposing that the text was genuine, and that it would shortly receive close critical attention in a variety of scholarly publications, one of the questions facing the reader was how best to present reproductions of the work in other, textual and electronic, environments. This challenge was a miniature counterpart to the major and genuine difficulties Ralph Franklin had been working with for more than three decades. Franklin himself had approached the problem of representing the integrity of Dickinson's originals in different ways.
Our passions are not too strong, they are too weak. We are far too easily pleased.
~C.S. Lewis
http://michellerichmond.com/fictionattic/?page_id=9
What if I write a bunch of letters with a person named Emily Dickinson and have her admit she is a hoax? Will that convince you?
They do indeed want attention . . . to be directed towards this briiliantly constructed hoax!!
Darn, Logos got there before I could:Poor guy!
Happy thoughts are never a bad thing, however. I'm sure Wilfred would appreciate it.
Or thank ShoutGrace for bringing this atrocity to public attention once again!Blame it on ShoutGrace for resurrecting this 'gem' of a 2+ yr old topic
I bet you these are the same kind of people who will try and tell you that Jim Morrison and Elvis are dead.
Last edited by ShoutGrace; 10-11-2006 at 08:55 PM. Reason: smileys!
“As Kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame . . .”
Why disqualify the rush? I'm tabled. I'm tabled.
I doubt you could to any degree mimic printed letters by her. Go ahead, I'll be waiting to read those letters.What if I write a bunch of letters with a person named Emily Dickinson and have her admit she is a hoax? Will that convince you?
This is my first time in this forum and I am in need of some guidance. I'm to write a 1-page paper on one of the following Emily Dickinson poems.
A Light exists in the Spring
A narrow fellow in the grass
Apparently with no surprise
As imperceptibly as grief
Because I could not stop for death
"Faith" is a fine intervention
I died for Beauty-but was scarce
I felt a funeral, in my brain
I heard a Fly buzz-when I died
I like a look of agony
I like to see it lap the miles
I never saw a moor
I taste liquor never brewed
It sifts from Leaden Sieves
Much madness is divinest Sense
One dignity delays for all
The last night that she lived
There is no Frigate like a book
There's a certain slant of light
There's been a death in the opposite house
There are the days when Birds come back
Twas warm-at first-like Us
I'm to note the theme of each, the similar subjects and viewpoints. I've read more than half of these and I'm totally confused. I was the same way with some of Nathaniel Hawthorne's novels, but after I read them over and over, I caught on. No such luck with these poems. I would appreciate a guide in the right direction; I just need a little guidance in understanding them.
A big welcome to you then Nancy!
That makes a lot of sense to me. Have you read the subject title of this thread?
Well, naturally. Hawthorne isn’t a gigantic fraud.
First I would ask you to open your mind and start thinking like a heroic iconoclast.
The first step is a proper understanding of the word ‘hoax’. Do you have a dictionary handy?
“As Kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame . . .”
Why disqualify the rush? I'm tabled. I'm tabled.
Well thanks ShoutGrace, I guess I'm in the wrong thread.
It’s no problem at all.
Whether or not you’re in the wrong thread depends on your intentions . . . there is always time available between homework problems to participate in some enlightening defrauding activities.
I sent you a PM by the way.
“As Kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame . . .”
Why disqualify the rush? I'm tabled. I'm tabled.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
