Poetry Analysis
Both Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman wrote many poems alluding to Nature and Death that sparked many debates and analyses of modernist views. Throughout both of their works, they discuss the Nature of America as well as Death and the afterlife. While both allude to life continuing in some way after death, both approach the topic in different ways. One with a more positive and hopeful eye, the other with pessimism.
In “Because I Could Not Stop For Death,” Dickinson personifies Death as an actual person. Throughout the poem, Dickinson and Death travel together through the afterlife. Death leads her on beyond life in a carriage that never ends. This implies that life continues after death. Whitman also alludes to this and even calls the grass “Beautiful uncut hair of graves” as his way of personifying death. He also says, “All goes onward and outward,” and even calls death lucky. He believed even in death, you continue onward just as Dickinson did.
The two also wrote about America’s Nature. Whitman wrote about America as a diverse and expansive nation with a heavy emphasis on individualism. He goes on to talk about the individual liberties Americans got, as well as the unique and diverse people, and how wonderful they were. This was partially due to the ties with slavery during his lifetime. Whitman was anti-slavery and celebrated diversity, while many at the time did not. Dickinson, on the other hand, describes America as stubborn and unmoving. Dickinson was a patriot of the feminist movement. During the 1800s, when she lived, there were few rights for women. Due to the lack of progress in this department as well as many others, Dickinson viewed America as stubborn in its views and unwilling or unable to change.
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