Both poets write from the first person, and seem to be speaking to or addressing someone. Dickinson's poem, "I'm Nobody! Who are you?" clearly represents this, as she actually asks a question to whoever it is she is addressing. Whitman also directly addresses an outside person or party. In stanza 5, he addresses and speaks to his soul, "I believe in you my soul," and spends the stanza speaking to his soul as he it was a lover. "Only the lull i like, the hum of your valved voice. / I mind how once we lay such a transparent summer morning, / How you settled your head athwart my hips and gently turn'd over upon me..." For both poets, there is a since of comradery with the person or thing they are addressing. For Dickinson, in all of her humdrum loneliness, excites in the fact that her addressee is a nobody just like her: "I'm Nobody! Who are you? / Are you -- Nobody -- Too? / Then there's a pair of us!" Both poets make that connection personal.
Both Whitman and Dickinson have a reverence for nature, where certain aspects of it get personified in their poems. Dickinson tackles nature in her poem "I started Early -- Took my Dog." She speaks of the sea as a person, "But no Man moved Me -- til the Tide / Went past my simple shoe... and made as He would eat me up -- / As wholly as a Dew." The sea is the only man that can move her. Whitman does the same in his poem "Song of Myself." He devotes much of his poem to the glories of nature, and even a stanza to the wonders of the sea. In stanza 22 he writes, "You sea! I resign myself to you also - I guess what you mean, / I behold from the beach your crooked fingers, / I believe you refuse to go back without feeling of me... / Cushion me soft, rock me in billowy drowse." Whitman also has a love and devotion to the sea, which he uses and portrays in his poem. The majesty of nature connects the lonely, private Dickinson and the ecstatic, life loving Whitman.
Nice observation about how both poets write from 1st person. While it is true that they both focus on self-reliance and intuition, they do it from different perspectives. Dickinson focuses entirely on introspection and how she factors into herself. Whitman takes joy in camaraderie and seeing himself as part of a universal whole. It is interesting that he choses to speak to himself or to his soul in the 5th stanza. This may be a statement on his perception of the fluidity of the soul. That is, he speaks to his soul as something that may take root in another body after his death.
ReplyDeleteTheir common interest in nature has interesting implications. While they both carry a reverence for it, I wouldn't say that Dickinson considers herself a part of it, as Whitman does. "I died for Beauty--but was scarce" is a good example of this. The moss at the end of this poem is presented as a threatening mechanism for her growing anonymity.
The personal connection that each poet creates with their audience is what makes them truly memorable and great. Although vastly different, one excitable and the other lonely, both poet's ideals can resonate with the average reader. With Dickinson, we feel the sense of loneliness and understand her feelings although she does not think anyone else can. Whitman forces one to celebrate in the life that we never truly looked at before. Dickinson makes you connect with her, but pushes you away immediately afterward. Whitman makes you want to scream with his intensity. We want to rejoice along with him with the excitement of life and the union of the soul.
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