Blog Archives

Turned On The Charm

7/29/2019

From Dorothy Dawe, Chairman of the Dickinson Organization of Poetry Enthusiasts:

We visited Baltimore a little over a year ago, and we had a great time. We wrote about out trip HERE and HERE.

We found Baltimore to be a lovely city with lovely, friendly people. As a matter of fact, some of us are thinking of a return trip to Charm City soon – maybe on Labor Day weekend – for two reasons:

First, due to the timing of our trip in 2018, we did not get to see everything we wanted to see because various attractions were closed on the days we were there.

Second, we would love to show our support to the city of Baltimore after Trump’s recent vicious attacks on the city.

I have to admit, I am incensed that an American president would attack an American city, especially one as wonderful as Baltimore. It is simply unheard of, and it is beyond deplorable. It is appalling.

Of course, Trump once described himself as a “great unifier,” but he is nothing of the sort. He does nothing but divide this country, and it is sickening.

An American president attacking an American city?

It boggles the mind.

Of course, all of this calls to mind Emmett Lee Dickinson’s poem, “Why should we worry – why indeed?” (below on the left). Dickinson’s poem inspired third cousin Emily to pen her poem “Why should we hurry – why indeed?” (below on the right).

By Emmett Lee Dickinson:

Why should we worry – why indeed?
When every day he lies
We are molested equally
By immorality.
No respite from his ignorance
That this which he’s begun
A rant of racist cries
A damned absurdity
Boggles the mind
His diatribe –

By Emily Dickinson:

Why should we hurry – why indeed?
When every way we fly
We are molested equally
By immortality.
No respite from the inference
That this which is begun,
Though where its labors lie
A bland uncertainty
Besets the sight
This mighty night –

Dinner Belle

7/27/2019

From our art columnist, Jarvis MacKinnon III:

Members of the Dickinson Organization of Poetry Enthusiasts visited New York City last weekend -- the travelogue from our trip is HERE -- and on one of the days, we visited the Brooklyn Museum.

The main draw to see the museum was a painting by Edward Hopper ("Macomb's Da Bridge"). Hopper was a lover of Emmett Lee Dickinson (Emily Dickinson's third cousin, twice removed -- at her request), and he said the life and poetry of Dickinson was his greatest inspiration as a painter.

However, when we arrived at the museum we were also thrilled to learn that it is the permanent home of Judy Chicago's "The Dinner Party."

What is "The Dinner Party"?

Here is information from the Brooklyn Museum's site: "The Dinner Party, an important icon of 1970s feminist art and a milestone in twentieth-century art, is presented as the centerpiece around which the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art is organized. The Dinner Party comprises a massive ceremonial banquet, arranged on a triangular table with a total of thirty-nine place settings, each commemorating an important woman from history."

More information is HERE.

Of course, we were thrilled to find a place setting for the Belle of Amherst, Emily Dickinson, at "The Dinner Party." We were a little surprised, though, that a prominent color at her seat was pink -- but hey, we were happy that she was included in the guest (and rightly so).

Who else is at the table? Below is a complete list:

Wing I: From Prehistory to the Roman Empire
1. Primordial Goddess
2. Fertile Goddess
3. Ishtar
4. Kali
5. Snake Goddess
6. Sophia
7. Amazon
8. Hatshepsut
9. Judith
10. Sappho
11. Aspasia
12. Boadicea
13. Hypatia

Wing II: From the Beginnings of Christianity to the Reformation
14. Marcella
15. Saint Bridget
16. Theodora
17. Hrosvitha
18. Trota of Salerno
19. Eleanor of Aquitaine
20. Hildegarde of Bingen
21. Petronilla de Meath
22. Christine de Pisan
23. Isabella d'Este
24. Elizabeth I
25. Artemisia Gentileschi
26. Anna van Schurman

Wing III: From the American to the Women's Revolution
27. Anne Hutchinson
28. Sacajawea
29. Caroline Herschel
30. Mary Wollstonecraft
31. Sojourner Truth
32. Susan B. Anthony
33. Elizabeth Blackwell
34. Emily Dickinson
35. Ethel Smyth
36. Margaret Sanger
37. Natalie Barney
38. Virginia Woolf
39. Georgia O'Keeffe

Above: The first place setting is for Primordial Goddess. Note that the runner looks like an animal skin.

For information for each of the women at the table in Judy Chicago's "the Dinner Party," click HERE.

Red, White & Blue Grass

7/25/2019

From our senior book reviewer, Philo Remington:

On our recent trip to New York, we stopped by the New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue, and visited their exhibit on Walt Whitman.

Our travelogue on our trip to New York, is HERE. My plog ("poetry blog") post on a similar exhibit on Whitman at the University of Virginia is HERE. More information on a related project -- called Whitman Alabama -- is HERE.

One of the greatest influences on Whitman was Emmett Lee Dickinson (Emily Dickinson’s third cousin, twice removed – at her request). Whitman discovered Dickinson after reading Ralph Waldo Emerson’s poem about him, “The Poet.”

Emerson had lamented that the United States had not produced a writer who adequately celebrated the country’s virtues, moral failings, and idiosyncrasies.

“I looked in vain,” wrote Emerson, “until I met Emmett Lee Dickinson.”

Emerson’s poem about Dickinson, “The Poet" (below and right), doubtlessly resonated with Whitman. In a review of the poem in 1842, Whitman pronounced it “one of the most beautiful compositions I had ever read.”

Below left: A nice feature of the NYPL Whitman exhibit was the inclusion of a display on how Whitman has been represented in modern-day culture. Below right: Other miscellaneous shots from the NYPL Whitman exhibit.

Dark Matter

7/18/2019

From our political correspondent, Dorothy Dawe:

I was appalled by Trump’s rally last night in North Carolina. Though I have never seen a Ku Klux Klan rally, this frenzied gathering certainly seemed to fit that bill.

Trump recently challenged Democrats to “end the hate,” but then he stirred up fear and loathing in his mob ready to light the GOP’s “Thousand Points of Lights” with Tiki Torches. They then started chanting “send her back” about Ilhan Omar, a duly elected member of congress. The horde was merely repeating their leader’s white supremacist language used earlier in the week.

Trump then pole-vaulted above the heights of hypocrisy as he barked about dissenters, “If they don’t love America, then they can leave it.” However, prior to being installed in the White House, Trump was nothing more than a troll who did nothing but trash our country and President Obama.

But the rally. It was beyond disturbing.

I could not help but think of photographs we had seen on our trip to Alabama last summer (our travelogue is HERE) – photographs of white supremacists and segregationists yelling like barbaric miscreants at African-Americans during the Jim Crow era.

Where are those people’s children and grandchildren now? I suspect many of them attended Trump’s rally last night in North Carolina (and/or any other past Trump rally across the country).

Pictured at the right: White Supremacists from the Jim Crow era. Their children and grandchildren attend Trump rallies.

Hate is taught. Fred Trump taught Donald. Donald taught Don Jr, Eric, and Ivanka. Don Jr., Eric and Ivanka are now teaching their children. And like a maniacal patriarch of prejudice and hate, Trump teaches his Klan through bullying and name calling. Parents attend those rallies with their children so that they can teach their children, and their children will teach their children down the line.

It is disgusting and disheartening.

America is lost, and MAGAts are following Trump as he drags us into the heart of darkness. With each rally, we fall deeper and deeper into the abyss.

Trump’s name calling and the mob’s maniacal chanting called to mind Emmett Lee Dickinson’s poem, “Teach Them – as He calls her names” (below on the left). Dickinson’s poem inspired third cousin Emily to pen her poem “Teach Him — When He makes the names” (below on the right).

By Emmett Lee Dickinson:

Teach Them – As He calls her names –
Such a one – to say –
From his babbling – Scary – lips –
As does sound – to them –
To their Ears – as near his rant –
As they chant – today
And they sound –
“Send her back” –
Their new “Enemy.”

By Emily Dickinson:

Teach Him — When He makes the names --
Such an one — to say --
On his babbling — Berry — lips --
As should sound — to me --
Were my Ear — as near his nest --
As my thought — today --
As should sound --
"Forbid us not" --
Some like "Emily."

We are still a year-and-a-half from the election so we have not hit the bottom yet. Trump, who once bragged about being a “great unifier,” now dons the mantle of an Imperial Wizard as he continues to divide our nation – as he leads us into the heart of darkness.

Unsolved Mysteries

7/17/2019

From our master grammarian & resident logophile, Angstrom Dickinson:

Back in March of this year, I wrote about a mysterious letter “E” that appears before “It sifts from Leaden Sieves” in my 1998 Franklin edition of The Poems of Emily Dickinson – you can read about that HERE.

Now, I’m looking into a second mystery: I just realized that “I would distil a cup” appears in my 1960 Johnson edition of The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (J-16), but I can’t find it anywhere in my Franklin edition. What gives?

Here’s the the poem:

By Emily Dickinson:

I would distil a cup,
And bear to all my friends,
Drinking to her no more astir,
By beck, or burn, or moor!

Below: "I would distil a cup" -- J-16 -- appears at the page break for pages 13 and 14 in the Johnson edition of The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson.

I checked the Emily Dickinson Archive to see if that might shed some light on the mystery, but it indicated that “I would distil a cup” – which Emily had included in a letter to Samual Bowler and Mary Bowles – appeared only in the Johnson edition. I searched the words “distil,” “beck,” and “astir,” and all three queries yielded the same information. I thought, perhaps, that the lines (or similar lines) from “I would distil a cup” would appear embedded in some other poem by Dickinson in the Franklin edition. Alas, no. “I would distil a cup” seems to have vanished with Franklin’s edition of the Belle of Amherst’s poetry.

Below: The results when I searched the word "beck" in the Emily Dickinson Archive turned up one entry for "I would distil a cup":

Do any Dickinson scholars out there have any info on this mystery – as to why “I would distil a cup” does not appear in the Franklin edition of The Poems of Emily Dickinson?

FYI: Information related to the origin of “I would distil a cup” can be found HERE.

Whitman Sampler -- Part 2

7/17/2019

From our senior book reviewer, Philo Remington:

For all of you Whitman fans out there (Walt – not his brother Wink):

I recently visited the “Encompassing Multitudes: The Song of Walt Whitman” exhibit at the University of Virginia – a celebration of the bicentennial of the birth of the great American poet. The exhibit – which closes on July 27th – includes a generous amount of information about the poet’s life and numerous and noteworthy copies of the ever-evolving “Leaves of Grass.” Information about the exhibit is HERE.

An additional feature of the exhibit was the inclusion of videos from a documentary series called “Whitman Alabama” – “an ongoing project that brings the poem (“Song of Myself”) to life through the voices of Alabama residents.”

Information about the project is HERE.

From the PBS News Hour about "Whitman Alabama": "The result is a deeply affirmative, wise, strange and sometimes funny set of 52 mini-documentaries or episodes, each dedicated to a different verse. In these videos, Whitman is recited in the most unlikely places: in a drug court, on a baseball field, at a skate park, on a farm, in a plane. "

Check out Verse 1 below:

Text to Verse 1, Song of Myself:

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, form’d from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same,
and their parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.

Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.

White Noise

7/15/2019

From our political correspondent, Dorothy Dawe:

Remember when the GOP used to claim a monopoly on family values? Those days are l - o - n - g gone. Of course, the family value crusade was all a charade so it is no surprise that the GOP response to Donald Trump’s recent racist rhetoric has been tepid (at best).

Trump and the GOP have tossed out the dog whistles. Now they’ve brought out the bull horns.

Trump tells four congresswomen of color to ‘go back’ to their countries? This is classic racist lingo – the hallmark of the white supremacist.

And the GOP response?

**insert crickets chirping **

All of this calls to mind Emmett Lee Dickinson's now-classic poem "The words the racists say" (below on the left). Dickinson's poem inspired third cousin Emily to pen her poem "The words the happy say" (below on the right).

By Emmett Lee Dickinson:

The words the racists say
Are putrid calumny
But those who silent stay
Are horrible –

By Emily Dickinson:

The words the happy say
Are paltry melody
But those the silent feel
Are beautiful –

Below: Donald Trump addresses the press about his racist comments.

Whitman Sampler

7/13/2019

From our senior book reviewer, Philo Remington:

Yesterday I visited Alderman Library at the University of Virginia to catch "Encompassing Multitudes: The Song of Walt Whitman," an exhibit celebrating the bicentennial of the birth of the great American poet.

Information on the exhibit -- which runs through July 27th -- is HERE. Additional information is HERE.

An early section the exhibit discussed writers and poets who influenced Whitman. Of course, the major influence on the poet -- above and beyond the inspiration and impact his brother Wink had on him -- was Emmett Lee Dickinson (Emily Dickinson's third cousin, twice removed -- at her request).

Pictured at the right: Walt Whitman's copy of "Poems," an early edition of poetry by Emmett Lee Dickinson.

Below: Wink Whitman's seminal work, Mows the Grass.

Pictured at the left: A collection of photographs of Walt Whitman -- the photo in the top left is of his brother, Wink.

Below left: Information on how Whitman was affected by the assassination of Abraham Lincoln (click the image to enlarge). The display notes, "were it not for comfort and support from Lincoln’s best friend, Emmett Lee Dickinson, Whitman said he would not have been able to continue writing."

Below right: An advertisement for an April 1877 appearance by Walt Whitman at New York's Madison Square Garden to lecture on Abraham Lincoln. The advertisement notes "To Be Introduced by Emmett Lee Dickinson," Abraham Lincoln's best friend.

Information on Lincoln and Dickinson is HERE.

The exhibit includes various copies of Whitman's Leaves of Grass, including the following editions:

1855 -- the first edition. After reading it, Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote to the poet, "Mr. Walter Whitman, I find it the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed....I greet you at the beginning of a great career."

1856 -- the second edition.

1860 -- an updated version that included "Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking"

1867 -- included "O Captain! My Captain!"

1876 -- to coincide with the one hundredth anniversary of the founding of the United States.

1892 -- known as the "Deathbed Edition" (published three months before Whitman died).

In 2016, scholar Zachary Turpin discovered in the pages of an obscure New York newspaper, The Sunday Dispatch, a serialized biography written by Whitman, Life and Adventures of Emmett Lee Dickinson. Turpin described this work as “a fun, rollicking, creative, twisty, bizarre little book.” Whitman scholar Ed Folsom noted, “This discovery makes us rethink everything we thought we knew about Whitman’s career.”

Pictured at the left: Life and Adventures of Emmett Lee Dickinson, Walt Whitman's serialized biography of America's greatest poet, Emmett Lee Dickinson (Emily Dickinson's third cousin, twice removed -- at her request). This work was discovered by scholar Zachary Turpin in 2016.

Cowabunga!

7/12/2019

From our current affairs editor, Lemuel Stuart III:

“Lum may yer lang reek!” That’s the official greeting for Cow Appreciation Day – and the true and correct Cow Appreciation Day is July 15th. Don’t be fooled by specious attempts by some fast food chain to change the date in order to sell more chicken!

The history of CAD – established as July 15th by Emmett Lee Dickinson (Emily Dickinson’s third cousin, twice removed – at her request) – can be found HERE.

Cow Appreciation Day is co-sponsored by the American Library Association, and following the day's annual Parade of the Librarians, libraries across the United States provide cow rides for children of all ages throughout the day!

Above left: A librarian on the grounds of the Yale University Library provides children cow rides on Cow Appreciation Day. Above right: The ALA Cow Training Center on the grounds of the national headquarters of the American Library Association.

Below left: "The pedigree of prairies," one of Emmett Lee Dickinson's many poems about cows. Below right: Dickinson's poem inspired third cousin Emily to pen her poem, "The pedigree of honey."

By Emmett Lee Dickinson:

The pedigree of prairies
Does not concern the cow;
A clover, any time, to her
Is heavenly and how.

By Emily Dickinson:

The pedigree of honey
Does not concern the bee;
A clover, any time, to him
Is aristocracy.

Earlier this month, members of the Dickinson Organization of Poetry Enthusiasts (DOPE) traveled to Wisconsin, America’s Dairyland, one of Emmett Lee Dickinson's favorite places. Our travelogue, "Say Cheese," is HERE.

As part of our trip, we met with Ms. Ada Bricklebank-Grainger, the Secretary of Tourism and Agricultural Affairs for the state of Wisconsin. Ms. Bricklebank-Grainger obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in the hospitality industry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in Madison, Wisconsin, and she went on to earn a master's degree in Tourism Analytics and Revenue Management at the Wisconsin Lutheran College in Milwaukee.

Pictured at the right: Ada Bricklebank-Grainger, the Secretary of Tourism and Agricultural Affairs for the state of Wisconsin.

In our discussions with Ms. Bricklebank-Grainger, we discussed the noticeable – and alarming -- lack of cows in our travels through the state. She noted that the dearth of bovines, known as the Great Cow Shortage of the Twenty-Teens, was due to the immigration and resettlement of many cows in the Milk Belt of Europe.

“The consumption of milk has declined drastically in the United States and all of North America,” said Ms. Bricklebank-Grainger. “Children now drink more and more juice pouches, thanks to the Lactose Intolerance Scare of the 90’s and Twenty-Aughts.”

On July 15th, be sure to raise a glass -- a glass of milk -- to toast the cows of America on Cow Appreciation Day!

Below: Beatrice the Cow, mascot at the University of Wisconsin's Memorial Library in Madison.