Conversion Factors

I’ve been posting info about Dickinson’s poem “I think I was enchanted” – which, like the previous poem I wrote about, “I have never seen ‘Volcanoes,’” seems to be more than a bit autobiographical in that Dickinson herself is the “sombre girl” who was “enchanted” – with her gift for writing poetry.  

NOTE:  The pic below includes the poem as published on the left and Dickinson's alternate word choices highlighted in red (and one in blue) on the right. 

The result of this enchantment” was a “Conversion of the mind.”  Check out the 5th and 6th stanzas:

The Days – to Mighty Metres stept –
The Homeliest – adorned
As if unto a Jubliee
’Twere suddenly confirmed –
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​I could not have defined the change –
Conversion of the Mind
Like Sanctifying in the Soul –
Is witnessed – not explained –

This change was indefineable, and it is described as by Dickinson a conversion to “Divine Insanity” (line 25).

From Susan Kornfeld’s analysis of the poem: 

“It is, the sombre Girl realizes, what is considered sanity that poses the real danger. Should she find herself succumbing to it, however, she has the antidote right at hand:  ‘Tomes of Solid Witchcraft’ – that is to say, books of poetry. The poet/magician may be asleep in death, but her magic/poems live on in divine immortality.”
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​All of this calls to mind an earlier poem by Dickinson, “Much Madness is divinest Sense” – talk about something written in 1862 that defines our current social and political climate.  Hmm…that also reminds me of the very famous opening to a very famous novel (published in 1859) – an opening that seems to describe our modern age.  

I’ll post that and info on Dickinson’s “Much Madness” tomorrow.