The Life and works of Emily Dickenson.

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One of America's most well respected poets is Emily Dickinson. Although she never personally received credit for her work, it continues to receive great recognition today. Through her successful poems we get a better idea of her life, views on religion, and feelings about love.

Emily Dickinson was born on December 10, 1830 in Amherst, Massachusetts. Her father, Edward, was a lawyer, legislator, and Calvinist. He was a stern religious man who required his family to attend Sunday School. In her late teens, Dickinson refused to call herself a believing Christian. She spent numerous years at a primary school and also studied classics at Amherst Academy. As a youthful teen, she lived an average and active life. This is when she began writing poetry consisting of occasional verses and valentines. She enrolled at South Hadley Seminary for Women, but withdrew within a year due to ill health. After her departure from school she returned home to spend the rest of her life maintaining family and household duties.

Several of Emily Dickinson's friends were men. In 1848 she met Benjamin Newton and he became her guide for reading. That soon ended due to his marriage and sudden death from Tuberculosis in 1853. She then met Reverend Charles Wadsworth in 1854, which she referred to as her "dearest earthly friend." Over the eight years she was in close contact with him her writing increased, but it grew drastically after he moved to

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San Francisco in 1862. Soon after Wadsworth's exit from her life, Dickinson began spending time with Thomas Higginson. He was a Civil War hero and literary critic who she sent some of her writings to. He began to make her feel as though he was ridiculing her work. Some critics believe that his pessimistic response...
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