Emily Dickenson and Walt Whitman

A detailed Summary of Emily Dickenson and Walt Whitman

I chose to write about Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman. These two were obviously two very important and talent poets who focused on very different themes. Emily Dickinson focused greatly on self-awareness as opposed to Walt Whitman who focused on nature. The first on I am going to talk about is Walt Whitman.

The first poem I chose to write about is from "By the Roadside" and the poem is called when I Heard the Learned Astronomer. I chose this poem not only because it caught my eye, but because I think it really showed how much he truly loved and valued nature. In the poem I think he is talking about sitting through an astronomy class listening to the astronomer lecture. He is saying to most people learning the mathematical part of astronomy may be interesting, but when he listens to it, it makes him sick. When I first read this I wondered why the astronomer made him sick since I know he does love nature so much and stars are a part of nature. Then I realized he loves nature as is, and that is does not need to be analyzed and figured out. It made him sick hearing the lecture. Only when he got back outside into nature and looked into the beautiful stars hearing their silence did he fe

The next poem I chose was number 241 on page 1196. The theme of this poem is very different. It does again talk about death, but this time not her own. The theme of this poem I would say is truth. The first line of this poem says it all. It says, "I like the look of agony, Because I know it is true." Emily Dickinson likes seeing people for who they are and in this poem she is showing that many people do not show who they really are unless they are feeling something like agony in which they can not hold their feelings back. She thinks there are certain things men can not fake and one of them is pain. Emily has an impression of the world, especially men, that they are never their true selves until something unpleasant comes about. The next part, "The eyes glaze once - and that is death - impossible to feign," shows again that you can not fake death. In this poem she is not only trying to show that the world is full of fake people and untruthfulness, but that she herself is not one of these people. By writing this poem along with others, she shows how much she does not trust anyone. Emily has the fear to get close to anyone, and part of not trusting anyone is the fact that she is afraid to do so. In most her poems she focuses on self-awareness, because she is afraid to know or trust anyone else but herself.

The next poem that I chose is called, Once I Passed Through A Populous City. I chose this on essentially because I came across a different theme besides nature. The overall theme of this poem is love, not love of nature, which I did not see a lot of in the rest of his writings. Whitman talks abo

Some common words found in the essay are:
Emily Dickinson, Populous City, Learned Astronomer, Walt Whitman, emily dickinson, theme poem, walt whitman, poem chose, death poem, poem talks, nature poem, love woman, love nature, emily fear,

Approximate Word count = 1096
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English