It Was Not Death For I Stood Up - Essay Plan on 'Intense Emotions'

“As if my life were shaven,

            And fitted to a frame”

Discuss ways in which Dickinson presents intense emotions in ‘It was not Death’.

Introduction

Intense emotions are important to the work of Dickinson. We see this in the poem ‘I heard a Fly buzz – when I died’ where the “Fly” causes the speaker to suffer ultimate panic as a result of their fear. Intense emotions are also seen in the poem ‘After great pain a formal feeling comes’ where the headache “go[es] round” and so the pain never comes to an end. However, it is in ‘It was not Death, for I stood up’ that we see the most clear depiction of intense emotions in Dickinson’s work. The poem explores the sadness felt by the speaker as a result of not dying, but instead having to suffer in entrapment and be “shaven”.

Symbol

‘It was not Death’

-          fearful of being entrapped – over takes her – “fitted to a frame” – capture and hiding from society – fearful of being trapped

-          intense emotions – seen through pathetic fallacy – “grisly frosts” – danger coming – possibly death

-          capture prevents her dying – “all the dead lie down” – her ultimate goal – death will provide happiness – depressed

‘There’s a certain slant of light’

-          “Heavenly hurt” – light brings upon pain – likewise entraps – she is afraid of it – light should be positive but makes her feel sad – deified emphasising the pain

Structure

‘It was not Death’

-          “marble feet” – further preventing escape – weighs down the line – disharmony of her world reflected

-          shorter lines – something missing – speaker not telling the reader everything – could be due to fear – embeds a sense of loss through each alternating line being short

-          solid rhyme – emphasises death is happiness – around” “ground” – desire to be dead

‘I heard a Fly buzz’

-          in comparison – lack of structure as a result of pain – fearful of the fly – wants to reach heaven

-          restricted verse form as stuck and trapped by the fly

Other

‘It was not Death’

-          use of synaesthesia – “tasted like them all” – strong depression – she feels things she shouldn't – infecting her mouth – yet it can’t be tasted – her emotions are mixed

-          repetition – “And” – longing to the audience to escape capture and die to be happy – listing out her suffering – anaphora – panic of not dying

‘One need not be a Chamber’

-          “gallop” – metaphor for a gentleman on horseback – taking the speaker to a place where their emotions aren't present – hope and happiness replace these

Conclusion

Ultimately, intense emotions are crucial to Dickinson’s work. In ‘After great pain a formal feeling comes’, though the headache is still present and so causing pain, happiness is felt as the speaker enters the “hour of lead”, symbolising the aftermath and the pain becoming a bearable emotion. But it is in ‘It was not Death, for I stood up’ where we see the most effective use of intense emotions. Through the speaker being “fitted to a frame”, not only are they physically trapped, but their emotions and captured and so making it impossible for the speaker to feel anything but pain.

It Was Not Death For I Stood Up - Essay Plan on 'Hope'

How does Dickinson present hope in ‘It was not death, for I stood up’ and elsewhere in her work

Introduction

Hope is important to the work of Dickinson. We see this in the poem ‘I heard a Fly buzz’ where her hopes of reaching heaven are cut short but the Fly “interposing” between herself and the light. Hope is also seen in the poem ‘There’s a certain slant of light’ where the character feels “despair” as result of her lost hope as she feels punished my God. However, it is in ‘It was not death, for I stood up’ that we see the most clear depictions of hope in Dickinson’s work. The poem explores how death is portrayed as ultimate hope and the disappointment that comes with being alive as she “stood up”.

Symbol

‘It was not death…’

-          lost hope as a result of capture

-          captured “fitted to a frame” – hiding from society – must change – needs to be normal – lacks the hope to do this as she is not dead

-          “without a key” – no way to get out – wants an end – death is hope

-          “all the dead lie down” – wants to be dead – depressed – ultimate hope and dream 

‘After great pain…’

-          likewise death is ultimate hope

-          “the letting go” – wants this more than anything – she can’t die – hope absent

Structure

‘It was not death…’

-          iambic tetrametre and trimetre

-          solid rhyme – emphasises death is happiness – ultimate wish – “around” “ground” – rhyming of “ground” – emphasises desire to be dead

-          pararhyme – lost hope – “crawl” “cool”

-          regularity of stanzas – no/lack of hope

‘This world is not conclusion’

-          in comparison least regularity of structure means most hope – no stop to poem – scared – don’t want to loose hope

-          hyphens represent no conclusion to any line – afterlife is good – hope for a better future

Other

‘It was not death…’

-          anaphora – repeating words for effect – “And”- panic of not dying – ambition to die

-          last stanza – hyphens – spacing words – getting further apart – losing hope even more – “report of land” – like a boat getting further away from land

‘I felt a funeral…’

-          repetition – “down” – hell – falling into nothing – no happy future – no prospect of death – just lost – in another world – not want she wanted – no hope for her

Conclusion

Ultimately, hope is crucial to Dickinson’s work. However as death is ultimately impossible in many of Dickinson’s poems, hope becomes absent but yet remains an aspiration. Pain and suffering will never end and so the desire of hope becomes unrealistic and a fantasy. It is in ‘It was not death, for I stood up’ that we see the most effective use as the hatred for capture and “stopless” leads to all chance of hope being lost. 

It Was Not Death For I Stood Up - Notes

It was not death, for I stood up,
And all the dead lie down.
It was not night, for all the bells
Put out their tongues for noon.


It was not frost, for on my flesh
I felt siroccos crawl,
Nor fire, for just my marble feet
Could keep a chancel cool.

And yet it tasted like them all,
The figures I have seen
Set orderly for burial
Reminded me of mine,

As if my life were shaven
And fitted to a frame
And could not breathe without a key,
And ’twas like midnight, some,

When everything that ticked has stopped
And space stares all around,
Or grisly frosts, first autumn morns,
Repeal the beating ground;

But most like chaos, stopless, cool,
Without a chance, or spar,
Or even a report of land
To justify despair.

Useful link: http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/notdeath.html

Theme:

Physical entrapment, sensory details, pain, anguish, overwhelming despair, death

Symbol:

Idea of abstraction , paradoxical state of mind and body
Having difficulty in identifying her own situation, and the source of her torment ® use pronoun “it”

-        Death of inner life – “lying down” while in reality, she is “standing up
 l    Living dead, soul being entrapped within the “frame”, contradiction between volition and the brutal reality

-        When the “grisly frosts” “repeal the ground” ‘s vitality® constitutes an oxymoron, implying an underlying relief in the abandonment of life ; feeling of suspension in life in earth mirrors the speaker’s emotional experience  ® the pulsation of life is obliterated by frosts.

-         One technique that gives order to her description is the parallelism or repetition of "it was not" followed by the reason for her eliminating a possibility; the speaker knows she can't be dead, because she is standing up; the blackness engulfing her isn't night, because the noon-time bells are ringing; nor is the chill she feels physical cold, because she feels hot as well as cold

-         The series of antithesis in the first two verses which coalesce in the third, where the dead remind the persona of herself.  These opposites are thereby resolved in the mind of the Dickinson’s persona, who then proceeds to state what her state of mind is most like.  

-          “fitted to a frame”® claustrophobic, fear of being confined in a particular place ® yet this contradicts with “space stares”® “space” connotations of freedom, liberty® uncomfortable in both of these places ®there’s no ending for her, no matter she is free or trapped

Structure: 

Iambic tetrameter and trimeter: follow the familiar hymn structure when most Dickinson’s poems strive  ® articulate sensations and emotional experiences, which are beyond the reach of words

o   The diminished trimetre emobodies the unspeakable pain, torment that could not be depicted.

o   Regular iambic tetrameter and trimetre epitomises the “frame”® she is destined to be entrapped within this world® even upon her speech

-          Opening  with logical structure that begun with negative definition, then refined and developed in the imagery of stanzas 3-5, with the purposive syntax “but most”, writer is creating a semblance of climax that the deliverance/ending could be found ® yet vanquished by the inability to even “justify despair”

-          Punctuation, usually so helpful in making the meaning clear, isn't here. Instead, the silence that takes its place is meant to warn and make us wary, to pause and parry, so that we lurch and linger—and turn back to the emphatic import of every capitalized noun.

-          Rhyming pattern exemplifies her fluctuation of emotion® solid rhyme, pararhyme

o   pararhyme: “down” , “noon”: disharmony from world has invaded into the rhymes ® she is unsettled

o   solid rhyme:  “seen”, “mine” : presence of these suggesting her calmness in mind could only be attained when the idea of death aroused in her mind

Key Features:

-          “chaos”, “stopless”, “cool” ® separated by hyphens to give them equal prominence

o   coined word “stopless” creates sense of momentum and shipwreck metaphor which follows reflects the emphasis on desolation

o   contrast between “chaos” and “cool” which give a sense of calmness, everything in the world is antithetical ® world is the cyclone whereas the poet herself is in the eye of the storm ® the co-existence of destruction and calmness give prominence to the idea that the trap/ despair is “stopless” ® there is no power to control it ® wait to be brought to trialled in serenity

-          “to justify despair”

o   undermines the attempt made to define by logic the irrationality of extreme emotion

o   despair could only exist providing that there is a presence of hope

o   ironically, if her condition were any of the possibilities she rejected at the beginning of the poem, there might be hope or possibility of change. If asleep, she might awaken; if in a stupor, she might be roused; if dead, she might be resurrected. Thus, her condition is worse than despair, causes more anguish than despair, and allows for no possibility of cure.

-          “without a chance or spar”, “or even a report of land”

o   psychological shipwreck imagery of her drifting further and further, sense of powerlessness, fear for the unknown while being already entrapped within the obscurity

-          “it tasted like all of them."

o   using a synesthetic image (tasting death, darkness, and cold) to show that her state affects every aspect of her life and that different states have become merged and indistinguishable

-          “everything ticked has stopped”

o   time has stopped® her depression is ceaseless that even time beomes “stopless” to her

-          “felt sicroccos crawl”

o   state of passiveness® could only feel with the possibility of vision being blocked ® crawling flesh is physically most unsettling.

o   Use of enjambement here ® the poem crawls over itself over to stand out® the inability to control her source of suffering

-          “not fire, for just my marble feet”

o    Just her feet could cool a chancel; she is presented synecdochally to be a marble statue but her feet alone could cool the chancel.

-          “and..and..and”

o   anaphora® shows blind panic, originates due to her life being “shaven”® repetition also suggest the cyclical entrapment in her life

CONCLUSION

Since the moment of “her life being fitted to a frame”, the attempt to “justify despair” even becomes futile and ludicrous.

MAIN QUOTATIONS:

-          “my life were shaven and fitted to a frame”,

-           “cannot breather without a key” .

-          “space stares”

-          “justify despair”

-          “figures set orderly, for burial”

RHYMES:

-          “down, noon”

“seen, mine”