Emily Dickinson

"Fame is a fickle food upon a shifting plate."

     Emily Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts on December 10,1830. Emily was one of the greatest poets of her time. She only published 7 poems in her life time. Emily's brother married Susan Gilbert, her close friend, and later Susan became the one person Emily would read her poems to. When Emily wrote, she did not care about money or fame. When she died on May 15, 1886, of kidney disease, on her death bed she told her sister to burn all of her poems. So her sister had the poems published, and burned the originals!

     Emily Dickinson dared to be different many times in her life. For example, in her writing, she followed her own feelings and wrote about things she cared about from her life. Unlike most people of her time, Emily did not care about fame or money when she was writing. To her, to experience the sun rise and the sun set was a fortune of its own. Emily once said,"People say a word dies when it is written by the pen, but for me that word's life is just about to begin".  And true to her word, Emily's poems lived on. Emily's poems have touched many lives with their beauty, wonder, and exquisite words, along with their ecstatic point of view. All in all, Emily Dickinson in her life, writing, and very existence, dared to be different.

Web Page researched and created by Kimberly

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