Ｏｎ Ｅｍｉｌｙ Ｄｉｃｋｉｎｓｏｎ’ｓ “Ｓｕｃｃｅｓｓ ｉｓ Ｃｏｕｎｔｅｄ Ｓｗｅｅｔｅｓｔ”

[摘要]迪金森是駕馭生死、成敗、愛恨等對立主題的天才。通過隱喻、偏離、象征等藝術(shù)手段，詩人展現(xiàn)給讀者一個(gè)處處充滿矛盾的世界。

[關(guān)鍵詞]迪金森 成功 悖論

One of the finest lyric poets in the English language， Emily Dickinson was born in Amherst， Massachusetts in 1830 to a politically prominent family headed by the father， Edward Dickinson， a lawyer， and a Congressman. Her strangely eventless life has long been the source of complex interpretations: She attended Mount Holyoke Female Seminary in South Hadley， but returned home after one year due to severe homesickness. Ever since then， she began to gradually withdraw from village activities and ceased to leave home except for short trips to visit relatives. Unmarried， she died in her father's house in 1886.

Dickinson was not publicly recognized during her lifetime. The wave of posthumous publications gave Dickinson's poetry its first real public exposure. In 1955 Thomas H. Johnson prepared for Harvard University Press a three-volume edition， chronologically arranged. Here， The Johnson text of the 1，775 extant poems is now the standard one.

As a keen observer of nature and a wise interpreter of human passion， she presents the common subjects of earthly life such as love， death， and nature in depth and intensity. The chief tension in her work comes from her inability to accept the orthodox religious faith of her day and her longing for its spiritual comfort. She is keen on treating antithesis， she alternates confident statements of belief with lyrics of despairing uncertainty that were both reverent and rebellious， and she switches between seeing nature as a testament to the glory of Creation and as a symbol of transient.

If what she writes is considered both simple and deep， how she writes gets the reputation of being original and creative. Instead of presenting her thoughts and feelings directly to the reader， Dickinson conveys her subtle emotion by an1ing ordinary referential correspondences between words and things. By disturbing the originality of the authoritative language， she presents the reader a different reality. Drawing from primarily musical forms such as hymns and ballads， and modifying them with her own sense of rhythm and sound， a Dickinson poem is unusual in that it both slows down and speeds up， interrupts itself， holds its breath， and sometimes trails off. The reader is led through the poem by the shape of her stanza forms， typically quatrains， her idiosyncratic vocabulary and imagery， and her unusual emphasis of words， either through capitalization or line position. \"Success is Counted Sweetest\" can serve as an illustration.

As is known， one aspect of Emily Dickinson's talent， among other things， is how she can catch accurately and represent originally the antithetical relationships in human life， such as death and immortality， love and loneliness， joy and sorrow， as well as success and failure. Her choice of living life internally within the confines of her home brought her world into sharp focus， rather than impinge upon her creative sensibilities. As Michael Myers points out， \"Dickinson found irony， ambiguity， and paradox lurking in the simplest and commonest experiences.\" In The poem \"success is counted sweetest\"， Dickinson provokes as well as moves the reader to understand， however reluctantly， that life is really full of paradoxes.

In this poem， Dickinson disturbs the peace of our mind right with the opening statement: \"Success is counted sweetest， by those who never succeed. To comprehend nectar， requires the sorest needs\" Here， The dilemma is obvious: Those who want success most can never get it， while those we achieve success cannot understand it. In either case， the enthusiastically pursued success turns meaningless.

Then the next two stanzas visualizes the readers an image of a defeated soldier who heard the cheering of victors as he lay dying. \" Distant\" and \"forbidden\" and \"agonized\" as those cheers are， the soldier， more than anyone else， heard them \"clear\" with his lingering flicker of consciousness. One can hardly disagree that in such a case， victory is desired and valued most by the defeated， since it is they rather than the winners that have tasted the misery of failure， of being deprived of the \"nectar\" of victory. If so， Isn't is perplexing that if one knows and wants success too much， he is doomed a failure， and at the same time， if one succeeds， he can never fully appreciate the values of winning.

Conventional as the topic of success and failure seems， Dickinson finds complex meaning latent in them. Furthermore， her unconventional interpretation of those conventional themes is conveyed via her unconventional innovative literary style: her ingenious choice of words， her verbal constructions， her deviational usage of capitalization and dash display how creative she is when trying to defy the poetic norms that stood in the way of the intensity of her thought and her images. Her poetic language like \" forbidden ear\"， \" Purple host\"， \"sorest need\"， \"comprehend a nectar\" both deviates from the conventional form anddisturbs the authoritative principle of language and saves herself from using limited languages that equate words and things.

Reynolds declares that Dickinson's supposed \"representativeness lies in her incomparable flexibility， her ability to be by turns coy， fierce， domestic， romantic， protofeminist， antifeminist， prudish， erotic\". Dickinson's poetry is challenging because her poems require active engagement from the reader， because she seems to leave out so much with her elliptical style and remarkable contracting metaphors. But these apparent gaps are filled with meaning if we are sensitive to her use of devices such as personification， allusion， symbolism， and startling syntax and grammar. her poetry has an undeniable capacity to move and provoke. If there is something left for the readers to for the basis of their readings， it is only her language and her texts that are there that is called Emily Dickinson.

References:

[1]Thomas H. Johnson. The Letters of Emily Dickinson[M]. Cambridge. Mass :Harward University Press，1958.197-198.

[2]Richard B Sewall. The Life of Emily Dickinson Farrar， Straus and Giroux [M]. New York: 1980.136.

（作者單位：浙江杭州電子科技大學(xué)）