tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post4439097323114763365..comments2024-03-27T11:02:20.107-07:00Comments on the prowling Bee: If she had been the MistletoeSusan Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05384011972647144453noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-34839538094450708922024-02-19T22:54:02.960-08:002024-02-19T22:54:02.960-08:00In F 895 we have "Druidic Difference."In F 895 we have "Druidic Difference."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-40291196778833686772022-05-09T14:37:11.583-07:002022-05-09T14:37:11.583-07:00ED first met Stephen Bowles when he visited Amhers...ED first met Stephen Bowles when he visited Amherst in June 1858; In late 1858. Bowles, accompanied by his wife Mary, made another visit to Amherst. (Habegger 2002. My Wars Are Laid Away in Books, p.429). Franklin regards this poem as the earliest manuscript ED sent to Bowles, dating it early 1859; Habegger dates it September or October 1859” (Miller 2016. ED's Poems p744). <br /><br />“September 6, 1859, the Bowleses’ eleventh anniversary, was probably the occasion for Emily’s gift of a [rose] and this poem. Wife Mary is the rose, and friend Emily the mistletoe—weird, more Druid than Christian, and emphatically not “of the dew”. Boldly imagining what it would be like to trade places with the wife, [ED] makes doubly clear how offbeat she is” (Habegger 2002).<br /><br />Long a Shakespeare fan, ED must have intended the double entendre of lines 3-4, which she cleverly disguises by saying “How gay upon your table / My velvet life to close!” instead of using the word “die”, a common Elizabethan euphemism for orgasm; for example, in Much Ado About Nothing, Benedick tells Beatrice “I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thy eyes; and moreover I will go with thee to thy uncle's.”<br /><br />In any case, this is a dramatically cheeky poem to send a married man with two children and another on the way, especially after meeting him only twice. ED must have been out of her infatuated mind.<br />Larry Bhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02810899482852120751noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-54384726478113550512016-06-02T08:07:56.044-07:002016-06-02T08:07:56.044-07:00Thank you for this additional insight. It's st...Thank you for this additional insight. It's strange, now that I think about it, that Dickinson only used 'druid' only the two times. It seems so apt for her and her work.Susan Kornfeldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05384011972647144453noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-71234925957963924832016-06-02T05:42:26.292-07:002016-06-02T05:42:26.292-07:00All well said. I would only add a few minor observ...All well said. I would only add a few minor observations to yours. The first is that this poem was the very first manuscript known to have been given by Dickinson to "Mr. Bowles" (Samuel Bowles, the editor-in-chief of the Springfield Republican newspaper), a man who clearly had an arresting and powerful influence on Dickinson. In that manuscript the poet underlined the word "she" (Line 1) which immediately calls attention to the identity-play going on in the poem. "She" was not emphasized in any way in the poem Dickinson copied into Fascicle 2. I would also note that the word "Druid" does not appear anywhere else in the Dickinson oeuvre. The only reference to anything related to "Druid" occurs in a letter that she wrote to her neighbor Mrs. Henry Hills around 1883 (Letter 849). The letter inquired about a recipe for a sacred and unforgettable Cake that Mrs. Hills baked and sent over to the Dickinson household. The poet associated this miracle of sweetness to "a remembrance of nectar" and "Druidic odors" that brought back reverential memories of the Cake and its maker. --Stephen Eric Berry, Ann Arbor. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00928512218370715913noreply@blogger.com