White Heat: The Friendship of Emily Dickinson and Thomas Wentworth Higginson

Read it for the fascinating character study of Dickinson, nothing more.

I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!

This is all I remember about Emily Dickinson, reclusive poet extraordinaire. One of my English teachers in high school would start her class every single day by making us recite this poem. A little strange, but I guess she didn't want any of us arrogant teenagers to get a big head. We're "nobodies".

The subtitle of this book says it all. This is the story of the odd "friendship" (although I don't know if I would call it that) between Dickinson and Higginson, an extreme abolitionist. Dickinson, who lived a hermit-like existence, never venturing beyond her father's gates, sent Higginson, an occasional contributor to various publications, some poems for critique. Calling him the "master" and herself the "pupil", Dickinson respected his opinion immensely. Higginson was one of the only visitors she would ever allow to see her, begging him to visit her in Amherst. We learn many things as both of their lives intertwine, including the fact that Higginson was the leader (not Robert Gould Shaw, as the movie Glory would attest) of the first Union regiment made up of ex-slaves. We are also introduced to Dickinson's family, who most of the time respected Emily's need for solitude, as well as Mabel Todd, Emily's brother's mistress. Todd and Higginson published Dickinson's poems posthumously, editing with a heavy hand. Since Emily only published on her own terms, the reader is made to wonder if she would have preferred to remain unknown, even in death.

Wineapple does a fine job of thoroughly researching her characters. However, while Emily Dickinson herself is a fascinating study, a 318 page book about a friendship can get a little dull.


MY RATING - 3/5

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An Interesting Book, but Wild Nights, Wild Nights by Daniela Gioseffi Reveals More

This is an interesting and well done book by Wineapple. Higginson is very important in the life of America's most iconic woman poet, but I've just read WILD NIGHTS, WILD NIGHTS by Daniela Gioseffi, a Dickinson scholar and an American Book Award Winning poet, who has discovered the latest research and revelatory truth concerning Emily Dickinson's Master Figure. Gioseffi expands on the research of Ruth Owen Jones in The Emily Dickinson Journal. Jones, a guide at the Dickinson Museum in Amherst, and a historian of Amherst, discovered who the Master figure in Dickinson's texts was, and Gioseffi's book, subtitled; THE STORY OF EMILY DICKINSON's MASTER; NEIGHBOR AND FRIEND AND BRIDEGROOM, has dramatized that truth, based on her own non-fiction afterword: LOVER OF SCIENCE AND SCIENTIST IN DARK DAYS OF THE REPUBLIC. Gioseffi peppers her novel with poems by Dickinson to show their origin and the impulse for their writing. Gioseffi, with Jones, has solved the greatest mystery in American literature: Who the Master Figure of Dickinson's texts really was. WILD NIGHTS, WILD NIGHTS, titled with a quote from a Dickinson love poem, makes for a very exciting book, indeed. Gioseffi captures the tone and style of Dickinson and her era very well, bringing the drama of the poet to life, and giving us a real window into the mysterious life of this great American writer--showing us what prompted her writing, why she did not publish much in her lifetime, and who influenced her output. Gioseffi's book, just published in 2010, really undoes the myths surrounding Emily Dickinson as a spinster poet and gives us the truth of her poetry, particularly her erotic love poems. The book demonstrates the importance of Emerson and Higginson as well as others in Emily Dickinson's story, especially the MASTER figure, a swashbuckling hero of the Civil War and the first European Ph.D. scientist of Amherst College. Read and discover who he was. The story is fascinating.