A Psychological Interpretation Of Emily Dickinson's Modernity

Dickinson, as well as her poems, is a myth for people of all nationalities and at all times. Her long-time solitude, and her riddle-like poems ignite enthusiastic study by scholars all over the world from every conceivable perspective.This paper begins with a portfolio of Dickinson and the previous studies on her, which lead to indefinite explanations. Yet Dickinson's characteristic disobedience, obscurity and transcendence strikingly associate her with modernism, a movement long after her times. With Fromm's theory of disobedience, Bem's gender schema theory and Adler's theory of striving for superiority, this thesis interprets Dickinson's modernity by exploring Dickinson's unique psychology.Dickinson's disobedience is examined through Fromm's theory of disobedience. Her disobedience complex presented in her poems concerning nature, love, death and religion is carefully studied. Through disobedience, Dickinson develops into an independent as well as daring person, and bequeaths us the fruitful outcome of her disobedience, most importantly among which, her courage to disobey.Dickinson's obscurity is decoded through her gender schema, or a girlhood complex. Bem's Gender schema theory is employed to explain the formation of her girlhood complex, which involves taking gender into account when making decisions about life. Thus, Dickinson chooses withdrawal, a moderate way of rebellion, to seek absolute freedom, which causes others'endless suspicion over her life. Dickinson invents her own way of composing, such as her obscure diction and syntax, excessive use of dashes and systematic titlelessness. All of them attribute to blur her true thoughts and confuse semantic meanings, which make her poems abstract and open to various interpretations. Dickinson's transcendence is explored through Alfred Adler's theory of striving for superiority. Dickinson's alienation is proposed to account for her feeling of inferiority. And Dickinson's striving for superiority is well examined in the present study. With extraordinary insight and arduous efforts, Dickinson finally attains her aim to be a poet and makes her poetry a great treasure of world culture heritage.With detailed analysis, this paper facilitates readers'appreciation of Dickinson's gem-like poems and sheds some light upon her incomparable achievement. It is also hoped that this thesis may benefit those who want to achieve self-realization of which Dickinson is a good example.