Androgynous Ideal In Emily Dickinson's Works

As a great writer in American literature in the 20th century, Emily Dickinson has been noted for her strong insight and extraordinary perspective, and her works have greatly contributed to the development of world poetry. The subjects of the critical studies range from impressionism, new criticism, structuralism, psychoanalytical criticism, biography study, cultural criticism, feminism, dialogic criticism, reader response theory, phenomenology, deconstruction, to hermeneutic study.This thesis, from the point of feminism, intends to illustrate her fluid and changeable writing strategies and proposes her ideal of androgyny through the analysis of Emily Dickinson's letters and poems. The social significance of the ideal is proposed as well.Through detailed analysis of her letters to Susan, Holland, Austin and Higginson respectively, we can see the writing strategy represented in Emily Dickinson's letters and poems, is actually changing the role of gender, aiming to secure protection and self-defense, a kind of active choice. Emily Dickinson's constantly shifting of her role of gender reflects her conscious awareness of women's inferior status and she has made her way to change her status quo in her communication with her friends, family and the society. The conclusion is that Emily Dickinson has got the consciousness of the ideal of androgyny, which also represents her ideal about the human, the androgynous and harmonious coexistence of men and women.