Tuesday, January 6, 2009

What imagery is used in Emily Dickinson's "Because I Could Not Stop For Death?" Is it visual, tactile, auditory etc.?

Dickinson uses visual and tactile but no auditory imagery in this poem to describe death.


In this poem, death is pictured as a gentleman in a carriage. While we as readers don't get a physical description of the appearance of the gentleman Death, we do learn that he is civil and we get a picture of the leisurely carriage ride, carried on without haste, that the narrator takes with Death. 


In the third stanza, more visual imagery is introduced. The carriage passes a school where children play at recess, as well as fields of "gazing" grain and a setting sun. 


In the fourth stanza, the narrator introduces tactile imagery in the form of cold weather. The narrator mentions the "chill" and the dew "quivering." The narrator wears only a thin gown, made of "gossamer," so we can imagine her feeling the chill. Coldness and chill are not familiar sensory images used to describe death. 


In the fifth stanza, the visual imagery returns as the narrator describes a "house," which is, in fact, a grave: "a swelling of the ground." 


In the final stanza, the narrator uses another visual image, saying that the "horses' heads" leading the carriage are headed towards eternity. Eternity is an abstract concept, but the idea that we are in a carriage pulled by horses slowly leading us toward eternity (death) is something we can see. 

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