Since Wednesday, Emily is Everyone's Friend.

Despite having lived over a century ago, many still consider Emily Dickinson to be a very significant figure in their lives, and it's due in large part to her poetry. One could say there is a sort of friendship between readers and her Poetry (and, by extension, the author herself). Mabel Todd, another avid reader of Dickinson, said it pretty well:

  

“The poems were having a wonderful effect on me, mentally and spiritually. They seemed to open the door into a wider universe than the little sphere surrounding me which so often hurt and compressed me… they helped me nobly through a very trying time.”

She's right: whenever I'm feeling down, I take a trip to Houghton Library over at Harvard College, where I can freely peruse through hundreds of poems and letters that Emily wrote by hand, at first marveling at how her handwriting influences the visual style of her poetry ("Wow! The dashes!), and then smiling as I come across an occasional dried, flattened flower amongst the pages.

Eventually, reading grows tiresome, and I go upstairs to the Dickinson Room to -- you know -- hang out.

And as I stroll past various furniture and paintings of the Dickinson family, I'm eventually confronted by a writing table: the writing table Emily used. Suddenly, I'm in the mood for something else. I want to see Emily's radical letters.

At Amherst College, one finds a whole other collection of Dickinson-related material. I, myself, am most interested in the various "scraps" held at these exhibits: poems written on envelopes, shopping lists, and grocery bags; and rough drafts of her poetry, with markings and notes of her creative process that serve as a snapshot of her efforts to push the boundaries of her work. (She definitely wanted these things to be readily available for public scrutiny).

 But you might be interested in another exhibit that Amherst College happens to be affiliated with: the Emily Dickinson Museum, where you can browse through her letters to friends and family, look at daguerreotypes of herself and her family, or check out strands of Emily's hair. All of the above would look great in a scrapbook.

Austin, brother of Emily Dickinson, and Mabel Todd, aforementioned reader and editor of Emily's manuscripts, on display, featuring the baggage of their now-publicly known affair.

By now, you must be thinking -- as I am -- "All these collections feel a bit scattered." And you're exactly right; in fact, Harvard and Amherst have always had a bit of a rivalry between them, regarding their respective Emily Dickinson collections.  This feud can be traced back to the labors of getting Emily's work printed. 

Emily's aversion to publication is very well known -- one need only reference 788:

Publication – is the Auction

Of the Mind of Man –

Poverty – be justifying

For so foul a thing

Possibly – but We – would rather

From Our Garret go

White – unto the White Creator –

Than invest – Our Snow –

Thought belong to Him who gave it –

Then – to Him Who bear

It's Corporeal illustration – sell

The Royal Air –

In the Parcel – Be the Merchant

Of the Heavenly Grace –

But reduce no Human Spirit

To Disgrace of Price –

And in many ways, her very life and soul was auctioned to Amherst and Harvard by two opposing parties: Mabel Todd and the surviving Dickinsons, respectively. The very origin of this fracture can be traced to Mabel Todd and Lavinia Dickinson (Emily's sister) in particular: the former was the main editor and transcriber of Emily's poetry, and later vanguarded an effort to collect the letters Emily wrote to friends and acquaintances; the latter discovered Emily's collection of manuscripts, several dozen hand-bound volumes of her work, as well as the subsequent "scraps." 

The two, in turn, not only felt that they each owned as much of Emily's poetry as the other, but that they were an authority on all things Emily Dickinson: her character, her personality, and her life.  When the two parties finally broke apart, the original manuscripts were scattered among a variety of sources: Yale, Smith College, Boston, Vassar College, the Library of Congress... but the majority was concentrated between Amherst and Harvard.

However, on the 23rd of October (so, like, yesterday) the Emily Dickinson Archive was finally launched: a joint effort among all the Dickinson "owners" fronted by Harvard. This electronic archive aims to provide digital scans of Emily's manuscripts to the public for free, alongside transcriptions and annotations from selected historical and scholarly editions. Cool, right? Her thought now belongs not to him who bear it, or Amherst, or Harvard, but to everyone.

But, behind the scenes, the rivalry continues. Amherst is still angry. Why? Well, Harvard has retained direct control over the site and archive, so it isn't really a joint project. Furthermore, the site was originally supposed to be a subscription service, until Amherst demanded it be open to the general public, free of charge.

And, most crucial of all, everyone visiting the archives should know that not all the manuscripts are on the site, only those relating to the poems published in Ralph Franklin's volumes of Poems of Emily Dickinson. However, the site claims that more manuscripts will be added in the future, so time will tell if all of Emily's preserved work will be available to the public.

In the midst of all this, one asks an obvious question:"How would have Emily reacted to all this?" And although this project is non-profit, one can still be shaken at how transparent the life and soul of Emily Dickinson has become. But it is clear that time and digital distribution has not given way to moral considerations. With this, a new consideration arises. I find myself less concerned with who Emily Dickinson was, and more interested in what she will become.

Sources:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/23/books/enigmatic-dickinson-revealed-online.html?pagewanted=2&_r=0

http://www.edickinson.org/about

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/10/19/trove-emily-dickinson-manuscripts-appear-online/5NWTLLg5qM8WjF0Hjb8LzH/story.html?s_campaign=sm_tw

http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2013/10/23/harvard-amherst-dickinson-archives/?utm_source=Email+Newsletter&utm_campaign=a64b1a42c9-10_23_2013&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_160d75b318-a64b1a42c9-17487993