17 pages • 34 minutes read
Emily DickinsonTo make a prairie
Emily DickinsonFiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1896A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Background
Literary Context: Transcendentalism
Transcendentalism was a 19th-century literary movement that coincided with Emily Dickinson poetry production. Scholars define Transcendentalism as “an American literary, philosophical, religious, and political movement of the early nineteenth century, centered around Ralph Waldo Emerson” ("Transcendentalism." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2003). Dickinson herself was not considered a Transcendentalist, though her work is couched within and inspired by other Transcendentalist authors such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Margaret Fuller. Transcendentalists often critiqued society and wrote against conformity. Some academics have argued that Dickinson’s work contains hints of Transcendentalism throughout a selection of her poems, declaring,
She appears to search for the universal truths and investigate the circumstances of the human condition: sense of life, immortality, God, faith, place of man in the universe. Emily Dickinson questions absolutes and her argumentation is multisided. The poetic technique that she uses involves making abstract concrete” ("Transcendental Legacy in Literature." American Transcendentalism Web).
Some could argue that “To make a prairie” features some of these themes. The reverie espoused in the poem represents self-reliance and innovation (“Self-reliance” being the name of one of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s most famous essays). Also, the discussion of industry and creating a place for oneself attempts to answer the question of purpose and belonging. Though influenced by the Transcendentalist movement around her, Emily Dickinson belongs more solidly in the camp of American Romanticism: Her work focuses on Romantic ideals such as nature, emotions, and psychology.
Historical Context: Westward Expansion
One important historical context to keep in mind while reading Emily Dickinson’s poem “To make a prairie” is that of Westward Expansion. During the time Emily Dickinson was alive in the 19th century, settlers still explored and claimed territories, and government entities finalized borders. When Dickinson was a young girl, “nearly 7 million Americans—40 percent of the nation’s population—lived in the trans-Appalachian West” (“Westward Expansion.” History.com, 2019). In 1803, Thomas Jefferson purchased Louisiana from France, and in 1843 the Great Emigration took place as 1,000 individuals traveled the Oregon Trail to try their chance at the American Dream. In 1820, the United States territories further grew with Missouri joining the nation as a slave state and Maine joining as a free state according to the Missouri Compromise. In 1837, Texas gained its independence from Mexico and joined the United States in 1846, followed a few months later by Oregon. Texas joined as a slave state while Oregon joined as a free state. This constant dance of slave versus free states shows the political tension that existed in Congress and that would eventually erupt in the Civil War.
After the Mexican American War ended in 1848, the United States gained another 1 million square miles of territory. The proposed creation of two new states in 1854, Kansas and Nebraska, fueled the debate over whether those states would be free or permit slavery. When Stephen Douglas proposed the idea of “popular sovereignty” to allow the inhabitants of those states to decide whether they would enter the union as slave or free states, bloodshed ensued as civil war erupted in Kansas. This civil war expanded nationwide by 1861 and lasted until 1865. The act of Westward Expansion was inextricably tied with the concept of Manifest Destiny. Manifest Destiny was a term originated by John L. O’Sullivan, a magazine editor, in 1845. The term came to refer to “the supposed inevitability of the continued territorial expansion of the boundaries of the United States westward to the Pacific and beyond” (Heidler, Jeanne T. “Manifest Destiny.” Britannica, 2022). Settlers associated Manifest Destiny with freedom, opportunity, and success—the chance to make their own American Dream a reality.
In her poem “To make a prairie,” Dickinson takes a very distinct landscape as her subject. Prairies were (and still are) symbolic of the Western/Northwestern Great Plains areas. For someone who lived her whole life in New England, the choice to write about a prairie may be curious to some until the historical context delineated above is taken into account. Also, prairies are very open spaces, full of opportunities for development and expansion, which perfectly aligns with the tenets of Manifest Destiny. Dickinson’s portrayal of the industry of the bee parallels the hard work and determination pioneers needed to succeed out West, while the visionary reverie was also needed to see the possibilities of what this new life might look like.
Unlock all 17 pages of this Study GuidePlus, gain access to 8,800+ more expert-written Study Guides.
Including features:
Related Titles
By Emily Dickinson
