What Is Emily Dickinson's View Of Human Understanding

(An explanation of Dickinson’s view on human understanding as shown in her poems) Famous Astrophysicist, Neil deGrasse Tyson, wrote, “The Universe is under no obligation to make sense to you”. The poet Emily Dickinson almost seems to capture a single moment in the vast cosmic perspective in her poems, and reading her works is as confusing as astrophysics. Dickinson lived from 1830 to 1886, and spend most of her later life secluded writing poetry. Dickinson was ahead of her time as she wrote in a unique style, and expressed thoughts that took decades to grasp. Above all else, Dickinson wrote about how she saw human understanding. Human understanding being the capacity of human's knowledge and understanding. Emily Dickinson presents the
Different from most of Dickinson’s other poems, Closed has a clear meaning and theme; specifically, death of a loved one opens hidden insights. The first stanza of Closed summarizes that the narrator has experienced the deaths of two people extremely dear to her, and doesn’t know if a third death will occur. The second stanza explains the deeper meaning. Dickinson discloses, “So huge, so hopeless to conceive / As these that twice befell. / Parting is all we know of heaven. / And all we need of hell.”(stanza 2 lines 1-4). The first two lines convey that death of someone close to heart is almost impossible to believe. The individual self can’t comprehend what the event even means or that it happened. Human understanding is limited in the confusion and grief of the loss of someone dearly loved. Dickinson describes the grief as if she dies before she really dies. When an individual experiences the pain of death, it’s as if the person who knew the dead are gone and the person living is a stranger. In contrast, the second part of the stanza reflects how human understanding is limitless. When one endure the death of someone loved, one gets a glimpse of the afterlife. One hopes and assumes his loved one are in heaven. However the closing line expose the true limitless of human understanding. To reiterate, Dickinson confesses, “Parting is all we know of heaven / And all we need of hell.”(stanza 2 lines 3-4). The separation of the dead from the living reveals all the living need to know of hell. Hell is the pain and grief a person goes through when a loved one is lost. An individual finds unlimited understanding in the limited experience of losing a loved