PBS, NPR and The London Review of Books all agree: “The Letters of Emily Dickinson,” co-edited by Cristanne Miller, SUNY Distinguished Professor of English emerita, is among the best books of 2024.
In addition to the book being ranked among the year’s best for 2024, “The Letters of Emily Dickinson” has also received significant critical attention and glowing reviews from The New Yorker, The Spectator, The Times Literary Supplement, the Poetry Foundation and Fortnight, which referred to the book as “a 955-page block of pure gold.”
It had been 60 years since scholars had collected Dickinson’s letters and so much has been learned, including the discovery of many previously uncollected letters, since the publication of that earlier edition by Thomas H. Johnson and Theodora Ward.
An updated edition of Dickinson’s letters has been long overdue, according to Miller, who co-edited the book with Domhnall Mitchell, professor of 19th century American literature at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.
“I knew it was time for a new edition when we started working on this project,” says Miller, one of the world’s foremost experts on Dickinson. “But what has surprised and delighted me is how much people are loving this work.”
Maureen Corrigan, the highly respected “Fresh Air” book critic, is among those offering praise. Corrigan said the book is “the closest thing we’ll probably ever have to an intimate autobiography of the poet.”
The London Review of Books wrote how the letters “shed light on the soaring and capacious mind of a great American poet and her vast world of relationships.”
Miller says Dickinson’s brilliance shines through her letters, as everything from a simple turn of phrase to a psychological insight takes on memorable form.
But the letters also show a side of Dickinson that might not be familiar to even her most dedicated readers.
Many people know her poetry of death, pain and suffering, but the letters are more upbeat and display a range of correspondence. Readers are presented with the portrait of a poet who has a rich and loving social community of friends, family and neighbors.
“One of the things that I hadn’t realized would come through so clearly in the letters is that she’s funny,” says Miller. “She has a great wit.”
And Dickinson’s letters have, in fact, inspired people to write to Miller, although electronically in this case.
“Just as people have told me how much they love the poetry, readers are writing to tell me how much they love the letters,” says Miller, who has some favorites of her own among Dickinson’s letters.
She mentions an unsigned letter consisting of a single line, which may have been sent with a gift of honey, most likely around the time of the nation’s centennial: “The founders of honey have no names.”
Miller explains that recipients knew such letters came from Dickinson, either through her recognizable handwriting or because she was known to send such cryptic and playful messages.
“The lack of a signature to me is a suggestion of intimacy,” says Miller, who retired from her more than four-decade academic career, including the last 19 years at UB, in August 2024.
She continues to accept invitations to discuss the book and has plans to present a paper that comes out of the letters at an upcoming Dickinson conference in Taiwan, but Miller’s next project could center on the poet Marianne Moore.
“We’ll see,” she says. “This work and spending time with these poems and poets is what I love to do.”
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