‘Had I the Art to Stun Myself / With Bolts of Melody!’: Emily Dickinson’s ‘Circumference of Expression’ as her ‘Chiefest Apprehension’ of a Hindered Creativity
England has had many learned women, not merely readers but writers of the learned languages, in Elizabeth’s time and afterwards – women of deeper acquirements than are common now in the greater diffusion of letters; and yet where were the poetesses? The divine breath … why did it never pass, even in the lyrical form, over the lips of a woman? How strange! And can we deny that it was so? I look everywhere for grandmothers and see none. It is not in the filial spirit I am deficient, I do assure you – witness my reverent love of the grandfathers! (1).
