In this final project, I will on exploring the ways in which Emily Dickinson and Toni Morrison have revolutionized the reading experience. Both women have consciously played with convention, occasionally accepting some elements of tradition, but more characteristically rejecting the rules of the past and recreating, transforming a literary genre and its impact. Though a seemingly unfit pairing, Dickinson and Morrison, as writers, have much in common. In this paper, I will be examining the way in which they have used a musical genre as a stencil for the structure of their work as well as their use of first and second person voice. By incorporating these elements into their work, Dickinson and Morrison, are facilitating a novel connection with the reader. They carve connection with their audience, drawing them in and requiring them to play a part in deriving meaning from the text. Dickinson and Morrison purposefully leave room in their writing for a reader, without which the work would be incomplete. These two amazing women have done something remarkable; they have created a text that is reader dependent; they have changed the reading experience.
For this paper, as far as primary texts are concerned, I plan to draw from Toni Morrison’s Jazz and Dickinson’s “You’re right – ‘the way is narrow’” and “The Spirit is the Conscious Ear”. In regards to critical insight, I intend on looking to Susan Howe’s My Emily Dickinson, Martin Orzeck and Robert Weisbuch’s Dickinson and Audience, as well as Elizabeth Beaulieu’s Toni Morrison Encyclopedia (Carolyn Jone’s “Narravtive Voice”) along with several others.
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Jazz: “But I can’t say that aloud; I can’t tell anyone that I have been waiting all for this all my life and that being chosen to wait is the reason I can. If I were able I’d say it. Say make me, remake me. You are free to do it and I am free to let you because look, look. Look where you’re hands are. Now,”(229).
733: The Spirit is the Conscious Ear.
We actually Hear
When We inspect—that’s audible—
That is admitted—Here—
For other Services—as Sound—
There hangs a smaller Ear
Outside the Castle—that Contain—
The other—only—Hear—
In these passages, Morrison and Dickinson facilitate a connection with reader by using first person to invite the reader into the text. It is as though the text itself is reaching out to the reader, asking him/her to join in the making of the meaning of the text.
the focus on voice seems strong and promising; the critical perspective will help you shape the problem and your argument about how voice matters for these writers and for the view you have of the reader’s response.
also might be interesting to think of related or different spiritual traditions they invoke, where reading and voice figure: the Bible, call and response, Dickinson’s hymns.