Pick two poets who seem to have nothing to do with each other — a Gothic American and a pastoral Englishman, say — and see where the catalogue actually joins them: overlapping years, shared ground, distinctive themes, and the poems that secretly rhyme.
Eunice Tietjens
Emily Dickinson
A random pair who overlapped in time and whose poems already rhyme in the catalogue — a way into poets you may not have met.
Eunice Tietjens was born in Chicago, Illinois, on 29 July 1884, into a city whose energy, contradictions, and cultural ambitions would shape the rest of her life. She died in the same city on 6 September 1944, after a career that had carried her across the United States, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. During those sixty years, she became known not only as a poet but also as a journalist, traveler, lecturer, edito…
“I'm terribly homesick for Poetry and Chicago and you!”
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was born on 10 December 1830 in Amherst, Massachusetts, and died there on 15 May 1886. During her lifetime she was known, if at all beyond her immediate circle, as the daughter of a prominent local family, an unusually lively correspondent, a gardener, and eventually a woman who lived with increasing privacy. After her death, she emerged as one of the most startling and essential poets in th…
“My friends are my estate.”
About 1,245 km separate Chicago, Illinois, USA from Amherst, Massachusetts, USA. Shared ground: United States.
Distinctive words drawn from each poet’s critiqued poems — what they keep writing about, not just what their biographies mention.
Eunice Tietjens: chicago, the candle, profiles from china, the singing wood, the crossroads, harriet monroe, poetry magazine, imagism. Emily Dickinson: amherst, massachusetts, edward dickinson, susan gilbert, because i could not stop for death, fascicles, mount holyoke female seminary, civil war.
The closest poem-to-poem matches in critique space — the sort of kinship a listener hears before the catalogue admits it.
Notable events from the years they were both alive.
Eunice Tietjens: Sorrow, Irony, Despair. Emily Dickinson: Wonder, Spirituality, Longing.
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