"This is my letter to the world" is a poem by the American poet Emily Dickinson, written around 1862. Like many of Dickinson’s poems, it is compact and enigmatic. In a broad sense, the poem is about isolation and communication: the speaker expresses deep frustration that he or she is unable to communicate with the "World." Some readers have taken the poem to be a reflection on Dickinson’s own isolation from society, since the poet spent much of her adult life as a recluse. Regardless, the poem documents the way that poetry attempts to translate the broader mysteries of nature into language and communicate them to other people.
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The Full Text of “This is my letter to the world”
1This is my letter to the World
2That never wrote to Me —
3The simple News that Nature told
4With tender Majesty
5Her Message is committed
6To Hands I cannot see —
7For love of Her — Sweet — countrymen
8Judge tenderly — of Me
The Full Text of “This is my letter to the world”
1This is my letter to the World
2That never wrote to Me —
3The simple News that Nature told
4With tender Majesty
5Her Message is committed
6To Hands I cannot see —
7For love of Her — Sweet — countrymen
8Judge tenderly — of Me
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“This is my letter to the world” Summary
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“This is my letter to the world” Themes
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Loneliness and Isolation
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The Purpose of Poetry
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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “This is my letter to the world”
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Lines 1-4
This is my letter to the World
That never wrote to Me —
The simple News that Nature told
With tender Majesty -
Lines 5-8
Her Message is committed
To Hands I cannot see —
For love of Her — Sweet — countrymen
Judge tenderly — of Me
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“This is my letter to the world” Symbols
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Letter
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News
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“This is my letter to the world” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language
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Enjambment
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End-Stopped Line
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Caesura
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Alliteration
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Assonance
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Consonance
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Personification
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Parallelism
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Synecdoche
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“This is my letter to the world” Vocabulary
Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.
- World
- News
- Nature
- Majesty
- Message
- Committed
- Countrymen
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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “This is my letter to the world”
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Form
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Meter
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Rhyme Scheme
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“This is my letter to the world” Speaker
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“This is my letter to the world” Setting
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Literary and Historical Context of “This is my letter to the world”
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More “This is my letter to the world” Resources
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External Resources
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Dickinson's Own Words — Images from the Emily Dickinson archive of the original manuscripts for "This is my letter to the world," in her handwriting and with her original punctuation.
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About Dickinson's Fascicles — A brief article on Dickinson's manuscript books—or fascicles—by Dorothy Huff Oberhaus.
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Emily Dickinson Biography — A detailed biography of Emily Dickinson from the Poetry Foundation.
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The History of Transcendentalism — A detailed article on the history and philosophy of transcendentalism, from Stanford University.
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The Poem Out Loud — A reading of "This is my letter to the world."
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LitCharts on Other Poems by Emily Dickinson
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