“What mystery pervades a well!” Summary

“What mystery pervades a well!” Themes

• 

  The Mystery of Nature

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• 

  Fear, Fascination, and Curiosity

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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “What mystery pervades a well!”

• Lines 1-6

  What mystery pervades a well!
  The water lives so far -
  A neighbor from another world
  Residing in a jar
  Whose limit none have ever seen,
  But just his lid of glass -

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 7-12

  Like looking every time you please
  In an abyss's face!
  The grass does not appear afraid,
  I often wonder he
  Can stand so close and look so bold
  At what is awe to me.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 13-16

  Related somehow they may be,
  The sedge stands next the sea -
  Where he is floorless
  And does no timidity betray

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 17-20

  But nature is a stranger yet;
  The ones that cite her most
  Have never passed her haunted house,
  Nor simplified her ghost.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 21-24

  To pity those that know her not
  Is helped by the regret
  That those who know her, know her less
  The nearer her they get.

  

  

  

  

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“What mystery pervades a well!” Symbols

• 

  The Well

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“What mystery pervades a well!” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

• Metaphor

  

  

  

  

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• Personification

  

  

  

  

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• Paradox

  

  

  

  

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• Repetition

  

  

  

  

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• Hyperbole

  

  

  

  

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“What mystery pervades a well!” 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.

• Pervades
• Limit
• Abyss
• Bold
• Awe
• Sedge
• Floorless
• Timidity
• Betray
• Cite
• Simplified
• Helped

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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “What mystery pervades a well!”

• Form

• Meter

• Rhyme Scheme

“What mystery pervades a well!” Speaker

“What mystery pervades a well!” Setting

Literary and Historical Context of “What mystery pervades a well!”

More “What mystery pervades a well!” Resources

• External Resources

  • The Poet's Life — A biography of Dickinson at the Poetry Foundation.

  • A Dickinson Doc — A short film about Dickinson from the Voices & Visions series.

  • The Original Text — Read the original, handwritten poem (including variant versions) at the Emily Dickinson Archive.

  • The Dickinson Museum — Explore further Dickinson resources via the Emily Dickinson Museum in Amherst, Massachusetts.

  • Dickinson and Hauntedness — An essay on the "Haunted House" of Dickinson's art.

• LitCharts on Other Poems by Emily Dickinson

  • A Bird, came down the Walk

  • After great pain, a formal feeling comes –

  • A Light exists in Spring

  • A Murmur in the Trees—to note—

  • A narrow Fellow in the Grass

  • An awful Tempest mashed the air—

  • As imperceptibly as grief

  • A still—Volcano—Life—

  • Because I could not stop for Death —

  • Before I got my eye put out

  • Fame is a fickle food

  • Hope is the thing with feathers

  • I cannot live with You –

  • I cautious, scanned my little life

  • I could bring You Jewels—had I a mind to—

  • I did not reach Thee

  • I died for Beauty—but was scarce

  • I dreaded that first Robin, so

  • I dwell in Possibility –

  • I felt a Funeral, in my Brain

  • If I can stop one heart from breaking

  • I had been hungry, all the Years

  • I have a Bird in spring

  • I heard a Fly buzz - when I died -

  • I like a look of Agony

  • I like to see it lap the Miles

  • I measure every Grief I meet

  • I’m Nobody! Who are you?

  • I started Early — Took my Dog —

  • I taste a liquor never brewed

  • It was not Death, for I stood up

  • I—Years—had been—from Home—

  • Like Rain it sounded till it curved

  • Much Madness is divinest Sense -

  • My Life had stood - a Loaded Gun

  • Nature is what we see

  • One need not be a Chamber — to be Haunted

  • Publication — is the Auction

  • Safe in their Alabaster Chambers

  • Shipwreck

  • Success is counted sweetest

  • Tell all the truth but tell it slant —

  • The Brain—is wider than the Sky—

  • The Bustle in a House

  • The Mushroom is the Elf of Plants

  • There came a Wind like a Bugle

  • There is no Frigate like a Book

  • There's a certain Slant of light

  • There's been a Death, in the Opposite House

  • The saddest noise, the sweetest noise

  • The Sky is low — the Clouds are mean

  • The Soul has bandaged moments

  • The Soul selects her own Society

  • The Wind – tapped like a tired Man –

  • They shut me up in Prose –

  • This is my letter to the world

  • This World is not Conclusion

  • 'Twas the old—road—through pain—

  • We grow accustomed to the Dark

  • Whose cheek is this?

  • Wild nights - Wild nights!