Fri, May. 4th, 2007, 09:30 am
My hyperliterate daughter

On the bus into school and work this morning, [info]madelineusher and I were talking about Emily Dickinson, her favorite poet. Apparently Connie Willis wrote a humorous story in which she pointed out that many of Dickinson's poems can be sung to the tune of "The Yellow Rose of Texas", e.g.

"Oh, because I could not stop for death, he kindly stopped for me!"

[info]madelineusher sang several other examples; she has much more Dickinson memorized than I do. Then I tossed in

"Oh, I burn my candle at both ends, it will not last the night!"

And [info]madelineusher, in a tone of barely-controlled outrage, said "That's Edna St. Vincent Millay, not Emily Dickinson! Don't confuse your dash-monger with my beautiful bisexual poet!"

One has to wonder what people sitting nearby make of our bus conversations. Oh, and I love the epithet "dash-monger" for Millay.
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Fri, May. 4th, 2007 04:58 pm (UTC)
[info]sphinxie

What?? That's all backwards. Millay was bisexual, and Dickinson pioneered the dash...
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Fri, May. 4th, 2007 05:04 pm (UTC)
[info]isomeme

Thank you!! I thought that, too, but she's the one who just got a 5 on her English AP, so I didn't argue the point. Now we know what tonight's dinner conversation will be about. :)
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Fri, May. 4th, 2007 06:19 pm (UTC)
[info]sphinxie

There was a tasty little bio of Edna St. Vincent Millay published in 2002, Savage Beauty, which detailed her life and loves. Emily Dickinson may have been queer in theory, but she never got to put it into practice.
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Fri, May. 4th, 2007 05:08 pm (UTC)
[info]kshandra

Funny...I learned that about Dickinson's poetry from Babylon 5, in the "Day of the Dead" episode - and they made the Millay mistake, as well. In fact, the two you quote above are the exact verses they chose for the episode.
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Fri, May. 4th, 2007 07:20 pm (UTC)
[info]isomeme

Wow, that's very intriguing. Neither of us watch Babylon 5, and I've seen the Willis reference. I wonder which came first?
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Fri, May. 4th, 2007 08:01 pm (UTC)
[info]kshandra

The original airdate of the B5 episode was 11 March 1998. I don't know the Willis reference myself.

As an aside, that episode's Wiki page mentions the Dickinson/Millay goof...and the Dickinson page notes that her sexuality is a topic of some debate. So [info]madelineusher may not have been so wrong after all.
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Sat, May. 5th, 2007 03:24 am (UTC)
[info]gridlore

You.. don't.. you.. haven't?

Kirsten! Cancel my teeth and my motorcycle! Boxed set of DVDs, stat!
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Sat, May. 5th, 2007 12:50 am (UTC)
[info]figmo

Try "I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing" as a tune for "Because I could not stop for death." It works. It's sick.
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Sat, May. 5th, 2007 08:51 am (UTC)
[info]ajrose93: FWIW...

...Millay's "Aria da Capo" changed my life (though I read it as a kid, so I don't know how it holds up). Still, Dickinson or no, the Millay play might be worth a glance -- and, hey, it's on Gutenberg. :)
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Sat, May. 5th, 2007 07:26 pm (UTC)
[info]z111

OMFG, if I'd heard that on a bus, it would have been in my lj fer sure!
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