Journal #42: Whitman vs. Dickinson

When choosing between reading/analyzing a poem by Emily Dickinson or Walt Whitman, I would have to say that I definitely prefer Emily Dickinson to Walt Whitman, without any doubt. Although some of Dickinson's poems can be a little boring and seem to have little significance, I like how they are so simple and contain little parts of everyday life from broken hearts to frogs and insects. Dickinson's writing style is much more appealing to me because everything is laid out so that you can relate to the meaning of the poem. Even though there were hidden meanings in Dickinson's poems like there were in Walt Whitman's poems, I think it is a lot easier to figure out what Dickinson is saying. One major reason I dislike Walt Whitman is his focus on "self". Honestly, if I never hear anything about Walt Whitman's "self" ever again in my life, I will probably be very happy. I prefer Dickinson's less egotistical approach to poetry and I also think that Whitman was too concerned with his idea of self. The way that all of his poems were drawn back to that idea just really bothered me. I think one very interesting part of poetry, or writing in general, is to see the similarities and the differences between one authors various pieces of work. Whitman's constant message of self-importance and "If God is everything and everything is God, I'm God too" approach. This idea was present is basically every single one of Whitman's poems that I read and it started to get old really fast. Dickinson's simplicity is the main reason that I enjoyed her poems the most. Although there were implications and hidden meanings in her poems, for the most part everything was out in the open and fairly easy to understand and relate too. Even though I do not agree with some of Dickinson's beliefs (like that everyone else in the world is shallow and not worth her time), I think a lot of poetry readers are able to find some connection with her through her writing because she wrote about such simple and common things.