Nimble Believing: Dickinson and the Unknown

As a 62-year-old guy that over the last couple of years has devoured a bunch of Emily Dickinson criticism, I've learned that Dickinson was a sexual lover of Sue! (Or not!) Collaborator of Austin's crossing the Rubicon! Brazen lover of an old fart! Or a bigoted conservative! Bah. As lovers of Emily's poetry know, you don't approach the poetry that way. Four newish books offer a better approach. The Dickinson section of Helen Vendler's "Poets Thinking" will amaze you. Buy it. Forget the off-putting title of Judith Farr's "The Gardens of Emily Dickinson." The close readings will blow you away. But for many readers, religion is a key attraction. Many of Dickinson's poems stroke the egos of us atheists; other poems make me sadly ask, "What happened to that revival-defying gal? Two recent books address this. One is "Emily Dickinson's Approving God." A worthy recent read. (See "Apparently with no surpise," No. 1668 in Franklin, No. 1624 in Johnson). But the book that I am reviewing, "Nimble Believing," (latest edition 2007) is better. It basically and smartly discusses Dickinson's objections to the cruel and unacceptable power of a God that makes people die and blames his victims for sins he omnipotently ordained. At the same time (in diffent poems), Dickinson seems conventionally pious. Huh? James McIntosh's "Nimble Believing" "nimbly" addresses this contradiction. It is filled with close and perceptive readings. It is, for Dickinson fans, a must read.