Home > Poetry What Difference Does a Word Make? Did you know that Thomas Wentworth Higginson, publisher and friend to Emily Dickinson, changed the word “Heft” to “weight” when he and Mabel Loomis Todd edited and published a collection of her poems after her death. Higginson wrote that Dickinson’s poems were “wayward and unconventional in the last degree; defiant of form, measure, rhyme, even grammar…” — precisely what makes her poems so original — and he adjusted them accordingly. Then in 1955 Thomas H. Johnson released a variorum edition of Dickinson’s work, and restored her original vocabulary. What difference does a word make? Scholar and poet Daniel Hoffman writes, “‘heft’ suggests a course physical effort required to handle heaviness…while at the same time the word embodies the successful act of lifting. It is this oxymoron that gives the image its synergy, its power.” #poem #poetry #columbiaupress #grangers #emilydickinson #analysis #poetsofinstagram cinemagraph by @gottakidtofeed A post shared by Columbia (@grangersworldofpoetry) on Jun 5, 2018 at 7:44am PDT Categories:Poetry Tags:#poem #poetry #columbiaupress #grangers #emilydickinson #analysis #poetsofinstagramColumbia Granger's World of Poetry Related Posts National Poetry Month / Poetry Columbia University Press Announces 2019 Student Poetry Contest Winners! Poetry Columbia Granger's Poem of the Day App! National Poetry Month / Poetry Columbia University Press Announces Student Poetry Contest Winners! National Poetry Month / Poetry In 1931 The Press Launched Two Definitive Works in Poetry: The Works of John Milton and the Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records series Book of the Week / National Poetry Month / Poetry Columbia University Press Announces the 2020 Student Poetry Contest Winners! Poetry Pity the Dewy Pearl Be Thrown Poetry The Best Thing in the World Poetry Granger’s Poetry Online Weekly Feature: “Gather ye rose-buds while ye may,” Prev Post Behind the Scenes of “The Operator” Next Post Introducing Game Theory and Climate Change
National Poetry Month / Poetry Columbia University Press Announces 2019 Student Poetry Contest Winners!
National Poetry Month / Poetry In 1931 The Press Launched Two Definitive Works in Poetry: The Works of John Milton and the Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records series
Book of the Week / National Poetry Month / Poetry Columbia University Press Announces the 2020 Student Poetry Contest Winners!