Emily Dickinson Face to Face

Emily Dickinson springs to life in this remarkable, long-out-of-print biography written by her niece . . . Though millions of pages have been written about Dickinson . . . few have provided such a thrilling close-up portrait. Readers will be rapt from the first page. Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) What would it be like to have Emily Dickinson as your babysitter? In this astonishing memoir, out of print for almost a century, Martha Matty Dickinson describes the childhood she spent next door toand often in the care ofher Aunt Emily. We see Matty as a little girl, hiding from the other grownups in Emilys upstairs rooms, helping Emily in the kitchen, venturing with her into the cellar for the gingerpead she wasnt supposed to have. As Matty becomes a teenager, she finds a confidante in her aunt, who is fascinated by the latest youth fads, school gossip, and the recurring question of what to wear to a party (her vote was for my highest-heeled red slippers)not to mention the music, novels, and poems she and Matty both love. From an early age, Emily teaches Matty the joys of solitude and independence: No one, Emily said, could ever punish a Dickinson by shutting her up alone. First published in 1932, this is the most intimate record we have of Emily Dickinson, whose death sparked a long family struggle over her work and her image. In a foreword to this new edition, the poet and critic Anthony Madrid provides a biographical frame for Mattys recollections, and explains how such a remarkable document could spend so long out of sight.