5 - Faith and doubt

Summary

Anyone who knows any Dickinson poems probably knows “Because I could not stop for Death –.” “If the word great means anything in poetry, this poem is one of the greatest in the English language,” wrote the American poet and critic Allen Tate, one of Dickinson's most important early critical champions, in 1936; his judgment has since been ratified not only by innumerable anthology editors, but also by the several composers who have set the poem to music, from Aaron Copeland to Natalie Merchant.

The poem Tate knew as “one of the greatest in the English language” was not, however, exactly the poem as Dickinson wrote it. A single manuscript copy of the poem survives, transcribed into one of Dickinson's fascicles around 1862. The only version available to Tate in 1936 was that published by Higginson and Todd as “The Chariot” in their first edition of Dickinson's poems. Compare it to Franklin's version, a century later:

THE CHARIOT

Because I could not stop for Death,

He kindly stopped for me;

The carriage held but just ourselves

And Immortality.

We slowly drove, he knew no haste,

And I had put away

My labor, and my leisure too,

For his civility.

We passed the school where children played,

Their lessons scarcely done;

We passed the fields of gazing grain,

We passed the setting sun.

We paused before a house that seemed

A swelling of the ground;

The roof was scarcely visible,

The cornice but a mound.

Since then 'tis centuries; but each

Feels shorter than the day

I first surmised the horses’ heads

Were toward eternity.

(Poems 1890)

Because I could not stop for Death –

He kindly stopped for me –

The Carriage held but just Ourselves –

And Immortality.

We slowly drove – He knew no haste

And I had put away

My labor and my leisure too,

For His Civility –

We passed the School, where Children strove

At Recess – in the Ring –

We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –

We passed the Setting Sun –