Success Is Counted Sweetest

As detailed in the biography section of this guide, Emily Dickinson retreated from social life around 1858. A closer look at the socio-historical context in which Dickinson studied and wrote provides some additional insight into what may have inspired her work. Some scholars trace Dickinson’s reclusive tendencies to the homesickness she expresses in her letters written while at Mount Holyoke Seminary. Dickinson’s father has been described as “domineering,” which may have contributed to her sense of isolation.

While critics have posthumously hailed Dickinson as a poetic genius, during her lifetime, Dickinson infrequently shared her poems and did so mostly with close acquaintances or family members. As one source explains, “She never married, despite several romantic correspondences, and was better-known as a gardener than as a poet while she was alive” (“A Short Analysis of Emily Dickinson’s ‘Success is Counted Sweetest.” Interesting Literature. 2022). Dickinson was aware of the restrictions society placed upon her as a young woman in the 19th century. As Poetry Foundation explains, upon leaving schools, “unmarried daughters were indeed expected to demonstrate their dutiful nature by setting aside their own interests in order to meet the needs of the home” (“Emily Dickinson.” Poetry Foundation. 2022). This expectation to devote herself to the domestic sphere explains “Dickinson’s own ambivalence toward marriage - an ambivalence so common as to be ubiquitous in the journals of young women…clearly grounded in her perception of what the role of ‘wife’ required” (“Emily Dickinson.” Poetry Foundation. 2022). These expectations and restrictions were Dickinson’s reality, defining what others around her considered to be a successful life for a young woman. Conscious of her own desires and aspirations, it is likely that Dickinson was all too familiar with the tensions between wants and needs and their unattainability. She knew firsthand how not being able to achieve one’s desires could make those desires even more appealing, and their absence even more painful.