A Discussion Of The Themes Of Sexuality In The Works Of Emily Dickinson And Sherwood Anderson  

In the past, sexuality was never discussed in “polite” society which often led to those with ‘different’ sexuality’s to feel isolated or disconnected from their own sexual experiences and feelings, two of these such people are Emily Dickinson and Sherwood Anderson, who included these themes in their work.

Anderson wasn’t as known for his views on sexuality as Dickinson was. However, he played an important role in history of twentieth-century gay and lesbian literature. Anderson was one of the first heterosexual modernist writers to explore homosexual identity and the homoerotic, he also was one of the first to show homosexual characters with compassion and sympathy. He included these themes in a few of his works such as “The Rabbit-Pen”, 'The Man Who Became a Woman”, “Hands”, and in his own Memoirs.

In “The Rabbit-Pen” is a great example of the “archetypal Andersonian man” this man is heterosexual with an overly idealistic vision of women, who are usually seen having many embodiments of one's mother, and there for beyond the reach of sexual desire.

For Anderson sex is not a question of what is deviant and unacceptable desire and what is not. To him “sex and sexuality are ultimately a mystery to be resolved not within the discrete moments of the individual's physical and psychological experience, but over the course of a lifetime's experience” (Peterson). Sometimes, like in 'Hands,' that experience leads to tragedy, usually because of society's violent rejection of sexual difference; or, like in 'The Man Who Became a Woman,' it can lead to psychological conflict because of one's inability to understand one's own sexual identity and desires.

In “Hands”, Anderson shows the tragic results that can arise from repressing what society deems “deviant” sexuality. The focus of this tale is twenty-year resident of Winesburg, Ohio, Wing Biddlebaum. Biddlebaum originally lived in Pennsylvania under the name Adolf Myers where he was a school teacher, however his affection for his students was often expressed through platonic caresses that are ultimately interpreted by the townspeople as actions pointing to 'unspeakable things. ' As a result a vigilante group intent on hanging him eventually forces him out of town. “Though the story clearly implies that Biddlebaum's attraction to young men was at least partly erotic, the narrator cannot justify the cruelty of the Pennsylvania townspeople, whose actions have crippled Biddlebaum's soul and left him with a fear of his hands so paralyzing that he can no longer control their movements” (Peterson).

In “The Man Who Became a Woman”, Anderson explores the complexities of sexual identity as it begins to reveal itself in adolescence. In this piece Herman Dudley looks back and describes a puzzling experience from his youth, saying that “I am forced, by some feeling inside myself, to tell' (Anderson). Dudley tells about his love for race horses, which in many of Anderson’s stories are associated with male sexuality, a horse groomer and an aspiring writer named Tom Means. His love for Tom is strongly tinged by gay feelings and Herman wants the listener to understand his problem dealing with his feelings because 'Americans are shy and timid about saying things like that and a man here don't dare own up he loves another man, I've found out, and they are afraid to admit such feelings to themselves even” (Anderson). He unconsciously realized the problematic nature of his feelings for Tom, the feelings were then displaced onto the race horses.

When talking about one of the horses in particular, named Pick-it-boy, Dudley says 'I wished he was a girl sometimes or that I was a girl and he was a man” (Anderson). His wish was granted in a way as later on in the story when he visited a run down bar near the horse track. While looking into mirror behind the bar he sees the reflection of a “lonesome and scared girl” instead of his own (Anderson). Back at the race track, he was then mistaken by the stable hands as a young girl from town who had been brought by another worker, and as they made advances at him he found himself unable to 'say anything, not even a word” (Anderson). He was able to escape, however the events of that night have followed him throughout the rest of his life, even into what he calls a happy marriage. What haunts him is not the fear of his own femininity, but instead the question of why he could not bring himself to “save my life, scream or make any sound. ' 'Could it be,' he asks, 'because at the time I was a woman, while at the same time I wasn't a woman? It may be that I was too ashamed of having turned into a girl and being afraid of a man to make any sound” (Anderson).

Anderson himself made several personal statements regarding homosexuality in his Memoirs. In these memoirs he recounts his close friend ship with John Emerson, “(the pseudonym assigned by Anderson to Clifton Paden…)” (Peterson). He writes about the stares from passersby received by he and John as they walked down the street

'with John's arm about my shoulder. ' 'I know now that they thought we were two fairies,' writes Anderson, 'but, at that time, I had never heard of homosexuality. I was a little embarrassed when we walked thus, feeling perhaps something in the eyes of the people we passed, something in their thoughts of us walking so, that made me uncomfortable. There was nothing of homosexuality in the feeling we had for each other. Of that I am sure. ” (Peterson)

Anderson certainly seems to have felt at least a little homosexual feelings during his lifetime even if he didn’t act on them.

Emily Dickinson wrote 1800 poem in total, however only seven of these were published during her lifetime, the rest of these poems were published posthumously starting in 1890. She lived in her family home in Amherst, Massachusetts her whole like, and starting in her 30’s she was virtually a recluse.

Emily’s first intimate friendship with with a girl named Sophia Holland who Emily idolized, however Sophia died when Emily was 14. Emily wrote of Sophia “she was too lovely for earth” (Tredell). Emily’s next female love was Susan Huntington Gilbert, she became passionately attached to Susan even though she was already being courted by Emily’s brother Austin Dickinson and in 1856 Austin married Susan. Susan then introduced Emily to Catherine Scott and her and Emily had a passionate romance until 1866 when Catherine got married.

Dickinson died on May 15, 1886. She was 55. And after her death her poems were found and published by various people.

Emily wrote to Susan almost all her life, out of all her correspondents she wrote to Susan the most. “Most Dickinson scholars will concede that at least one of the loves and poetic inspirations of Dickinson's life was indeed a woman; however, the focus has shifted from Kate Anthon to Dickinson's sister-in-law, Susan Huntington Gilbert Dickinson, as the primary object of Dickinson's desire” (Tredell). Two of the surviving letters from Emily to Susan quote Antony and Cleopatra with Emily as the role of Antony and Susan as Cleopatra.

This passage refers to act 2, scene 2, of Antony and Cleopatra, where Enobarbus describes Antony's first meeting with Cleopatra. She refuses his invitation to dinner, inviting him to be her guest instead. Though he has never been refused by a woman before, Antony is enthralled by Cleopatra and goes, but is left frustrated by his unsatisfied physical desire. This implies that Emily felt frustrated my her inability to feel satisfied in her physical desire for Susan. Through out their various letters over the years Emily subtly implies her attraction to Susan, though Susan never realized.

Both Emily Dickinson and Sherwood Anderson expressed and wrote about different sexuality’s in their various works throughout their life’s.