Poetry for All
Transcript for Episode 2: Emily Dickinson, ÒTell all the truth but tell it slantÑÓ

Abram:

Hello, IÕm Abram Van Engen, an English Professor at Washington University in Saint Louis.

Joanne:

And IÕm Joanne Diaz, a poet and English Professor at Illinois Wesleyan University.

Abram:

And this is Poetry For All, the podcast where we look at one poem each episode and think a bit about what it does, and how it works.

Joanne:

This podcast is for those who already love poetry and for those who know veryÊlittle about it. We hope it will be useful for teachers and students, but also forÊanyone who has ever been curious about poems.

Abram:

In this podcast, weÕll read a poem, discuss it, learn from it, and then read it one more time.

Joanne:

We thought weÕd start this whole series with a few poems about poetry itselfÑWhatÕs called ars poetica. And today, we have the great poet Emily Dickinson and her poem ÒTell all the truth but tell it slant.Ó Abram, would you be willing to read that poem for us?

Abram:

Absolutely. ÒTell all the truth but tell it slantÓ by Emily Dickinson.

Tell all the truth but tell it slant Ñ
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind Ñ

Joanne: 

That was great. So Abram, what do you see the speaker trying to say in this poem? We only have eight lines of poetry, itÕs a very tight little poem; what isÊtrying to be said here?

Abram:

Yeah, I think a great first question about any poem is just: what are they trying to get across? And sometimes when you just hear a poem, like if this was the first time youÕd ever heard this poem, it might seem strange--what is she actually trying to say? And in a way, itÕs a very simple sort of message. SheÕs saying: the best way to get at the truth is indirectly. If you try to tell the truth directly, it doesnÕt come across, or it blinds people, or it stuns them; it doesnÕt get across to people. So the best way to actually get the truth across to somebody is to approach it indirectly. And thatÕs sort of the basic point in the poem. But then you have to ask yourself: Well, why does she say it this way, then? And thatÕs where poetry comes in. So, when you ask why is she doing it this sort of way, what do you noticeÊabout the kind of structure of this poem?

Joanne:

This structure is so interesting to me because Emily Dickinson is drawing upon not only her own contemporary moment, but the long history of common meter or ballad meter in English. This has been a popular form since the Middle Ages in the English language. So what is that form? You can hear it if you just read the poem aloud as you just did, Abram, right? So you heard it when you said, ÒTell all the truth, but tell it slant.Ó So thereÕs four beats in that line, right? And then in the second line, there are three beats: ÒSuccess in circuit lies.Ó ÒSuccess in circuit lies.Ó

Abram:

Mm-hmm.

Joanne:

So itÕs four against three and then four against three, and the ballad or common meter goes like that the whole way down. So through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, this was a really popular meter for singing a tune to go with poems that were popular stories. And then by the time Emily Dickinson is engaging with this meter, she was hearing it in church. So a lot of the Psalms had been translated into this meter for song in the 1800s; it was enormously popular. And so sheÕs tapping into a rhythm and a sound that is very resonant and powerful for her in her lived daily experience. What I love about that four-three-four-three is that itÕs an even against an odd, so thereÕs a feeling of asymmetry that needs to be completed every time you get through one of those two-line pairings. ThereÕs also a rhyme going on at the ends of the lines. So: ÒTell all the truth but tell it slant Ñ / Success in Circuit liesÓ Ñ thatÕs the B-line Ñ ÒToo bright for our infirm Delight / The TruthÕs superb surpriseÓ. So what Emily Dickinson is doing is aligning ÒliesÓ with Òsurprise.Ó I think we have a tendency to imagine that rhyme is just this ornament, this prettifying thing that poets use. In fact, itÕs the opposite; it actually relates directly to content, and is actually very important in our understanding of the narrative situation of the poem.Ê

Abram:

Yes.

Joanne: 

And so, I wonder if I could just use that as a launching-off point to ask you the next question, which is: When you encounter this poem, what do you see as its narrative situation? What do you see as whatever has spurred or inspired the speaker to speak this poem?

Abram:

Yeah, I love that. So, I mean one of the things I see happening here is that this speaker is telling this to someone, and that person might be herself, it might be somebody else. But clearly, thereÕs a sense in which they have tried other ways and they havenÕt worked. It sort of feels like a poem that comes out of failure. And so theyÕre coming to this recognition: Ah well, tell all the truth but tell it slant,Êsuccess in circuit lies. TheyÕve figured out the way to success, and itÕs through this inversion, itÕs through this circuitous way. So just to return to the structure for just a moment, I mean one of the things I love about what you were just saying about that the meter of the thing, it sort of hangs perfectly in the balance between a secular ballad and a ÒchurchyÓ hymn. And so, when sheÕs getting at the truth of the matter and what sheÕs doing and her relationship to it, it could be in any of those contexts. If you think about the hymns a lot of people knowÑso for example ÒAmazing GraceÓ works perfectly with thisÑ[Abram sings to the tune of ÒAmazing GraceÓ] Tell all the truth but tell it slant. It goes all the way through the poem that way. So people know this meter even now and all of the common hymns and songs that we have. But yeah, it lands this stress at the ends of these lines, and then what you can see her doing with that stress is precisely what she says you ought to do, which is sheÕs inverting things. SheÕs making things circuitous. So, what she should be saying is: Tell all the truth but tell it slantÑsuccess lies by coming at things in circuit. And instead, she moves the word ÒliesÓ to the end of that line, she inverts the proper grammatical orderÑÒSuccess in Circuit liesÓÑand it forces us to pause on that word, lies, and it forces us to see it in a different sort of way.

Joanne:

Okay, and to follow up on what youÕre saying, if you look at the next two lines after that: ÒToo bright for our infirm Delight / The TruthÕs superb surpriseÓ; it should read: The TruthÕs superb surprise is too bright for our infirm Delight.

Abram:

Right.

Joanne:

What she does by flipping those is she gets to land on ÒThe TruthÕs superb surpriseÓ which is superior to anything that we can possibly access as humans. So it lands on the most important resonant thing, which is very effective.

Abram:

Right, and so you start to look at: what is it about these particular emphases that she wants us to notice? And, even if you go back to that second line that lands on the word ÒliesÓ, sheÕsÑin a certain sense, sheÕs just having fun with that. I mean, sheÕs basically saying, ÒMaybe sometimes the best way to get at the truth is through a lie.Ó And so sheÕs playing with the double meaning of that word Òlies.Ó ItÕs sort of surprising, again the rhyme there having a formal feature and a content feature to it, as well. The ÒliesÓ ÒsurpriseÓ us into the truth. And so sheÕs doing with this poetry exactly what sheÕs telling us to do with poetry.Ê

Joanne:

Very nice.

Abram:

We havenÕt gotten to the second half of the poem yet, though!

Joanne:

No, we probably should! NowÕs a good time to do that.

Abram:

NowÕs a good time to do it! So, what do you notice in the second half of this poem, or how do you see it as relating to the first half?

Joanne:

What I notice right away is that itÕs almost likeÑif you were to describe the shape of the poemÑitÕs almost like a bifurcated shell, right? So when you find a shell onÊthe beach, and you can crack it open right on that hinge, this is a perfectly symmetrical poem because the first four lines are very theoretical. TheyÕre giving us an idea about how one ought to theoretically approach the truth. The second four lines are providing us with an example to help anchor our understanding of how one should tell the truth. Does that make sense? So, I know that we talked about language when we were discussing this poem before recording thisÑare there some keywords that you kind of latch on to in that second part of the poem that help you understand how the second half of the poem is an illustration of the theory that is set up in the first part?

Abram:

Yeah. So for me, the word ÒexplanationÓ is really key here, and this is part of what makes it, for me, an ars poetica. There are other ways of reading this poem, but whenever I read this poem, thatÕs kind of how I understand it because sheÕs in a certain sense telling herself how to do this art, and why to do this art. And the explanation of lightning is, in a certain sense, her understanding of what poetry is. What is poetry? ItÕs a kind of ÒexplanationÓ of the ÒLightning.Ó And if you think about that, how do you explain the lighting? If a kid says to you, ÒWhat is the lighting?Ó I mean, what are you going to say to them? ThereÕs a dictionary definition of it. You could say to them, ÒOh, itÕs the flashing of light produced by the discharge of atmospheric electricity.Ó But thatÕs not really going to help them. When you think about how you explain lightning, what you end up doing is falling into poetic devices. So if one of my kids were to ask me what the lightning is, I would try to bring it down to their level. I would say, ÒOh, itÕs sort of like this huge build up of energy, kind of like when you shake a pop can, and it needs to get out. And so, as soon as itÕs poked, it just explodes out, and thatÕs sort of what lightning is. It all comes out at once in a big explosion, itÕs a big flash of light. ItÕs amazing, but itÕs also dangerous, so we need to kind of look at it from a distance.Ó But you see: immediately IÕm falling into comparison, IÕm falling into metaphor, or simile, IÕm falling into poetry to explain what the lightning is. And thatÕs one of the reasons why I think of this poem as a kind of ars poetica.

Joanne: 

And it also seems important to the poem, and to her point, that sheÕs giving us an example of explaining lightning to children. And that thereÕs a way in which we never quite emerge from that child-like state. Which is to say, itÕs not as if when weÕre children, we donÕt get certain things, and then as we mature, weÕre suddenly able to access the truth in a very direct, honest sort of way. We always need to be gradually told the truth because itÕs so dazzling, itÕs so superb, and we are so infirm in our perceptions, that this is a position weÕre in our whole lives.

Abram:

Yeah, and even if we think about the imagery that sheÕs using thereÑso step back and ask yourself, ÒOkay well, what is the truth of lightning then?Ó And, on the one hand itÕs that dictionary definition about an atmospheric discharge of electricity; on the other hand, itÕs all the experiences of lightning we knowÑitÕs our memories of lightning, itÕs the awe of lightning, the danger of lightning. So, lightning is more than its dictionary definition. It is all of those things. And in order to get at the truth of lightning, you actually need to get at all of those things. And the best wayÑmaybe the only wayÑto get at them is indirectly. ItÕs going to require poetry. So, thatÕs a little bit about how I sort of see this as her, again, as a poet talking to herself about her art.

Joanne:

ThatÕs really nice. So, that helps me understand how you see this as an ars poetica poem.That is, any kind of poem that addresses the art of making. And of course, there are so many ways in which when you initially approach this poem, you might feel like itÕs inaccessible, right? That inversion of syntax weÕve talked about, the rhyme, the meter, those capitalized nouns. However, the more you talk about it, the more you can see that sheÕs drawing upon a very long tradition thatÕs actually quite accessible, and comes to a commonplace piece of wisdom at the very end of the poem: ÒThe Truth must dazzle gradually / Or every man be blind ÑÓ. She has this remarkable abilityÑas so many poets have over the centuriesÑthis remarkable ability to create this tiny piece of commonplace, epigrammatic wisdom that can be easily excerpted and sort of memorized and transferred into other spaces that I just think is so remarkable.

Abram:

Yeah, and I love too, I mean, you can feel her in this poem combining that incredible sort of epigrammatic wisdom, as you say, with a kind of just fun in and of itself. ThereÕs a kind of delight in the poem itself that is getting at our Òinfirm Delight.Ó So, you know, when my daughter took naps and she would wake up, and IÕd turn the light on and you know, she was always sort of taken aback by that, and as I was changing her diaper, then I would say, ÒAh! Too bright for our infirm Delight, the TruthÕs superb surprise!Ó ThereÕs a kind of, like, funness to it. I donÕt know if she thought that it was so fun when she was just waking up from her nap, but I thought it was fun. AndÑthereÕs a kind of jauntiness and fun and delight to the poem itself that then ends on this sort of kernel of wisdom, and I love the way sheÕs combining those registers here.

Joanne:
Yeah, itÕs wonderful.

Abram:

Would you be willing to read this poem for us?

Joanne:

Yes.

Tell all the truth but tell it slant Ñ
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind Ñ

Abram:

ThatÕs great, thank you. For more on this poem, please visit our website, andÊplease follow us on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

Joanne:

Thank you, see you next time!



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