Emily Dickinson’s Poems Become Public Domain
Copyright ends, creativity begins. Dickinson’s Further Poems is now public — learn the story of feuds, fame, and freedom in art.
When Emily Dickinson died in 1886, she left an astonishing 1,800 unpublished poems behind. And, because of a strange quirk of copyright law, an important part of this legacy of one of our greatest poets is finally about to become public domain.
It all began with Lavinia Dickinson, Emily’s devoted sister, who discovered this unpublished trove. Lavinia, determined to share her sister’s work with the world, sought help from family and friends, including Susan Dickinson, an important confidant in Emily’s life as well as her sister-in-law, and Thomas Wentworth Higginson (a mentor of Emily’s).
However, frustrated by delays, Lavinia then made the fateful choice of turning to Mabel Loomis Todd, the mistress of Emily’s brother, for help. That choice accidentally ignited decades of rivalries over who truly had the right to shape and share Emily’s legacy. “Superficially a war between women, the Todd-Dickinson feud began and ended in property battles” (Horan, 1996).
It all came down to family dynamics, money, and sheer stubbornness. The Todd family and the Dickenson’s quarreled over a small…
