VIRTUAL PROGRAM

This virtual program is free to attend. Registration is required. 

REGISTER

Join us for the first in a three-part series exploring the collection of the Emily Dickinson Museum. The Museum’s collection is the largest assemblage in the world of objects representing the Dickinson family’s material legacy. Progress continues on the three-year collections documentation project funded by the Institute for Museum and Library Services. In this series, Museum staff converse with specialists and conservators about the unique qualities, challenges and opportunities of this singular collection.

Parts 2 + 3 are TBA. Sign-up for our e-newsletter to be the first to know!

Join us for a lively virtual discussion of Emily Dickinson’s poetry and letters, meeting once a month from February to May. This program is designed to welcome newcomers and seasoned readers of Dickinson alike. 

Each session is facilitated by a guest scholar with unique expertise, who leads the group in discussion following an introductory talk. Brief reading handouts will be distributed prior to each month’s program. February and May’s sessions will be extended, for those who would like more time to connect with fellow group members.

Topics and Leaders:

• February: “I think the Hemlock likes to stand”: Emily Dickinson’s Trees with Marta McDowell
• March: “The Life That Tied Too Tight Escapes”: The Visual Legacy of Dickinson’s Imaginary with Zoë Brigley
• April: “…an instant’s act”: Exploring the Architecture and Ecology of Ruins in Dickinson’s Poetry” with Ryan Heryford
• May:  “Emily Dickinson’s Master Hours”: Reading Dickinson’s Master Letters with Marta Werner

Format

As a registrant, you are signing up to join a small group of 30 or fewer regular participants for four 90-minute zoom sessions. Meetings are participatory, with video and audio encouraged. Because we want everyone to feel comfortable speaking, sessions will not be recorded. The program is designed for adult audiences (18+).

Registration

Registration is now closed. Thank you for your interest!
Sign up for our e-newsletter to be the first to know about our next Poetry Discussion Group

We are offering an identical program for the Wednesday and Friday groups. Please review the dates carefully. Because space is limited, we hope only those who can commit to attending will register. Refunds are not available for this program.

Wednesday Group, $100 program fee (inclusive of all sessions),  limited to 30 participants
February 22, 6-7:30 ET, optional sign-on at 5:30 to meet the group!
March 22, 6-7:30 ET
April 19, 6-7:30 ET
May 17, 6-7:45 ET

Friday Group, $100 program fee (inclusive of all sessions), limited to 30 participants
February 24, 12-1:30 ET, sign on at 11:30 to meet the group!
March 24, 12-1:30 ET
April 21, 12-1:30 ET
May 19, 12-1:45 ET

Reservations are made on a first-come, first-served basis.

Questions: Don’t hesitate to reach out at edmprograms@emilydickinsonmuseum.org with any questions about the program.

FEBRUARY

“I think the Hemlock likes to stand”: Emily Dickinson’s Trees

Marta McDowell teaches landscape history and horticulture at the New York Botanical Garden and consults for private clients and public gardens. Her latest book, Unearthing The Secret Garden explores the plants and places that inspired Frances Hodgson Burnett to write the classic children’s book. Timber Press also published Emily Dickinson’s Gardening Life, The World of Laura Ingalls Wilder, All the Presidents’ Gardens, and Beatrix Potter’s Gardening Life. All the Presidents’ Gardens made The New York Times bestseller list and won an American Horticultural Society book award in 2017. Beatrix Potter’s Gardening Life won the Gold Award from the Garden Writers Association and is now in its eighth printing. Her books have been translated into Chinese, Japanese and Korean. She is the 2019 recipient of the Garden Club of America’s Sarah Chapman Francis Medal for outstanding literary achievement. martamcdowell.com

MARCH

The Life That Tied Too Tight Escapes: The Visual Legacy of Dickinson’s Imaginary, featuring the art of Victoria Brookland

Zoë Brigley is the author of three books of poetry published by Bloodaxe: Hand & Skull (2019), Conquest (2012), and The Secret (2007), and recently published chapbooks with Broken Sleep: Aubade After A French Movie (2020), and Verve: Into Eros (2021). She also wrote a collection of nonfiction essays Notes from a Swing State (Parthian 2019) and co-wrote a pamphlet of creative nonfiction with Kristian Evans, Otherworlds: Writing on Nature and Magic (Broken Sleep 2021). Brigley is Assistant Professor in English at the Ohio State University where she produces an anti-violence podcast: “Sinister Myth”. She won an Eric Gregory Award for the best British poets under 30, was Forward Prize commended, and is listed in the Dylan Thomas Prize. zoebrigley.com/

APRIL

“…an instant’s act:’ Exploring the Architecture and Ecology of Ruins in Dickinson’s Poetry”

Ryan Heryford is Associate Professor of Environmental Literature in the Department of English at California State University East Bay, where he teaches courses in nineteenth and twentieth century American literature, with a focus in cultural narratives of environmental justice.  Recent publications can be found in ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies of Literature and the Environment, The Mark Twain Annual, and The Emily Dickinson Journal.

MAY

 “Emily Dickinson’s Master Hours”: Reading Dickinson’s Master Letters

Marta Werner is the Martin J. Svaglic Chair in Textual Studies at Loyala University in Chicago. She is the author/editor of Emily Dickinson’s Open Folios: Scenes of Reading, Surfaces of Writing (1995), Radical Scatters: An Electronic Archive of Emily Dickinson’s Late Fragments and Related Texts, 1870-1886 (1999), and Writing in Time: Emily Dickinson’s Master Hours ( 2021). Werner is currently working on two related projects: a sound installation of Dickinson’s bird-poems that seeks to re-conceive the archive as a living, evolving, but also dying space, and a collection of essays titled “‘Conjecturing a Climate’: Reading Dickinson at the End of the World.”

Phosphorescence Amherst College LitFest featured poets:
Victoria Chang and Tyehimba Jess

IN-PERSON PROGRAM

This program is free to attend. 

REGISTER FOR LITFEST

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 25
Hosted by Emily Dickinson Museum Keiter Family Executive Director Jane Wald
Location: Friendly Reading Room, Frost Library

To Emily Dickinson, phosphorescence, was a divine spark and the illuminating light behind learning — it was volatile, but transformative in nature. Produced by the Emily Dickinson Museum, the Phosphorescence Poetry Reading Series celebrates contemporary creativity that echoes Dickinson’s own revolutionary poetic voice. The Series features established and emerging poets whose work and backgrounds represent the diversity of the flourishing contemporary poetry scene. The 2021 Series will be a virtual event to ensure the health and safety of participants. While we are disappointed not to gather together in Amherst, we are excited to connect with a global community of friends and writers.  Join us on the last Thursdays of each month to hear from poets around the world as they read their work and discuss what poetry and Dickinson mean to them.

This program is part of Amherst College’s LitFest, an annual literary festival celebrates the College’s literary life by inviting distinguished authors and editors to discuss the pleasures and challenges of verbal expression — from fiction and nonfiction to poetry and spoken-word performance.
To learn more about LitFest:
amherst.edu/about/literary-amherst/litfest

About the poets:

Tyehimba Jess is the author of two books of poetry, Leadbelly and Olio. Olio won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, The Midland Society Author’s Award in Poetry, and received an Outstanding Contribution to Publishing Citation from the Black Caucus of the American Library Association.  It was also nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award, the PEN Jean Stein Book Award, and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award.  Leadbelly was a winner of the 2004 National Poetry Series. The Library Journal and Black Issues Book Review both named it one of the “Best Poetry Books of 2005.”

Jess, a Cave Canem and NYU Alumni, received a 2004 Literature Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, and was a 2004–2005 Winter Fellow at the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center. Jess is also a veteran of the 2000 and 2001 Green Mill Poetry Slam Team, and won a 2000–2001 Illinois Arts Council Fellowship in Poetry, the 2001 Chicago Sun-Times Poetry Award, and a 2006 Whiting Fellowship. He presented his poetry at the 2011 TedX Nashville Conference and won a 2016 Lannan Literary Award in Poetry. He received a Guggenheim fellowship in 2018. Jess is a Professor of English at College of Staten Island.  

Jess’ fiction and poetry have appeared in many journals, as well as anthologies such as Angles of Ascent: A Norton Anthology of Contemporary African American Poetry, Beyond The Frontier: African American Poetry for the Twenty-First Century, Role Call: A Generational Anthology of Social and Political Black Literature and Art, Bum Rush the Page: A Def Poetry Jam, Power Lines: Ten Years of Poetry from Chicago’s Guild Complex, and Slam: The Art of Performance Poetry.
tyehimbajess.net

Victoria Chang’s forthcoming book of poems, With My Back to the World will be published in 2024 by Farrar, Straus & Giroux and Corsair Books in the U.K. Her most recent book of poetry, The Trees Witness Everything was published by Copper Canyon Press and Corsair Books in the U.K. in 2022, and was named one of the Best Books of 2022 by the New Yorker and The Guardian.

Her nonfiction book, Dear Memory (Milkweed Editions), was published in 2021 and was named a favorite nonfiction book of 2021 by Electric Literature and Kirkus. OBIT (Copper Canyon Press, 2020), her most recent poetry book, was named a New York Times Notable Book, a Time Must-Read Book, and received the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in Poetry, and the PEN/Voelcker Award. It was also longlisted for a National Book Award and named a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Griffin International Poetry Prize. She has also received a Guggenheim Fellowship.

She lives in Los Angeles and is Acting Program Chair and Faculty at Antioch’s low-residency MFA Program. She is the current poetry editor of the New York Times.
victoriachangpoet.com

Support Phosphorescence and Honor Someone Special:
Admission to all Phosphorescence events is free, but online donations, especially those made in honor or memory of family, friends, or colleagues are heartily encouraged and vital to the future of our programs. All gifts are tax deductible.

IN-PERSON PROGRAM

Location: Cole Assembly Hall in Converse at Amherst College

REGISTER

Composer Dana Kaufman screens Emily and Sue, her a cappella pop opera, in a film version shot on location at the Emily Dickinson Museum, and directed by Ron Bashford in collaboration with Four/Ten Media. The opera, which premiered in June 2022 at Amherst College, features soprano Jasmine Muhammad and spotlights the relationship between Emily Dickinson and her sister-in-law Susan Huntington Gilbert Dickinson, exploring themes of isolation, queerness, and forbidden love. Stay for a Q&A after the screening!