A QUIET PASSION

Born into privilege in 1803, Emily Dickinson spent most of her life on her parents’ estate in Armherst, Massachusetts. In her youth, the introverted Emily is depicted as a fiercely intelligent young woman who exchanges forthright opinions on life and art – and, more particularly, on the place of women in a deeply patriarchal society.

Emily becomes more and more reclusive as the years pass, gradually withdrawing from society. In her cloistered existence she is consumed by poetry, but the lack of recognition – fewer than a dozen of her nearly 1800 poems were published in her lifetime – and her frustrations regarding gender inequality and creative integrity make for an ever more vociferous dissention...