Question

Describe why Dickinson might have used an arc structure for "Because I could not stop for Death."

Answer 1

Dickinson's "Because I could not stop for Death" is structured as arc because throughout the course of the poem, Dickinson takes the reader on her journey. At the beginning she discusses how she sees the school children, which represents her youth. Then, she writes about the "fields grazing grain," which represents her adulthood. Finally, she talks about the setting sun and her at her old age. Each of these are leading to death when she is being brought to the grave. This allows for the reader to understand that death comes to everyone and ends our mortality.

Step-by-step explanation:

Answer 2

I understand the caesurae (plural for caesura) as decelerating down its pace, which makes intellect seeing the speaker's privilege that, when Death came to accumulate her, "He knew no haste." First, they initiative near the school to watch the children play, then to the fields to lookout the sun set over the scrap. She describes the way night seems to fall after the sun has passed them, and how she grows chilly. Finally, Death's carriage reaches at the speaker's grave "in the Ground," and she designates how corporeal time is moving so swiftly while time for her moves so slowly because she is measuring it against "Infinity." Therefore, Dickinson's use of caesurae really slows the pace because the reader must pause so often, at least every time she employs an end dash, and this is appropriate to the content of the text.