The most persistent image of Emily Dickinson (1830–1886) is that of the recluse, a woman whose creative endeavors were so hidden that even her sister Lavinia was taken aback by the amount of poems (currently estimated at 1,789) discovered shortly after her death. Like most myths, that of Dickinson as a recluse lacks subtlety but still has some truth to it. Biographical evidence shows that Dickinson stopped attending church and other public events in her twenties; after two enforced stays in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for eye treatment (in 1864 and 1865), she never again left the family house on Main Street, Amherst, and became extremely selective about receiving visitors. And her obituary (by her sister-in-law Susan Dickinson, thought to have known her better than most) acknowledged this domesticity as a willed arrangement, rather than something enforced by her father, caused by romantic disappointment, or resulting from mental...