On this page there will be criticism from the nineteenth century along with the twentieth century...

Nineteenth Century Criticism:

Critics of Emily's time said her verses faulted her language as too unsentimental and explain to suit contemporary tastes and her structure was not as published as the conventional romantic verse that was published in the periodicals of the day. Samuel Bowles, the editor of the Springfield Republican call her poems "part angel and part demon." The popular nineteenth century literary criticism, Colonel Higginson, and Mrs. Mabel Loomis Todd who was an Amherst friend, were the first to jointly edit a selection of her poems and publish them five years after Emily's death. Higginson wrote a letter to Todd stating that he thought that they had uncovered a rare genius. He also said that there was no way Emily could have written such poetry without knowing its rarity and its worth. Other critics such as William Dean Howells, Thomas Bailey Aldrich and Bliss Carman also comment about Emily's poems. Howells said that "the soul of an abrupt, exalted New England woman speaks in such brokenness." Aldrich said that Emily's "impossible rhyme, involved significance, and incoherence and shapelessness." Carman also stated that Emily had the "stability of a character, that strong sanity of mind, which could hold out against the perils of seclusion, unshaken by solitude, underthroned by doubt."

Twentieth Century Criticism:

Modern critics have commented about her poetry saying that her style was decades ahead of its time and it was like she had anticipated the modern poetry movement of the twentieth century by “using simple words and images to meditate on such profound universal concepts as nature, death and immortality.” A recent reviewer said that “[Emily] never dreamed of her potential pinions.” Modern critics also believe that Emily's irregularity was conscious and of artistic purpose. It is also said that Emily remains one of the most interesting of the minor poets in the world of poetry.
Emily did not make a living out of writing poetry and mostly wrote as an outlet of her feelings. She considered her writing as her “hearts record.” Her poetry in her era had no effect and was considered taboo, but in society today she is a well known poet and her poetry has a huge impact on the poetic world. Emily's poetry fell under the typical topics which women write about, such as life, love, nature, time and eternity, but her work as a whole was considered rebellious against the law and order of the masculinist society. Emily was the only nineteenth-century woman writer included in the canon, which also included Whitman, Thoreau, and Emerson.