I Started Early — Took My Dog — Essay Questions

Why does the poem begin with the images of mermaids and frigates?

The poem's opening stanzas do not immediately delve into the speaker's fear. Instead, they deal primarily with her sense of amazement at the "frigates" floating on the water and the "mermaids" rising from the deep to look at her. While these sights make her feel small in comparison, they do not fill her with an abject sense of terror. Dickinson's choice to begin the poem with seemingly peaceful images is part of her portrayal of the ocean as a whole. While its violent force is shown later on, as the speaker tries to escape drowning, here it is shown as the home of wondrous images, both manmade and fantastic. Dickinson shows the ocean as complex, housing danger as well as natural majesty.

How does the poem utilize personification to highlight its main themes?

Dickinson personifies the ocean as a man when it grabs the speaker and tries to drag her out into the open water. The effect of this figurative language is twofold. Dickinson builds the impression that the ocean is brutish and strong, seeking to impose itself on the speaker and her body without her permission. In turn, this also reflects the dangers women faced from men in Dickinson's time. The water threatens to both pull and engulf the speaker, much like the overwhelming influence of the men in this period. The personification that Dickinson uses here highlights the natural dangers of the ocean while also reflecting on major gender issues of the era.