The Apprentice

Death can be deIined as liIe ending. The Grim Reaper is the widely known Iigure that
represents death. Emily Dickinson`s 712th poem is about death and the personiIication oI death,
the Grim Reaper. In this poem you Iirst realize that death is reIerred to as the Grim Reaper. Also
it is evident that the narrator has become some sort oI apprentice Ior the Grim Reaper. But, this
poem tells more than a story, it tells oI the misery and torment that the narrator Ieels with this
new job title. All oI these aspects oI the poem will be broken down and explained in detail Irom
a New Critics standpoint.
In this poem is very evident that the Grim Reaper and the narrator are the main subjects.
Several times in this poem there is a reIerence Irom death to him which would indicate that death
is a man. Also in this poem there are a Iew reIerences to eternity which suggests that the narrator
is experiencing a longer time period than a normal liIe time. It seems that in this poem there is a
journey that is being made with the Grim Reaper. At Iirst it would seems to be about the liIe the
narrator lived but at the end oI the poem it again shows this experience lasts much longer than a
liIetime.
With these observations put into context with the poem it then becomes clear that the
narrator is not simply another soul that death has come to claim. The Iirst stanza shows how this
soul is in Iact special and diIIerent Irom others. The narrator is in Iact the Grim Reaper`s
apprentice. The narrator must put aside her previous liIe to accommodate the Grim Reaper. This
poem shows the journey and experiences that come along with the job oI working with the Grim
Reaper. They travel to a school and Iields which show the places that death must go. The sun not
only sets put moves when they cannot. Everything around them changes when they themselves
can`t change. In the end, years have gone by but it Ieels like no time at all.
The journey with death is not the only thing that has been portrayed in this poem.
Throughout the poem despair and anguish is seen Irom the narrator. The number and placement
oI the hyphens is one indicator oI this. Another is the seemingly random use oI capitalization.
The tone oI voice is apparent through the choice oI words used throughout the poem.
All oI these Iactors when put together provide a story about a person who has become the
Grim Reapers assistant. This evidence put together with the theory based on the evidence
provides a New Critics perspective on this poem.