There's A Certain Slant Of Light

The ambiguity and complexity of Dickinson’s symbols is one of the defining features of her poetry. In this poem, the speaker uses the symbol of a beam of light to embody the paradoxical experience they feel in their religious experiences. On one hand, light is often associated with positive feelings and experiences like hope, warmth, enlightenment, and salvation. The speaker depends on this connotation of hope in her thematic discussion of Despair. This sin, for 19th century Christians, was one of two sins that could keep someone from entering heaven. Light, then, represents that hope is still present, even if it is the dying light of “Winter Afternoons” (Line 2).

But the speaker makes clear they are talking about a “certain” (Line 1) beam of light. This light is a particular “Slant” (Line 1). This word choice indicates this symbol of the light is not straightforward. The word itself suggests the light is sloped or, symbolically, distorted due to a bias in a person’s point of view. If light represents faith, then the speaker seems to suggest human perspective distorts religious beliefs.

Dickinson explicitly connects the light to religious faith in the opening stanza. By comparing the light to “the Heft / Of Cathedral Tunes” (Lines 3-4), the speaker emphasizes the weight and the impact of the light. Like hymns sung in a cathedral, the light “oppresses” (Line 3) the speaker but results in “Heavenly Hurt” (Line 5). This weight of Christian belief, though, does not leave a physical “scar” (Line 6). Instead, it makes an “internal difference” (Line 7) on the soul.

The final stanza highlights the light’s connection to humanity. Here, the speaker uses the light to symbolize life, comparing it to the disappearance of life from the eyes of a corpse. The “Shadows” (Line 14) emphasize how death is the absence of light. For the speaker, a loss of faith is like a loss of life.