Dickinson's Fascicles A Spectrum of Possibilities is the first collection of essays dedicated exclusively to re-examining Emily Dickinson's fascicles, the extant forty hand-crafted manuscript "books" consisting of the roughly 814 poems crafted during the most productive period in Dickinson's writing life (1858-1864). Why Dickinson carefully preserved the fascicles despite her meticulous destruction of many of her early manuscript drafts is the central question contributors to this volume seek to answer.

The collection opens with a central portion of Sharon Cameron's 1992...