Blog #8 - I'm Nobody, Who Are You?

I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us--don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.

 How dreary to be somebody!

How public, like a frog

To tell your name the livelong day

To an admiring bog!

     Emily Dickinson's poem I'm Nobody, questioning who she, along with everyone else, is a very intriguing poem to me. I think this poem is a satire and criticizes society. (Maybe, society is the reason that Dickinson didn't get out of her home a lot...because she was known as recluse. But that's just my opinion, because I don't particularly like society either.) To me, she is saying that a nobody is really a somebody and someone who thinks they are somebody is really nobody (wow, that's confusing.)

     To me, Dickinson is saying that someone who honestly identifies themselves and has an "identity" is a nobody in society's eyes unless they have some kind of social status. To be "somebody" in society, one must have status in society and must be well known amongst others. A "somebody" is one who has admirers that can just admire a person for whom they THINK they are, but they may not really know that person. Take celebrities, for instance. We all have some sort of celebrity that we love (or think we love). We care about their every move, and we think they're the greatest person that ever lived. We just perceive them to be "somebody" because their name is spread around a lot and they have a status within our society. But, we don't really personally know them and we are considered a "nobody" to them because they have no clue who we are because we're just one in a million of their fanbase.

    In stanza 2, Dickinson calls the admiring person a "bog." A bog is a piece of wet, spongy ground. She could be implying that the admiring person soaks in everything the "somebody" says or does like a sponge. She might be suggesting that they could take on the personality of their admired person, and would not have their own true identity because they're so influenced by the "somebody." She says it is dreary to be a somebody, because you don't really know your true self because you're so concerned with who you think you are based on the opinions of others.

     Cummings says:

I'm Nobody! Who Are You?” presents the theme that it is better to be a humble nobody than a proud somebody. After all, somebodies have to spend their time maintaining their status by telling the world how great they are. How boring!

     I wonder what Dickinson would think about today's society because we put so much emphasis on celebrities and public figures. We even have tv shows and magazines dedicated to finding out about the lives of such people, such as Entertainment Tonight and People magazine. We care so much about knowing about the lives of others, that sometimes we may not take the time to examine our own lives and who we are as a person. A lot of us strive to be like the celebrities we see instead of just trying to be proud of who we really are.