The letters that we looked at for today were Emily Dickinson’s correspondence with her mentors, first to some unknown person (thought to be Reverend Charles Wadsworth) and then to Higginson. When reading these first two letters, just addressed to her “Master,” I thought at first that these were meant to be to God, until she started talking about God in the third person and asking second person questions simultaneously. After these, the letters are all addressed to or are from Higginson, who she reaches out to out of the blue and entreats to be her preceptor. However, even though she regularly sends him poems for him to criticize and makes her gratitude to him very clear and frequently humbles herself to him, it seems to me that she doesn’t often take his advice. When he advised her to change something about one of her poems, Dickenson replied “I do not let it go, because it is mine. (letter 271)” This makes me wonder if she ever took much advice from her old “Master,” and who that person is. She could have learned much of what she knew from him and refused to change to accommodate Higginson. Or she could have gone against his advice as much as Higginson. At one point, she explains to Higginson that she is not religious, even though her family is, and if her old mentor really was the Reverend, I’m thinking this could point towards some dissent from his teachings. Dickinson also mentions to Higginson that her former tutor died, so this could be the same person that she was writing those initial get-well letters to.