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The Three Emilys as an Extension of Livesay

Dorothy Livesay’s The Three Emilys explores the contrary roles of an artist and a mother. Livesay compares the poem’s persona, presumably herself, to the Emily’s, a synecdoche for Bronte, Dickinson, Carr and other female poets who forsook the domestic life. While Livesay initially sees the Emily’s lack of domesticity as pitiful, she eventually comes to envy their creative freedom.