Afternoons with Emily (69 page)

Her sense of connection with Emily Dickinson is not surprising. Both of them were intoxicated with words and were immensely
intelligent and well read, looked beneath the surfaces of things, and shared a rather dark approach to life. Like Emily, Rose
MacMurray would have said her first love was poetry, not novels. Therefore, the arrival of
Afternoons with Emily
into her life was a surprise and a challenge that happily consumed her final four years. The night before she went into the
hospital for what was expected to be a routine operation, she told me with glee that she had finished her manuscript. A few
nights later, after an eerily purposeful round of phone calls to her children and a visit with Frank, she suddenly died.

After her death, my father and I took on the major responsibility of bringing her work to light. He and I had both been an
integral part of the writing process: we read and commented on chapters as they emerged and fact-checked some of the historical
detail. A family friend, Pat Hass, helped with sage and expert guidance, and saw that it reached the hands of our agent, Donald
Maass. My two brothers were concerned and generous with their advice. But as time passed, other priorities intervened, and
the prospect of publication seemed increasingly remote. My father’s health began to fail, and I began to think that we must
be content with simply knowing that our mother had produced something remarkable. But Pat and Don never lost faith. And the
call from Little, Brown seemed like a miraculous affirmation of Rose’s originality and talent.

A number of people have contributed to this work, and to them we are truly grateful. Emily Dickinson herself was its ever-present
inspiration. Though I believe my mother truly captured Emily’s voice and spirit, I hope that scholars reading this novel will
remember that Rose was primarily a fellow poet. A number of people have contributed to the work since its initial writing:
Don Maass is the kind of agent authors dream about, and Helen Atsma has been a patient and sensitive editor, qualities particularly
appreciated by the previously uninitiated. Carla Jablonski, Susan Leon, and Madeleine Robins offered valuable contributions.
Finally, I can clearly remember my mother telling me how she would like to dedicate her book. The phrasing is mine, since
I didn’t have the sense to write down her exact words. But the feelings are her own:

This book is dedicated to Pat Hass, without whose tireless friendship
Afternoons with Emily
would never have appeared.

And above all to Frank, with deepest love and gratitude for everything.