At France Culture, a dive like a daydream into the words and life of Emily Dickinson

On France Culture, a plunge like a reverie into the words and life of Emily Dickinson

Read by two actresses, letters and poems of the American writer merge with today’s books to bring her back to life. A tribute to daydreaming…

For her limitless imagination, it was a small but fertile space: Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) spent her entire life in her family home in Amherst, New England. First the garden, then the house, and finally her room, a sanctuary where the American author wrote nearly two thousand poems on any type of material. Laure Egoroff composes a sensitive tribute to her in “Samedi fiction,” blending passages from two books by Dominique Fortier (“Les Villes de papier” and “Les Ombres blanches”) with the artist’s texts and extracts from her correspondence.

A sound landscape unfolds and conjures the imagination, offering an immersion sometimes ethereal into Dickinson’s interior world. “I wanted these sound images to offer listeners a form of reverie,” explains the director and adapter. The narrative follows Emily from childhood, interpreted by Liléa Le Borgne, to adulthood, where she is ardently embodied by Clémence Poésy. “I love her spontaneity and the way she embraces the poetic form,” Laure Egoroff continues. “There is something ambiguous, luminous, and melancholic in Clémence’s voice.” The piece subtly captures Dominique Fortier’s gentle phrases while allowing the violence, anxiety, and obsession with death that permeate Emily Dickinson’s poetry to emerge. It is an incandescent path off the beaten track.

“A life of paper, Emily Dickinson,” on “Samedi fiction” on France Culture. 58 minutes.

By Carole Lefrançois Published on March 7, 2026 at 1:00 P.M.

[Source: Telerama]

(Translated from French)