[en] Dickinson remained fascinated by the evocative power of song and voice, and her poetry has an unmistakable lyrical ring to it. At the same time, however, Dickinson evolved a poetic theory—based upon "stint," secrecy and even silence—which appears to be quite distinct from the outpourings of emotion that are usually associated with lyricism. What, then, are the nature and identity of the first-person poetic voice that secretly speaks through the lyrical persona of Dickinson's poems? That is the question which I seek to answer in this essay, from the point of view of a theory of lyricism, according to which the lyrical self exists only as a figure of the biographical subject. The lyrical self embodies the tension of the poet's voice diffracted through the signifier and implies an ironical distance with the poet's real identity, thus becoming her secret signature. This self is nothing but the gap in which the poet withdraws and re-draws herself in order to write.I start with a detailed reading of a few clearly metapoetic poems in which Dickinson proposes an aesthetic theory defining the poet as a subject caught between image and voice, incapable of choosing between a visual or an aural mode of inscription in the poems' words. Such a calling into question of the first person is then analyzed according to its various figurative inscriptions in the language, leading me to envisage the poetic self as a "metaplasmic" self, caught in her own shifting iconic presence in the poems and eventually deriving the power of her voice from her intermediary position between ear and eye.As she conceals herself behind the often deceitful assertion of a "first person," "Dickinson" creates for herself a much more ambiguous poetic identity whose aesthetic creed relies on secrecy, a self speaking in the confidential and provisional tones of a voice which remains potential, or even "spectral.

[fr] Cet article explore les paradoxes du lyrisme d'Emily Dickinson, qui se fonde sur le secret et le silence pour subvertir le modèle conventionnel d'un épanchement de la voix lyrique. Quelles sont la nature et l'identité de la voix poétique qui secrètement parle à travers la persona lyrique des poèmes d'Emily Dickinson ? C'est à cette question que je souhaiterais apporter un début de réponse, guidé par une théorie " figurale " du lyrisme pour laquelle le sujet lyrique n'est autre que la faille dans laquelle le sujet poétique se retire et se retrace pour pouvoir écrire et s'inscrire. À travers la lecture de quelques poèmes ouvertement métapoétiques, je montre comment la polyphonie du lyrisme dickinsonien se traduit par une écriture synesthésique où le sujet acquiert son identité propre entre l'ouïe et l'œil. Cette remise en jeu de la première personne est ensuite analysée selon ses modalités figurales : le sujet lyrique apparaît ainsi pris dans les multiples inscriptions iconiques des poèmes. Derrière l'assertion souvent trompeuse d'un " je, " Dickinson " se constitue en sujet poétique plus ambigü, élaborant une esthétique selon laquelle la poésie ne peut s'accomplir pleinement que dans la réserve, sur le mode à la fois confidentiel et conditionnel d'une parole restée potentielle, spectrale.