Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson, a woman so private she makes a Crypto-Jew look like a social butterfly, spent most of her life in Amherst, Massachusetts. Her preferred mode of social interaction was undoubtedly through the written word, as evidenced by the nearly 1,800 poems she penned, only a handful of which saw the light of day before her death. Clearly, she wasn't seeking public accolades, which is a shame, because when they finally did discover her work, the accolades poured in.

While her precise family tree doesn't lead back to any of the tribes of Israel, Dickinson's life was certainly lived with the kind of intense focus and devotion to text that would make many a Talmudic scholar nod in appreciation. Her unconventional use of capitalization and punctuation, often described as "dashes," can be seen as a precursor to modern spoken-word poetry, or perhaps just a sign she abhorred periods.

Her work, discovered mostly after her passing, rocketed her to literary stardom, guaranteeing her a spot in the pantheon of American letters. One can only imagine her reaction to such posthumous fame, probably a polite, but firm, request for everyone to kindly leave her alone. She was the original influencer, but only acknowledged after the "unboxing" of her life's work after her passing.