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Actress feels fierce after playing the role of famous American poet

Actress and singer Hailee Steinfeld just took on a challenging new role, playing legendary 19th-century poet Emily Dickinson in Apple TV’s new series Dickinson. The show is a “period piece” about Dickinson’s life, with some supernatural and “psychedelic” touches, Steinfeld told Variety.

Steinfeld said playing the role made her feel “fearless.”

The real Emily Dickinson led a reclusive life, never marrying or leaving home. Her poetry, however, was revolutionary for its time–the 1850s, when even the most talented female writers had trouble getting published.

“She sits in the corner of her room [writing] and looks out the window and there’s a world out there — but even a bigger one in her mind,” Steinfeld said. “[The show has] incredible comedic moments and this dark humor and dramatic moments and everything in between, and it really reflects everything in her poetry, which is every possible emotion.”

Alena Smith, the show’s creator, said she wanted Dickinson to get the recognition she never received in life.

“The basic idea here is if Emily wasn’t understood in her time, maybe we can better understand her now,” Smith said. “I once read this thing that said period shows make the best feminist TV because when things were more exaggerated, we can perhaps look at how things aren’t so different today.”