Anne Bradstreet!
1612 – 1672
• Father was John Dudley, a nonconformist
soldier
• 1630, sailed with family to America
• His coworker, Simon Bradstreet, married
Anne when she was 16 and he was 25
• Anne was well tutored in literature, history,
Greek, Latin, French, Hebrew, and English.
• In her memoirs, she wrote of America: "I found a
new world and new manners at which my heart
rose [up in protest.]“
• Bother her father and husband were governors of
Massachusetts, allowing her some luxury of
lifestyle.
• Though her men had social prominence, "any
woman who sought to use her wit, charm, or
intelligence in the community at large found
herself ridiculed, banished, or executed by the
Colony's powerful group of male leaders."
• Her husband, in quest for more land and power,
constantly moved them to the edges of the
dangerous frontier.
• Through this dangerous life, Anne and Simon had
8 children, all of whom lived through childhood,
which was rare enough in mire populous areas.
• Anne herself was frequently ill and constantly
expected death, but survived to be 60 years old.
Ann Hutchinson
• A Friend of Ann – intelligent, well educated
• Mother of 14 children
• Debated religious and ethical ideas with other
women in the community
• She believed good works not necessary to go
to heaven
• Banished from the colony and killed by Indians
• Her later poetry was published posthumously,
and contained a much more well-developed
poetic voice.
• Her Apologies, especially, dripped with sarcasm in
her response to the male opinion of women in
society.
• Anne was a radically feminist poet, challenging
the banishing of women to the private sphere of
life and questioning the idea of an unforgiving
Puritan God.
• Because of the tendency of the Puritans to
ostracize female intellectuals, Anne was
hesitant to publish any of her poetry.
• Her brother took some of her early poems to
England (legendarily against her will) and
published them as The Tenth Muse Lately
Sprung Up in America when she was 38. It
sold very well.
• Anne was viewed as an intriguingly feminist
writer, merging her sometimes overtly sexual
imagery with the concepts of both her love for
God and for her husband and family.
• She examined the paradoxical reconciliation of
a woman in the Puritanically repressive roles
carnal love for her husband and her more
stately and respectable relationship with God
and the church.
• This led to a more in-depth examination by
feminist critics in the mid-20th century of her
individualist take on more traditional doctrine.
Criticism
• Since she stuck to this traditionally accepted
courtly style, her Tenth Muse was wellacclaimed among critical circles.
Literary Terms
• Extended metaphors: Detailed and complex
metaphors that extend over a long section of
a poem - Robert Frost “The Road Not Taken”
• Inversion:In grammar, a reversal of normal
word order, especially the placement of a verb
ahead of the subject (subject-verb inversion).
• Ex – “In silent night when rest I took”
• Special thank you to “Biography of Anne
Bradstreet” by Ann Woodlief located at
http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/webtexts/Bradst
reet/bradbio.htm.
• “Even as highly respected a man as Governor
John Winthrop believed women could not
bear intellectual rigor without irreparable
harm.”
• “Women simply did not do what Bradstreet
did in the seveenth century unless there was
something ‘wrong’ with them”
• In your group read the poem Verses upon the
Burning of our House and individually rewrite
the versus in your own words.
• Do the same thing for “An Author to Her
Book”
• http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/webtexts/Bradst
reet/bradpoems.htm