Essay about Phillis Wheatley

The first known African American to have a poetry book published in America was the late Ms. Phillis Wheatley. Wheatley was born in 1753, in West Africa. In 1761, when Wheatley was roughly seven or eight years of age; she was purchased as a personal slave for Susannah Wheatley, the wife of John Wheatley. Phillis was taught to read and write from Susannah Wheatley’s daughter, Mary in between her household duties. At an early age, Wheatley was deeply involved in the Bible and multitude of other things to include Latin and Greek to English Literature. Wheatley’s love of poetry began when she was just twelve years old. At this age, she started writing poetry and Phillis’ first poem was published in 1770. (Carretta, 2011)

The illustration that Phillis Wheatley portrays in history is an African-American woman who wrote poetry. Her life goes more into depths that what is perceived, however. Phillis Wheatley uses her poetry as a unique way to get out the truth. Through poems such as On Being Brought From Africa to America and the poem about Lee, she made statements about was what going on at that time; a revolution. Phillis Wheatley was known as a revolutionary mother, for she gave hope to slaves, ease to whites, and was an influence to America. She was not known for conflict or trying to start an argument, but she more known for personalizing her thoughts onto a piece of paper, read by all of America. Her ideas were used as an influence during

Phillis Wheatley was the the first African American writer to have her books published in the United States. Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral written by Wheatley was viewed as a model for the importance of education with religious aspects, as it was often seen throughout her poetry. Formulated mainly of neoclassical elegiac poetry, Poems on Various Subjects triggered several discussions concerning the length to which Wheatley can be deemed a minor poet or whether she wrote to express politics and moral trouble.

Born in Senegal around 1753, Phillis Wheatley became an important American poetic figure. At the age of 8, she was kidnapped and brought to Boston on a slave ship and upon her arrival to Boston, she was quickly sold to John Wheatley (Bio). Under her new family, Phillis adopted the master’s last name, taken under the wife’s wing, and showed her deep intelligence. Even though suffering from poor health, Phillis’s intelligence did not go unnoticed; she received lessons in theology, English, Latin and Greek. Being a slave did not stop Phillis from learning and experiencing her life, she participated in the master’s family events and eventually became a family member. The irony in this situation is

Within sixteen months of her arrival, she was reading astronomy, geography, history, and British literature. Wheatley was able to break a language barrier that had held so many others of her race back. Her desire for learning increased and the quest for knowledge became embedded in her spirit, mind, and soul. By her teenage years, Wheatley was a well known author, reciting poems for the New England elite in homes where blacks could not even sit at the table with whites.Phillis Wheatley made many contributions to American literature. Other than successfully representing and expressing the feelings of anger, frustration, and impatience of African American people abroad, she has paved the way for young aspiring African American writers.

Phillis Wheatley overcame extreme obstacles, such as racism and sexism, to become one of the most acclaimed poets in the 18th Century. Her works are characterized by religious and moral backgrounds, which are due to the extensive education of religion she received. In this sense, her poems also fit into American Poetry. However, she differs in the way that she is a black woman whose writings tackle greater subjects while incorporating her moral standpoint. By developing her writing, she began speaking out against injustices that she faced and, consequently, gave way to authors such as Gwendolyn Brooks and Countee Cullen.

In a time when Africans were stolen from their native lands and brought through the middle passage to a land that claimed was a free country, a small African girl, who would later be known as Phillis Wheatley, was sold in Boston in 1761. In the speech, “The Miracle of Black Poetry in America”, written by June Jordan, a well respected black poet, professor and activist, wrote the speech in 1986, 200 years after Phillis walked the earth, to honor the legacy of the first black female poet for the people of the United States. Jordan, passionately alludes to the example of Phillis Wheatley’s life, to show the strength and perseverance of African-American people throughout difficult history and how they have overcome the impossible.

Anne Bradstreet, Daughter of the one governor and first published poet in America, was classified as a classic religious poet and also was also considered a very modern poet who really focused on her everyday life and all of her daily activates. Phillis Wheatley, enslaved at the age of 6, and became the first black women poet in America wote mostly classical poetry and had many Christian views. Her poetry used pyscholical meaning and also used poetic devices. Although both poets were to very respected poets of there time both are also very different compared to their work. Phillis Wheatley’s poetry was more in depth, thoughtful, and had somewhat more stylish than the work of Anne’s Bradstreet’s.

Phillis Wheatley was an American figure unlike any other at her time. In a time where slavery was the normal, Ms. Wheatley was a revolutionary figure. She was not revolutionary because she was one of the enslaved but because she was one of the enslaved that knew how to read and write, becoming a published author. Women at the time of Phillis Wheatley were oppressed into submission to social norms. It was almost unheard of for a woman to write poetry, much less to be published. So, for Phillis Wheatley not only to be a slave, but also to be a woman that wrote poetry, she was an extremely influential figure. She was not influential in just one area, but in two areas because she led the way to women being accepted as writers and planted a seed of abolition, although not directly intentional.

She settled in Auburn after the civil war and began taking in Orphans and old people, A practice that eventuated in the Harriet Tubman home for aged negroes (Harriet). The home attracted the support of former abolitionist comrades and the citizens of Auburn, It even existed for some years after her death. (Harriet). She donated 25 acres of land to the church in 1903 for establishment of shelter for poor and homeless African Americans. She then died of pneumonia in new york in 1913 (Americans). She was known as “The moses of her people” because of her brave and courageous rescues of hundreds of slaves on the Underground Railroad, She was a living symbol of resistance of African Americans to slavery

Harriet Tubman, a runaway slave, helped so many blacks escape to freedom that she became the ‘‘Moses’’ of her people. She was born in 1820 in Bucktown, Maryland and died in 1913 in Auburn, New York. During the civil war, she served the union army as a nurse, cook scout, and spy for four years. In 1844, Harriet married a free black man, John Tubman. She left him in 1849. She married Nelson Davis in 1870 and stayed with him.She traveled at night and day guided by the underground railroad a secret network of secret routes and safe house’s. She built the Tubman Home in 1870. She receives honor from queen Victoria for bravery (1893) Harriet Tubman is a hero because of her Determination, Sacrifice and Loyalty. Here’s why,

The Underground Railroad which many of you have heard the term before in your history classes was actually started around 1780. The Civil War started in 1861 many years later this passage contributed to the war. The Underground Railroad was a word that was used to describe a network of places to meet, unknown routes, passages and safe homes used by slave to escape into Canada from the United States for freedom. The Railroad was estimated to free 1,000 slaves a year in total the freed an estimated 100,000 between 1810 and 1850. The “conductors” of the railroad would act as a slave and go on the plantation and would convince slaves that they were slaves and could be free with their help but they would need to do as

In around 1844, Harriet became married to a free man named John Tubman, despite her marriage for two more years she lived with her owner at the time, Dr. Thompson. After her master had died, she promptly left the plantation, seeing as though the slaves had been freed in a will a long while back. “Harriet resolved not be sold, and so, with no knowledge of the North- having only heard of Pennsylvania and New Jersey- she walked away one night alone.” After reaching her new home of Philadelphia she found work, yet decided to travel to Maryland to find her husband, how upon her arrival, she discovered had married another woman. Seeing as though her domestic life with this man would not work out, so from approximately 1845 to 1860 she helped escort approximately 50 to 60 slaves to freedom. Thomas Garret, in a letter, is quoted saying, “No slave who placed himself under her care, was ever arrested that I have heard of; she mostly had her regular stopping places on her route; but in one instance, when she had two stout men with her, some 30 miles below here, she said that God told her to stop, which she did; and then asked him what she must do.”Harriet remarked that God guided her on her path, she followed his directions to guide her and the people she was escorting to safety. It is said that to the people she escorted, sometimes all the way to Canada, “Harriet was their good

Around the age of 13, Phillis published her first poem. Phillis was the first African-American female poet in history. By the time she turned 18, she had a total of 28 poems wrote. Mrs. Wheatley helped her run advertisements and helped her promote these poems. She had much success with that, she had many other good ones that followed. In 1773, her book called Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral was published (Biography.com).

The underground train network of secret routes and safe houses used by 19 people in the Horn of African slaves in the United States in efforts to escape to free states and Canada calls for the abolition of slavery and its allies sympathetic to the cause. This term also applies to the abolition of slavery, both black, free and enslaved, who helped refugees and white. He took several other ways to Mexico or abroad. The "underground railroad" of South Florida, then Spanish king until the 17th century, and after a brief period of the American Revolution. But now the network has been established and known as the Underground Railroad in the 19th century and reached its peak between 1850 and 1860. One estimate is that in 1850, 100 thousand slaves