Full Description
In 1773, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral became the first book of poetry by an African-American author to be published. At the tender age of seven, Phillis had been brought to Massachusetts as a slave and sold to the well-to-do Wheatley family. There, she threw herself into education, and soon she was devouring the classics and writing verse with whatever she had to hand - odes in chalk on the walls of the house. Once her talent became known, there was uproar, and in 1772 she was interrogated by a panel of 'the most respectable characters in Boston' and forced to defend the ownership of her own words, since many believed that it was an impossible that she, an African-American slave, could write poetry of such high quality.
As related in the 1834 memoir by an outspoken proponent of antislavery, B.B. Thatcher, also included in this volume, the road to publication was not straight, and while it became clear that such a volume could not be published in America at the time, Phillis was recommended to a London publisher, who brought out the book - albeit with an attestation as to her authorship, as well as a 'letter from her master' and a short preface asking the reader's indulgence. This edition includes the attestation, the 'letter from her master' and notes from the original publishers as an appendix, so that the twenty-first-century reader can discover Phillis Wheatley as she should have been read - as a poet, not property.
Contents
To the Public; Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral: 'To Maecenas', 'On Virtue', 'To the University of Cambridge in New England', 'To the King's Most Excellent Majesty', 'On Being Brought from Africa to America', 'On the Death of the Rev. Dr Sewell', 'On the Death of the Rev. Mr George Whitefield', 'On the Death of a Young Lady of Five Years of Age', 'On the Death of a Young Gentleman', 'To a Lady on the Death of Her Husband', 'Goliath of Gath', 'Thoughts on the Works of Providence', 'To a Lady on the Death of Three Relations', 'To a Clergyman on the Death of His Lady', 'A Hymn to the Morning', 'A Hymn to the Evening', 'Isaiah LXIII 1-8', 'On Recollection', 'On Imagination', 'A Funeral Poem on the Death of C.E.', 'To Captain H——d of the 65th Regiment', 'To the Right Honourable William, Earl of Dartmouth', 'Ode to Neptune', 'To a Lady on Her Coming to North America', 'To a Lady on Her Remarkable Preservation in a Hurricane in North Carolina', 'To a Lady and Her Children on the Death of Her Son and Their Brother', 'To a Gentleman and Lady on the Death of the Lady's Brother and Sister, and a Child', 'On the Death of Dr Samuel Marshall', 'To a Gentleman on His Voyage to Great Britain', 'To the Rev. Dr Thomas Amory', 'On the Death of J.C., an Infant', 'A Hymn to Humanity', 'To the Honourable T.H., Esq., on the Death of His Daughter', 'Niobe in Distress for Her Children Slain by Apollo', 'To S.M., a Young African Painter', 'To His Honour the Lieutenant Governor, on the Death of His Lady', 'A Farewell to America', 'A Rebus, by I.B.', 'An Answer to the Rebus; A Memoir of Phillis Wheatley, a Native African and a Slave; Note on the Text; Notes; Index of First Lines; Appendix: Preface from the First Edition of the Poems, Notice to the Public from the First Edition of the Poems, Notice to the Public from the First Edition of the Memoir
