Phillis Wheatley

Phillis Wheatley

Phillis Wheatley was America’s first black female poet to publish a book. Phillis Wheatley was born around 1753. She was born into the Fulani tribe, which is in the extreme west of Africa that is now Senegal and Gambia. At the age of 7 she was kidnapped and brought to New England and from there she was put on sale at the slave market in Boston. She was bought by John Wheatley as a present for his wife Susannah. The Wheatley’s called Phillis Wheatley, Phillis because the ship that brought her to America was named the Phillis. (O'Neale)

Phillis Wheatley was a household servant. She received far better treatment than most slaves. For example, slaves during this era were never, if rarely, allowed to be in the master’s house. Phillis was the exception to this because she lived in the house on a daily basis. By the time she was a teenager, Wheatley had become an intelligent student and received equal if not more education than any other woman at the time. One of her central studies was the Bible, which in time would become one of the main topics in her writing. (http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/DC)

Phillis was freed from slavery in March, of 1774. She married a freed slave named John Peters who was a grocer. Phillis and John had three children together, but lived in the worst of poverty. Phillis worked as servant, but never made enough money to sustain the family. Because of their economical status John eventually went to debtors prison and left Phillis and their one surviving child to fend for themselves. On December 5th 1784 Phillis died and a few hours later her infant child died. (http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/DC)

Wheatley’s primary works where elegiac poems and letters that honored the lives and accomplishments of famous contemporaries. (http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/DC) One of her most famous poems congratulating and honoring someone was “To His Excellency General Washington”. In this poem Wheatley is addressing George Washington and congratulating him on being chosen as General by the Continental Congress to run the armies of the North American colonies. My feeling is that the poems theme is freedom’s cause. Freedom from the once admired and revered Britain. She gives the pretext that heaven is on the side of America and warns that if England goes to war with it that it is destined for failure, when she says, “And so may you, whoever dares disgrace the land of freedom’s heaven-defended race!” Towards the end of the poem it seems that Wheatley is urging Washington on to continue with his good work. What she is basically telling him is that he needs to defeat the British at all cost. Washington was very touched by this poem and offered to meet Wheatley, Which the he later did.

In the poem “On Being Brought from Africa to America” is considered to be one of the few poems that Wheatley acknowledges her slave roots. This poem was far from her norm because almost none of her poems ever talked about slaves or the issues involved with it. In the first stanza she states,” ‘TWAS mercy that brought me from my pagan land”. I find it interesting that she uses the word mercy in this stanza. She unlike the majority of other slaves is happy and grateful that she has been brought to America. That one stanza is a very clear marker that her life wasn’t very hard and probably lived like most white people in the era did. In the fourth and fifth stanza she says, “Some view our sable race with scornful eye, Their colour is a diabolic die”. In these two stanzas is where Wheatley acknowledges the fact that racism is very alive and that slavery is an important issue to her. In the last two stanzas of the poem she states, “Remember Christians, Negros, black as Cain, may be refin’d and join th’ angelic train”. I think that in these stanzas she is saying that no matter what race you are you will be accepted by god and allowed on his “angelic train”. As you can see Christianity was a staple in Wheatley’s writings. Many of her works deal with aspects of the Christian faith such as redemption