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<\/a>Anne Bradstreet\u2019s collected poems, edited by John Harvard Ellis, was published in 1867 by A. E. Cutter in Charlestown, and bears the mark \u201cNo. 157 of 250 copies printed.\u201d\u00a0 Ellis\u2019s Preface provided me with reassurance that this edition would indeed hold true, if not exact, to the first edition of Bradstreet\u2019s works which was published during her lifetime in London in 1650.\u00a0 Specifically, Ellis explains that at the time of his edition there had been three published editions of Bradstreet\u2019s collected works.\u00a0 The first (1650), a second published in Boston in 1678 six years after Bradstreet\u2019s death, and a third published from the second edition in 1758, also in Boston.\u00a0 Ellis notes that the third edition contains \u201cnumerous omissions of words, changes in spelling, and other alternations of little importance.\u201d\u00a0 In his edition, Ellis paid careful attention to maintaining the integrity of the second edition of Bradstreet\u2019s collection thereby, it would appear, dismissing any value in the third edition.\u00a0 The second edition, Ellis notes, \u201ccontained the additions and corrects of the author, and several poems found amongst her papers after her death.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, the second edition is a more exhaustive collection of Bradstreet\u2019s work.\u00a0 It also provides \u201cextensive\u201d corrections to both spelling and grammar.<\/p>\n\u201cI changed my condition and was married, and came into this country, where I found a new world and new manners, at which my heart rose.\u00a0 But after I was convinced it was the way of God, I submitted to it and joined the church at Boston.\u201d [i]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 This recollection, shared by Anne Bradstreet with her children once many years settled, speaks volumes to a woman\u2019s position and identity in Puritan colonial society.\u00a0 Specifically, a woman\u2019s duty was to submit, be it to God or to husband, and most preferably to both.\u00a0 Yet Anne Bradstreet would do something remarkable for her times.\u00a0 She would become the first published female poet in colonial America.\u00a0 A female voice, un-muted.\u00a0 Bradstreet first came to my attention in a survey undergrad American Literature course.\u00a0 We read a handful of her poems and spent all of five minutes discussing her work and life in class.\u00a0 Remarkable, in my opinion, given Bradstreet\u2019s significant accomplishment.\u00a0 And so I chose for this post to delve deeper into why Bradstreet\u2019s voice carried while so many female voices were muted in colonial America.<\/p>\n I have briefly encountered another colonial America Anne during my studies \u2013 Anne Hutchinson.\u00a0 While this post is not about Hutchinson, and I will not devote any great length to a discussion on Hutchinson, it is important to make note of Hutchinson because her banishment from society stands in stark contrast from the acceptance that Anne Bradstreet received.\u00a0 Bradstreet\u2019s female voice won over her contemporaries, rather than inciting their wrath as Hutchinson\u2019s had.\u00a0 Hutchinson and Bradstreet were contemporaries, somewhat.\u00a0 Anne Hutchinson settled in America from 1634 to 1643 and Anne Bradstreet from 1630 to 1672.\u00a0 They lived among the same Puritan settlers under similar male confines.\u00a0\u00a0 So why did Hutchinson\u2019s voice get her banished while Bradstreet\u2019s voice was rewarded with the ultimate prize for a writer; being published?\u00a0 For an answer I look to how the two women chose to express themselves.\u00a0 Anne Hutchinson\u2019s voice was fervent and oppositional; she directly challenged the ministry.\u00a0 Anne Bradstreet on the other hand sneaked in through the back door; her writings left much room for interpretation.\u00a0 Her voice was equally challenging; not in its demanding strength but in its crafty manipulation.<\/p>\n By way of example, I look to To my Dear and Loving Husband<\/i>.<\/p>\n If ever two were one, then surely we.<\/p>\n If ever man were lov\u2019d by wife, then thee;<\/p>\n If ever wife was happy in a man,<\/p>\n Compare with me ye women if you can.<\/p>\n At first reading, this is a love poem written by a devoted wife.\u00a0 She expresses not only her love but also urges others to look to this couple as an example of married bliss.\u00a0 However, Bradstreet\u2019s words quickly force us to question if there is perhaps more she is trying to tell us when she continues:<\/p>\n I prize thy love more than whole Mines of gold,<\/p>\n Or all the riches that the East doth hold.<\/p>\n My love is such that Rivers cannot quench,<\/p>\n Nor ought but love from thee, give recompence.<\/p>\n These lines speak of such trivial matters of earthly possessions and payment.\u00a0 She attempts to place a size and value on love.\u00a0 In this, Bradstreet has strayed from the ethereal to the earthly; and in doing so, she diminishes the value of love.\u00a0 If her love can be compared to such an earthly thing as a mineral, if a value can be placed upon it, if it can be measured, surely its magnificence is overrated.<\/p>\n Thy love is such I can no way repay,<\/p>\n The heavens reward thee manifold I pray.<\/p>\n Then while we live, in love lets so persever,<\/p>\n That when we live no more, we may live ever.<\/p>\n Anne Hutchinson\u2019s story reveals a rift in Puritan society between those who preached the covenant of grace and those who preached the covenant of works.\u00a0 In the above lines I hear Bradstreet\u2019s musings on this debate.\u00a0 She speaks of salvation; \u201cheavens reward,\u201d and tells her husband that \u201cwhile [they] live, in love let\u2019s so persever.\u201d\u00a0 Her practical approach is to deal with the here and now, loving her husband while they live, so that they may enjoy eternity together.\u00a0 It is in these final lines of the poem that I believe Bradstreet\u2019s female voice speaks out against the contentious debate that plagued Puritan society.\u00a0 Softly and cleverly hidden in endearing terms of affection towards her husband, Anne Bradstreet gives her own interpretation of salvation and how one can attain it.<\/p>\n Another example of Bradstreet\u2019s ability to express herself in an unforgiving puritan society is in The Prologue<\/i>. Here, Bradstreet\u2019s use of epic genre invokes classical style:<\/p>\n To sing of Wars, of Captains, and of Kings,<\/p>\n Of Cities founded, Common-wealths begun,<\/p>\n For my mean pen are too superior things:<\/p>\n Or how they all, or each their dates have run,<\/p>\n Let Poets and Historians set these forth,<\/p>\n My obscure Lines shall not so dim their worth.<\/p>\n In using this genre and style, Bradstreet mimics the writing style of the Great Men; a style well accepted throughout history.\u00a0 In doing so, Bradstreet sneaks onto the scene.\u00a0 Yes she is a woman.\u00a0 But her style is familiar, and therefore, she is allowed to continue.\u00a0 She cleverly carries this deceit forward in the next stanza where she hides within her theme, simply mimicking her muse, Bartas:<\/p>\n A Bartas can, do what a Bartas will<\/p>\n But simple I according to my skill.<\/p>\n Bradstreet has set the scene for us.\u00a0 We are safe to read on, un-threatened by the humble female voice.\u00a0 Yet in the blink of an eye she springs on us, as if glaring at the reader, knitting needles angrily click-clacking, body tense:<\/p>\n I am obnoxious to each carping tongue<\/p>\n Who fays my hand a needle better fits,<\/p>\n A Poets pen all scorn I should thus wrong,<\/p>\n For such despite they cast on Female wits:<\/p>\n If what I do prove well, it won\u2019t advance,<\/p>\n They\u2019l say it\u2019s stoln, or else it was by chance.<\/p>\n The once self-diminishing and humble Puritan wife is now the combative and angry Poet.\u00a0 She angrily calls out society and its \u201ccarping tongue\u201d that insist a woman\u2019s voice is better silenced; a woman\u2019s place is in the home.\u00a0 She is no feeble-minded female.\u00a0 Her \u201cPoets pen\u201d is guided not by accident or chance but rather by an intelligent \u201cfemale wit.\u201d\u00a0 The next stanza shows us just how clever Bradstreet\u2019s Poetic pen could be:<\/p>\n Let Greeks be Greeks, and women what they are<\/p>\n Men have precedency and still excel,<\/p>\n It is but vain unjustly to wage warre;<\/p>\n Men can do best, and women know it well<\/p>\n Preheminence in all and each is yours;<\/p>\n Yet grant some small acknowledgement of ours.<\/p>\n With this stanza Bradstreet speaks in more conciliatory tones, gradually calming the reader down.\u00a0 In a single breath she acknowledges a man\u2019s \u201cprecedency\u201d and \u201cpreheminence\u201d while also asking that her female voice be judged not by its femininity but by the intelligence that guides it.\u00a0 The entire poem is a whirlwind of emotion and manipulation.<\/p>\n From the role of diminutive sex to angry feminist to well-reasoned litigator, The Prologue and To My Dear and Loving Husband are prime examples of Anne Bradstreet\u2019s clever use of manipulative language and style that would save her from a fate similar to Anne Hutchinson.\u00a0 Anne Bradstreet\u2019s works survive today, neatly bound and displayed in library stacks worldwide.\u00a0 Ironically, Cotton Mather, the grandson of John Cotton and turncoat of Anne Hutchinson, would sing Anne Bradstreet\u2019s praise, writing that her poems \u201chave afforded a grateful entertainment unto the ingenious, and a monument for her memory beyond the stateliest marbles.\u201d [ii]<\/a> \u00a0Thankfully, time alters perspective; the female voice of each Anne has survived history in spite of those who believed such a voice should not.<\/p>\n
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