10 GROUNDCOVER NEWS POETRY “Kidnapped from her West African home in 1762 and sold into slavery, Phillis Wheatley grew up to become the first popular African American poet. She was also the first African American and the first slave to publish a book of poems.” — Britannica Kids website The story of Phillis Wheatley is one which appeals to both the younger and the older generation. She was a trailblazer. When we talk about early Black literary achievements, her contributions and her excellence loom large. This is our fourth and last article about early Black writers and poets of America. The author plans to encourage more discussion and dialogues on this topic at some bookstores and coffee houses in Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti. Stay tuned for some announcements and community invitations. Biography of Phillis Wheatley Historians do not have the exact birthday for Phillis Wheatley. Many have suggested that she was seven or eight when she was abducted and sold into slavery in 1761. She was a young girl when the slave ship brought her to the shores of Boston. A wealthy tailor, John Wheatley, purchased the little girl to be a servant to his wife, Suzanna. Soon, Suzanna and John noticed Phillis had reading and writing abilities. Suzanna and her young daughter, Mary, started to teach young Phillis English, grammar, religion, Greek, Latin and English literature. Within two years, Phillis could read and write clearly in English. She also demonstrated proficiency in Latin. She mastered the styles and techniques of popular poets by the time she turned 14. A Britannica Kids online article said that as a teenager of 14, Phillis had a poem published in the Newport Mercury Newspaper of Rhode Island. Later, other poems by Phillis appeared in Boston publications. Phillis’s poems were influenced by the words of poets John Milton, Thomas Gray and Alexander Pope. Britannica Kids observes that in 1770, her “An Elegiac Poem, on the Death of the Celebrated Divine … George Whitefield’ was published first in a locally-produced pamphlet and then in newspapers throughout British America and England.” Britannica kids continued, “...the poem’s wide distribution brought her recognition as the ‘extraordinary poetical genius of New England.’ Selina Hastings, countess of Huntingdon and a WILL SHAKESPEARE Groundcover vendor No. 258 friend of Whitefield, invited the young poet to England and sought a publisher for her works.” According to Poets.org, Phillis traveled to London, England, in 1771, accompanied by Nathaniel Wheatley, son of John and Suzanna Wheatley. She had put together a collection of her poems into a book, “Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral.” In London, she was well-received. The book of 39 poems was published in London and she dedicated it to Countess Selina Hastings. While in London, she met with some dignitaries, including William Legge, second earl of Dartmouth, the abolitionist Granville Sharpe and Benjamin Franklin. She was unable to meet the countess who invited her to England, because when Suzanna became ill in 1773, Phillis hurried back to Boston to help her recover. Poets.org noted: “In 1776, Wheatley wrote a letter and a poem in support of George Washington, who replied with an invitation to visit him ...” Phillis was freed from slavery before Suzanna’s death in 1774. After John Wheatley died, Phillis tried to support herself as a seamstress and a poet. Phillis married a free Black man known as John Peters in 1778. He was a grocer and a lawyer. The couple had three children. Mr. Peters abandoned Phillis and her children. To provide for her kids, Phillis became a maid in a boardinghouse. Two of her children died while she experienced poverty. Britannica kids noted, “On December 5, 1784, Wheatley and her third child died within hours of each other. They were buried together in an unmarked grave.” A very sad tragedy! Historians tell us that Phillis continued to write poems until her last day on earth. However, she was unable to find publishers for her books of poems. About 50 years after her death, in 1834, “Memoirs of Phillis Wheatley” was published. Another book, titled “Letters of Phillis Wheatley, the Negro-slave of Boston,” was published in 1864. Britannica Kids noted that abolitionists refer to Phillis Wheatley’s On Being Brought from Africa to America 'Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land, Taught my benighted soul to understand That there's a God, that there's a Saviour too: Once I redemption neither sought nor knew. Some view our sable race with scornful eye, "Their colour is a diabolic die." Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain, May be refin'd, and join th' angelic train. writing as a refutation of society’s claim in the 18th and 19th centuries that “African Americans were intellectually inferior to Whites.” Many legacies Wheatley left an impressive legacy of brave and thoughtful African American women writers. It took several decades in the 1800s before Frances Ellen Watkins Harper became the first African American woman to publish a short story. Harper was both an abolitionist and a suffragette. Other Black women writers and women rights activists displayed their talents in the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries. Women writers who were inspired by Wheatley’s sense of empowerment and excellence include Ida B. Wells, Mary Church Terrell, Alice Dunbar-Nelson, Zora Neale-Hurston, Shirley Graham DuBois, Lorraine Hansberry, Toni Morrison, Audrey Lorde, Angela Davis, Maya Angelou, Amanda Garman, Nikole Hannah Jones and Isabel Wilkerson, to mention a few. Harvard scholar and historian Henry Louis Gates paid tribute to Phillis Wheatley in his recent books, “The Black Box” and “The Trial of Phillis Wheatley.” In the latter book, Dr. Gates said, “In 1773, the slave Phillis Wheatley literally wrote her way to freedom. The first person of African descent to publish a book of poems in English, she was emancipated by her owners in recognition of her literary achievement. For a time, Wheatley was the most famous Black person in the West. But Thomas Jefferson, unlike his contemporaries Ben Franklin and George Washignton, refused to acknowledge her gift as a writer — a repudiation that eventually inspired generations of Black writers to build an extraordinary body of literature in their efforts to prove him wrong.” JULY 26, 2024 Phillis Wheately: a pioneer of Black literary excellence PUZZLE SOLUTIONS
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