Question

What did Anne Bradstreet and Phillis Wheatly have in common? what were the purpose, audience and style of both their writing?

Answer 1

Bradstreet’s refined verse conforms to and perfects many of the standard poetic
conventions used by men and is a subtle assertion of women’s capabilities in the literary sphere.
Furthermore, as Bradstreet’s poetic style became more her own, she expanded her subject to
reflect matters such as childbirth, family, and earthly desires, which were everyday concerns.
Bradstreet looked not only to Heaven for inspiration but also to her natural surroundings. She
found a place for uniquely personal expression working both within an acceptable literary format
of highly stylized verse and imagery, and through the Puritan values of her society.
Like Bradstreet, Wheatley refined and appropriated various conventional poetic
techniques. Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral was published in London in 1773
and has since been reprinted “more than two dozen times” (Robinson Phillis Wheatley and Her
Writings 87). She made frequent use of Biblical allusions, the interpretation of which reveals her
abolitionist stance. The dominant strain of Christianity in New England known as Puritanism
also had an important influence on Wheatley, who went further than her white counterparts in
her critique of religion and society’s failure to abolish slavery

Answer 2

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