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, She was kidnapped and enslaved at age seven. The final word train not only refers to the retinue of the divinely chosen but also to how these chosen are trained, "Taught to understand." She thus makes clear that she has praised God rather than the people or country of America for her good fortune. Though lauded in her own day for overcoming the then unimaginable boundaries of race, slavery, and gender, by the twentieth century Wheatley was vilified, primarily for her poem "On Being Brought from Africa to America." Nor does Wheatley construct this group as specifically white, so that once again she resists antagonizing her white readers. Following are the main themes. White people are given a lesson in basic Christian ethics. This could be a reference to anything, including but not limited to an idea, theme, concept, or even another work of literature. Henry Louis Gates, Jr., claims in The Trials of Phillis Wheatley that Boston contained about a thousand African Americans out of a population of 15,520. ." Wheatley was freed from slavery when she returned home from London, which was near the end of her owners' lives. Erkkila's insight into Wheatley's dualistic voice, which allowed her to blend various points of view, is validated both by a reading of her complete works and by the contemporary model of early transatlantic black literature, which enlarges the boundaries of reference for her achievement. Such couplets were usually closed and full sentences, with parallel structure for both halves. The "authentic" Christian is the one who "gets" the puns and double entendres and ironies, the one who is able to participate fully in Wheatley's rhetorical performance. Just as the American founders looked to classical democracy for models of government, American poets attempted to copy the themes and spirit of the classical authors of Greece and Rome. This could explain why "On Being Brought from Africa to America," also written in neoclassical rhyming couplets but concerning a personal topic, is now her most popular. As Christian people, they are supposed to be "refin'd," or to behave in a blessed and educated manner. Phillis Wheatley was taken from what she describes as her pagan homeland of Africa as a young child and enslaved upon her arrival in America. The poem describes Wheatley's experience as a young girl who was enslaved and brought to the American colonies in 1761. Phillis Wheatley was born in Gambia, Africa, in 1753. Abolitionists like Rush used Wheatley as proof for the argument of black humanity, an issue then debated by philosophers. ", In the last two lines, Wheatley reminds her audience that all people, regardless of race, can be Christian and be saved. In fact, Wheatley's poems and their religious nature were used by abolitionists as proof that Africans were spiritual human beings and should not be treated as cattle. Of course, Wheatley's poetry does document a black experience in America, namely, Wheatley's alone, in her unique and complex position as slave, Christian, American, African, and woman of letters. INTRODUCTION This was the legacy of philosophers such as John Locke who argued against absolute monarchy, saying that government should be a social contract with the people; if the people are not being served, they have a right to rebel. 1 Phillis Wheatley, "On Being Brought from Africa to America," in Call and Response: The Riverside Anthology of the African American Literary Tradition, ed. The eighteen judges signed a document, which Phillis took to London with her, accompanied by the Wheatley son, Nathaniel, as proof of who she was. The audience must therefore make a decision: Be part of the group that acknowledges the Christianity of blacks, including the speaker of the poem, or be part of the anonymous "some" who refuse to acknowledge a portion of God's creation. All other trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners. Boston, Massachusetts (February 23, 2023). In regards to the meter, Wheatley makes use of the most popular pattern, iambic pentameter. It is used within both prose and verse writing. Carretta, Vincent, and Philip Gould, Introduction, in Genius in Bondage: Literature of the Early Black Atlantic, edited by Vincent Carretta and Philip Gould, University Press of Kentucky, 2001, pp. Read more of Wheatley's poems and write a paper comparing her work to some of the poems of her eighteenth-century model. 1'Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land. They must also accede to the equality of black Christians and their own sinful nature. The typical funeral sermon delivered by this sect relied on portraits of the deceased and exhortations not to grieve, as well as meditations on salvation. And she must have had in mind her subtle use of biblical allusions, which may also contain aesthetic allusions. The line leads the reader to reflect that Wheatley was not as naive, or as shielded from prejudice, as some have thought. Currently, the nature of your relationship to Dreher is negative, contemptuous. Particularly apt is the clever syntax of the last two lines of the poem: "Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain / May be refin'd." Wheatley's use of figurative language such as a metaphor and an allusion to spark an uproar and enlighten the reader of how Great Britain saw and treated America as if the young nation was below it. His art moved from figurative abstraction to nonrepresentational multiform grids of glowing, layered colors (Figure 15). She was thus part of the emerging dialogue of the new republic, and her poems to leading public figures in neoclassical couplets, the English version of the heroic meters of the ancient Greek poet Homer, were hailed as masterpieces. In this verse, however, Wheatley has adeptly managed biblical allusions to do more than serve as authorizations for her writing; as finally managed in her poem, these allusions also become sites where this license is transformed into an artistry that in effect becomes exemplarily self-authorized. For example, while the word die is clearly meant to refer to skin pigmentation, it also suggests the ultimate fate that awaits all people, regardless of color or race. Barbara Evans. As Wheatley pertinently wrote in "On Imagination" (1773), which similarly mingles religious and aesthetic refinements, she aimed to embody "blooming graces" in the "triumph of [her] song" (Mason 78). The first allusion occurs in the word refin'd. It is not only "Negroes" who "may" get to join "th' angelic train" (7-8), but also those who truly deserve the label Christian as demonstrated by their behavior toward all of God's creatures. The poem consists of: A single stanza of eight lines, with full rhyme and classic iambic pentameter beat, it basically says that black people can become Christian believers and in this respect are just the same as everyone else. Both races inherit the barbaric blackness of sin. The black race itself was thought to stem from the murderer and outcast Cain, of the Bible. Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land. During her time with the Wheatley family, Phillis showed a keen talent for learning and was soon proficient in English. Spelling is very inaccurate and hinders full understanding. In returning the reader circularly to the beginning of the poem, this word transforms its biblical authorization into a form of exemplary self-authorization. On Being Brought from Africa to America by Phillis Wheatley is a simple poem about the power of Christianity to bring people to salvation. by Phillis Wheatley. Erin Marsh has a bachelor's degree in English from the College of Saint Benedict and an MFA in Creative Writing from Lesley University's Low Residency program. The multiple meanings of the line "Remember, Christians, Negroes black as Cain" (7), with its ambiguous punctuation and double entendres, have become a critical commonplace in analyses of the poem. Rather than creating distinctions, the speaker actually collapses those which the "some" have worked so hard to create and maintain, the source of their dwindling authority (at least within the precincts of the poem). Recent critics looking at the whole body of her work have favorably established the literary quality of her poems and her unique historical achievement. On Being Brought from Africa to America by Phillis Wheatley is a short, eight-line poem that is structured with a rhyme scheme of AABBCCDD. The latter is implied, at least religiously, in the last lines. by Phillis Wheatley. One of Wheatley's better known pieces of poetry is "On being brought from Africa to America.". This is a reference to the biblical Book of Genesis and the two sons of Adam. Q. Phillis Wheatley read quite a lot of classical literature, mostly in translation (such as Pope's translations of Homer), but she also read some Latin herself. Although he, as well as many other prominent men, condemned slavery as an unjust practice for the country, he nevertheless held slaves, as did many abolitionists. In this sense, white and black people are utterly equal before God, whose authority transcends the paltry earthly authorities who have argued for the inequality of the two races. However, in the speaker's case, the reason for this failure was a simple lack of awareness. In this book was the poem that is now taught in schools and colleges all over the world, a fitting tribute to the first-ever black female poet in America. February 2023, Oakland Curator: Jan Watten Diaspora is a vivid word. Her most well-known poem, "On Being Brought from Africa to America," is an eight-line poem that addresses the hypocrisy of so-called Christian people incorrectly believing that those of African heritage cannot be educated and incorrectly believing that they are lesser human beings. Alliteration occurs with diabolic dye and there is an allusion to the old testament character Cain, son of Adam and Eve. These miracles continue still with Phillis's figurative children, black . At the age of 14, she published her first poem in a local newspaper and went on to publish books and pamphlets. Line 7 is one of the difficult lines in the poem. The first two children died in infancy, and the third died along with Wheatley herself in December 1784 in poverty in a Boston boardinghouse. Slaves felt that Christianity validated their equality with their masters. Starting deliberately from the position of the "other," Wheatley manages to alter the very terms of otherness, creating a new space for herself as both poet and African American Christian. Carole A. Wheatley's first name, Phillis, comes from the name of the ship that brought her to America. Wheatley's shift from first to third person in the first and second stanzas is part of this approach. Contents include: "Phillis Wheatley", "Phillis Wheatley by Benjamin Brawley", "To Maecenas", "On Virtue", "To the University of Cambridge", "To the King's Most Excellent Majesty", "On Being Brought from Africa to America", "On the Death of the Rev. While the use of italics for "Pagan" and "Savior" may have been a printer's decision rather than Wheatley's, the words are also connected through their position in their respective lines and through metric emphasis. Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain. answer choices. 43, No. By rhyming this word with "angelic train," the author is connecting the ideas of pure evil and the goodness of Heaven, suggesting that what appears evil may, in fact, be worthy of Heaven. 1, 2002, pp. They are walking upward to the sunlit plains where the thinking people rule. HubPages is a registered trademark of The Arena Platform, Inc. Other product and company names shown may be trademarks of their respective owners. Either of these implications would have profoundly disturbed the members of the Old South Congregational Church in Boston, which Wheatley joined in 1771, had they detected her "ministerial" appropriation of the authority of scripture. The very distinctions that the "some" have created now work against them. What difficulties did they face in considering the abolition of the institution in the formation of the new government? 4.8. 'Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land. PDF downloads of all 1699 LitCharts literature guides, and of every new one we publish. A discussionof Phillis Wheatley's controversial status within the African American community. Most descriptions tell what the literary elements do to enhance the story. Structure. 235 lessons. Richard Abcarian (PhD, University of California, Berkeley) is a professor of English emeritus at California State University, Northridge, where he taught for thirty-seven years. In addition to editing Literature: The Human Experience and its compact edition, he is the editor of a critical edition of Richard Wright's A Native Son . Personification. In A Mixed Race: Ethnicity in Early America, Betsy Erkkila explores Wheatley's "double voice" in "On Being Brought from Africa to America." They can join th angelic train. The Lord's attendant train is the retinue of the chosen referred to in the preceding allusion to Isaiah in Wheatley's poem. For example: land/understandCain/train. She did light housework because of her frailty and often visited and conversed in the social circles of Boston, the pride of her masters. The refinement the poet invites the reader to assess is not merely the one referred to by Isaiah, the spiritual refinement through affliction. Derived from the surface of Wheatley's work, this appropriate reading has generally been sensitive to her political message and, at the same time, critically negligent concerning her artistic embodiment of this message in the language and execution of her poem. Text is very difficult to understand. 92-93, 97, 101, 115. 135-40. In line 1 of "On Being Brought from Africa to America," as she does throughout her poems and letters, Wheatley praises the mercy of God for singling her out for redemption. Many of her elegies meditate on the soul in heaven, as she does briefly here in line 8. In the following essay on "On Being Brought from Africa to America," she focuses on Phillis Wheatley's self-styled personaand its relation to American history, as well as to popular perceptions of the poet herself. "On Being Brought from Africa to America." The Norton Anthology of American Literature, edited by Robert S. Levine, shorter 9th ed., Vol.1, W. W Norton & Company, 2017, pp. Here, Wheatley is speaking directly to her readers and imploring them to remember that all human beings, regardless of the color of their skin, are able to be saved and live a Christian life. So many in the world do not know God or Christ. Line 3 further explains what coming into the light means: knowing God and Savior. This simple and consistent pattern makes sense for Wheatleys straightforward message. The final and highly ironic demonstration of otherness, of course, would be one's failure to understand the very poem that enacts this strategy. She had been enslaved for most of her life at this point, and upon her return to America and close to the deaths of her owners, she was freed from slavery. To a Christian, it would seem that the hand of divine Providence led to her deliverance; God lifted her forcibly and dramatically out of that ignorance. "On Being Brought from Africa to America" is a poem written by Phillis Wheatley, published in her 1773 poetry collection "Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral." answer choices. Question 4 (2 points) Identify a type of figurative language in the following lines of Phillis Wheatley's On Being Brought from Africa to America. Wheatley's mistress encouraged her writing and helped her publish her first pieces in newspapers and pamphlets. Wheatley lived in the middle of the passionate controversies of the times, herself a celebrated cause and mover of events. John Hancock, one of Wheatley's examiners in her trial of literacy and one of the founders of the United States, was also a slaveholder, as were Washington and Jefferson. The brief poem Harlem introduces themes that run throughout Langston Hughess volume Montage of a Dream Deferred and throughout his, Langston Hughes 19021967 In appealing to these two audiences, Wheatley's persona assumes a dogmatic ministerial voice. The poem is more complicated that it initially appears. Conditions on board some of the slave ships are known to have been horrendous; many died from illness; many were drowned. The definition of pagan, as used in line 1, is thus challenged by Wheatley in a sense, as the poem celebrates that the term does not denote a permanent category if a pagan individual can be saved. Notably, it was likely that Wheatley, like many slaves, had been sold by her own countrymen. The European colonization of the Americas inspired a desire for cheap labor for the development of the land. Parks, Carole A., "Phillis Wheatley Comes Home," in Black World, Vo. The material has been carefully compared Benjamin Rush, a prominent abolitionist, holds that Wheatley's "singular genius and accomplishments are such as not only do honor to her sex, but to human nature." That this self-validating woman was a black slave makes this confiscation of ministerial role even more singular. "Mercy" is defined as "a blessing that is an act of divine favor or compassion" and indicates that it was ordained by God that she was taken from Africa. The word Some also introduces a more critical tone on the part of the speaker, as does the word Remember, which becomes an admonition to those who call themselves "Christians" but do not act as such. In Jackson State Review, the African American author and feminist Alice Walker makes a similar remark about her own mother, and about the creative black woman in general: "Whatever rocky soil she landed on, she turned into a garden.". Wheatley, however, applies the doctrine of salvation in an unusual way for most of her readers; she broadens it into a political or sociological discussion as well. 253 Words2 Pages. For the unenlightened reader, the poems may well seem to be hackneyed and pedestrian pleas for acceptance; for the true Christian, they become a validation of one's status as a member of the elect, regardless of race . Wheatley, however, is asking Christians to judge her and her poetry, for she is indeed one of them, if they adhere to the doctrines of their own religion, which preaches Christ's universal message of brotherhood and salvation. Speaking of one of his visions, the prophet observes, "I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple" (Isaiah 6:1). STYLE A Narrative of the Captivity by Mary Rowlandson | Summary, Analysis & Themes, 12th Grade English Curriculum Resource & Lesson Plans, ICAS English - Papers I & J: Test Prep & Practice, Common Core ELA - Literature Grades 9-10: Standards, College English Literature: Help and Review, Create an account to start this course today. Levernier considers Wheatley predominantly in view of her unique position as a black poet in Revolutionary white America. This appreciative attitude is a humble acknowledgment of the virtues of a Christian country like America. She wants them all to know that she was brought by mercy to America and to religion. Into this arena Phillis Wheatley appeared with her proposal to publish her book of poems, at the encouragement of her mistress, Susanna Wheatley. Today: Since the Vietnam War, military service represents one of the equalizing opportunities for blacks to gain education, status, and benefits. This line is meaningful to an Evangelical Christian because one's soul needs to be in a state of grace, or sanctified by Christ, upon leaving the earth. Although her intended audience is not black, she still refers to "our sable race." In the last line of this poem, she asserts that the black race may, like any other branch of humanity, be saved and rise to a heavenly fate. On the other hand, by bringing up Cain, she confronts the popular European idea that the black race sprang from Cain, who murdered his brother Abel and was punished by having a mark put on him as an outcast. The poem was "On Being Brought from Africa to America," written by a 14-year-old Phillis in the late 18th century. Wheatley is saying that her soul was not enlightened and she did not know about Christianity and the need for redemption. Poetic devices are thin on the ground in this short poem but note the thread of silent consonants brought/Taught/benighted/sought and the hard consonants scornful/diabolic/black/th'angelic which bring texture and contrast to the sound. "May be refined" can be read either as synonymous for can or as a warning: No one, neither Christians nor Negroes, should take salvation for granted.