Q. Phillis Wheatley's poem "On Being Brought from Africa to America" appeared in her 1773 volume Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, the first full-length published work by an African American author. 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. It is about a slave who cannot eat at the so-called "dinner table" because of the color of his skin. 253 Words2 Pages. In these ways, then, the biblical and aesthetic subtleties of Wheatley's poem make her case about refinement. Provides readers with strategies for facilitating language learning and literacy learning. Following her previous rhetorical clues, the only ones who can accept the title of "Christian" are those who have made the decision not to be part of the "some" and to admit that "Negroes / May be refin'd and join th' angelic train" (7-8). The difficulties she may have encountered in America are nothing to her, compared to possibly having remained unsaved. An overview of Wheatley's life and work. Find related themes, quotes, symbols, characters, and more. That there was an audience for her work is beyond question; the white response to her poetry was mixed (Robinson 39-46), and certain black responses were dramatic (Huddleston; Jamison). Phillis Wheatley. "On Being Brought from Africa to America" by Phillis Wheatley, is about how Africans were brought from Africa to America but still had faith in God to bring them through. Even Washington was reluctant to use black soldiers, as William H. Robinson points out in Phillis Wheatley and Her Writings. Nevertheless, Wheatley was a legitimate woman of learning and letters who consciously participated in the public discussion of the day, in a voice representing the living truth of what America claimed it stood forwhether or not the slave-owning citizens were prepared to accept it. Her benighted, or troubled soul was saved in the process. Wheatley is saying that her being brought to America is divinely ordained and a blessing because now she knows that there is a savior and she needs to be redeemed. both answers. The speaker has learned of God, become enlightened, is aware of the life of Christ on Earth, and is now saved, having previously no knowledge or need of the redemption of the soul. The poem's rhyme scheme is AABBCCDD and is organized into four couplets, which are paired lines of rhymed verse. On Being Brought from Africa to America was written by Phillis Wheatley and published in her collection Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral in 1773. They can join th angelic train. The speaker makes a claim, an observation, implying that black people are seen as no better than animals - a sable - to be treated as merchandise and nothing more. Wheatley perhaps included the reference to Cain for dramatic effect, to lead into the Christian doctrine of forgiveness, emphasized in line 8. The enslavement of Africans in the American colonies grew steadily from the early seventeenth century until by 1860 there were about four million slaves in the United States. chamberlain1911-1 | PDF | Plato | Homer - scribd.com She was in a sinful and ignorant state, not knowing God or Christ. She also indicates, apropos her point about spiritual change, that the Christian sense of Original Sin applies equally to both races. 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. Educated and enslaved in the household of prominent Boston commercialist John Wheatley, lionized in New England and England, with presses in both places publishing her poems,. Here Wheatley seems to agree with the point of view of her captors that Africa is pagan and ignorant of truth and that she was better off leaving there (though in a poem to the Earl of Dartmouth she laments that she was abducted from her sorrowing parents). Black people, who were enslaved and thought of as evil by some people, can be of Christian faith and go to Heaven. The speaker takes the high moral ground and is not bitter or resentful - rather the voice is calm and grateful. If she had left out the reference to Cain, the poem would simply be asserting that black people, too, can be saved. She does not, however, stipulate exactly whose act of mercy it was that saved her, God's or man's. Once I redemption neither sought nor knew. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1998), p.98. Despite the hardships endured and the terrible injustices suffered there is a dignified approach to the situation. Even before the Revolution, black slaves in Massachusetts were making legal petitions for their freedom on the basis of their natural rights. They have become, within the parameters of the poem at least, what they once abhorredbenighted, ignorant, lost in moral darkness, unenlightenedbecause they are unable to accept the redemption of Africans. 235 lessons. For example, "History is the long and tragic story . Question 14. The darker races are looked down upon. It is organized into four couplets, which are two rhymed lines of verse. The Wheatleys had to flee Boston when the British occupied the city. Being Brought from Africa to America - The Best of Phillis Wheatley Source: Mary McAleer Balkun, "Phillis Wheatley's Construction of Otherness and the Rhetoric of Performed Ideology," in African American Review, Vol. The last two lines of the poem make use of imperative language, which is language that gives a command or tells the reader what to do. 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. This discrepancy between the rhetoric of freedom and the fact of slavery was often remarked upon in Europe. Carretta and Gould note the problems of being a literate black in the eighteenth century, having more than one culture or language. 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. This poem also uses imperative language, which is language used to command or to tell another character or the reader what to do. John Peters eventually abandoned Wheatley and she lived in abject poverty, working in a boardinghouse, until her death on December 5, 1784. The material has been carefully compared Phillis Wheatley: Complete Writings (2001), which includes "On Being Brought from Africa to America," finally gives readers a chance to form their own opinions, as they may consider this poem against the whole body of Wheatley's poems and letters. For My People, All People: Cicely Tyson, Angela Bassett, Viola Davis This could be a reference to anything, including but not limited to an idea, theme, concept, or even another work of literature. In this regard, one might pertinently note that Wheatley's voice in this poem anticipates the ministerial role unwittingly assumed by an African-American woman in the twenty-third chapter of Harriet Beecher Stowe's The Minister's Wooing (1859), in which Candace's hortatory words intrinsically reveal what male ministers have failed to teach about life and love. An overview of Wheatley's life and work. She does more here than remark that representatives of the black race may be refined into angelic mattermade, as it were, spiritually white through redemptive Christianizing. (Thus, anyone hearing the poem read aloud would also have been aware of the implied connection.) CRITICAL OVERVIEW By the time Wheatley had been in America for 16 months, she was reading the Bible, classics in Greek and Latin, and British literature. Patricia Liggins Hill, et. Such a person did not fit any known stereotype or category. . Line 3 further explains what coming into the light means: knowing God and Savior. This failed due to doubt that a slave could write poetry. This essay investigates Jefferson's scientific inquiry into racial differences and his conclusions that Native Americans are intelligent and that African Americans are not. In this poem Wheatley finds various ways to defeat assertions alleging distinctions between the black and the white races (O'Neale). Further, because the membership of the "some" is not specified (aside from their common attitude), the audience is not automatically classified as belonging with them. In "On Being Brought from Africa to America," Wheatley asserts religious freedom as an issue of primary importance. African American Protest Poetry - National Humanities Center Dr. Sewell", "On the Death of the Rev. Both well-known and unknown writers are represented through biography, journals, essays, poems, and fiction. One critical problem has been an incomplete collection of Wheatley's work. She has master's degrees in French and in creative writing. May be refin'd, and join th' angelic train. As a member, you'll also get unlimited access to over 88,000 She makes this clear by . I feel like its a lifeline. The Quakers were among the first to champion the abolition of slavery. Cain - son of Adam and Eve, who murdered his brother Abel through jealousy. William Robinson provides the diverse early. Christianity: The speaker of this poem talks about how it was God's "mercy" that brought her to America. Indeed, at the time, blacks were thought to be spiritually evil and thus incapable of salvation because of their skin color. Many readers today are offended by this line as making Africans sound too dull or brainwashed by religion to realize the severity of their plight in America. Shuffelton, Frank, "Thomas Jefferson: Race, Culture, and the Failure of Anthropological Method," in A Mixed Race: Ethnicity in Early America, edited by Frank Shuffelton, Oxford University Press, 1993, pp. The fur is highly valued). Notably, it was likely that Wheatley, like many slaves, had been sold by her own countrymen. Phillis Wheatley Peters was one of the best-known poets in pre-19th century America. Alliteration is a common and useful device that helps to increase the rhythm of the poem. "Some view our sable race with a scornful eye, "Their colour is a diabolic dye." Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain." Personification Simile Hyperbole Aphorism Most descriptions tell what the literary elements do to enhance the story. Although she was an enslaved person, Phillis Wheatley Peters was one of the best-known poets in pre-19th century America. Erkkila, Betsy, "Phillis Wheatley and the Black American Revolution," in A Mixed Race: Ethnicity in Early America, edited by Frank Shuffelton, Oxford University Press, 1993, pp. She also means the aesthetic refinement that likewise (evidently in her mind at least) may accompany spiritual refinement. Then, copy and paste the text into your bibliography or works cited list. The irony that the author, Phillis Wheatley, was highlighting is that Christian people, who are expected to be good and loving, were treating people with African heritage as lesser human beings. themes in this piece are religion, freedom, and equality, https://poemanalysis.com/phillis-wheatley/on-being-brought-from-africa-to-america/, Poems covered in the Educational Syllabus. The use of th and refind rather than the and refined in this line is an example of syncope. 233 Words1 Page. They must also accede to the equality of black Christians and their own sinful nature. If it is not, one cannot enter eternal bliss in heaven. To be "benighted" is to be in moral or spiritual darkness as a result of ignorance or lack of enlightenment, certainly a description with which many of Wheatley's audience would have agreed. The Art Of Public Speaking [PDF] [7ljt3gng4060] - vdoc.pub On Being Brought from Africa to America Sophia has taught college French and composition. According to Merriam-Webster, benighted has two definitions. Baker, Houston A., Jr., Workings of the Spirit: The Poetics of Afro-American Women's Writing, University of Chicago Press, 1991. These include but are not limited to: The first, personification, is seen in the first lines in which the poet says it was mercy that brought her to America. FURT, Wheatley, Phillis An allusion is an indirect reference to, including but not limited to, an idea, event, or person. Mercy is defined as "a blessing that is an act of divine favor or compassion." Against the unlikely backdrop of the institution of slavery, ideas of liberty were taking hold in colonial America, circulating for many years in intellectual circles before war with Britain actually broke out. There are poems in which she idealizes the African climate as Eden, and she constantly identifies herself in her poems as the Afric muse. These miracles continue still with Phillis's figurative children, black . Also supplied are tailor-made skill lessons, activities, and poetry writing prompts; the . Skin color, Wheatley asserts, has nothing to do with evil or salvation. Following the poem (from Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, 1773), are some observations about its treatment of the theme of . PDF downloads of all 1699 LitCharts literature guides, and of every new one we publish. Although she was an enslaved person, Phillis Wheatley Peters was one of the best-known poets in pre-19th century America. By using this meter, Wheatley was attempting to align her poetry with that of the day, making sure that the primary white readers would accept it. Wheatley may also be using the rhetorical device of bringing up the opponent's worst criticism in order to defuse it. She asks that they remember that anyone, no matter their skin color, can be said by God. There are many themes explored in this poem. It is not mere doctrine or profession that saves. 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. In just eight lines, Wheatley describes her attitude toward her condition of enslavementboth coming from Africa to America, and the culture that considers the fact that she is a Black woman so negatively. The speaker then discusses how many white people unfairly looked down on African American people. Metaphor. In the case of her readers, such failure is more likely the result of the erroneous belief that they have been saved already. The image of night is used here primarily in a Christian sense to convey ignorance or sin, but it might also suggest skin color, as some readers feel. 189, 193. On Being Brought from Africa to America. The first allusion occurs in the word refin'd. This article needs attention from an expert in linguistics.The specific problem is: There seems to be some confusion surrounding the chronology of Arabic's origination, including notably in the paragraph on Qaryat Al-Faw (also discussed on talk).There are major sourcing gaps from "Literary Arabic" onwards. The first two children died in infancy, and the third died along with Wheatley herself in December 1784 in poverty in a Boston boardinghouse. 172-93. Religion was the main interest of Wheatley's life, inseparable from her poetry and its themes. That same year, an elegy that she wrote upon the death of the Methodist preacher George Whitefield made her famous both in America and in England. Slaves felt that Christianity validated their equality with their masters. Wheatley's revision of this myth possibly emerges in part as a result of her indicative use of italics, which equates Christians, Negros, and Cain (Levernier, "Wheatley's"); it is even more likely that this revisionary sense emerges as a result of the positioning of the comma after the word Negros. 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. 233, 237. 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." Thus, John Wheatley collected a council of prominent and learned men from Boston to testify to Phillis Wheatley's authenticity. Although she was captured and violently brought across the ocean from the west shores of Africa in a slave boat, a frail and naked child of seven or eight, and nearly dead by the time she arrived in Boston, Wheatley actually hails God's kindness for his delivering her from a heathen land. Today, a handful of her poems are widely anthologized, but her place in American letters and black studies is still debated. Wheatley proudly offers herself as proof of that miracle. 5Some view our sable race with scornful eye. During her time with the Wheatley family, Phillis showed a keen talent for learning and was soon proficient in English. In context, it seems she felt that slavery was immoral and that God would deliver her race in time. Pagan It is important to pay attention to the rhyming end words, as often this can elucidate the meaning of the poem. Hitler made white noise relating to death through his radical ideas on the genocide of Jews in the Second World War. The lady doth protest too much, methinks is a famous quote used in Shakespeares Hamlet. All rights reserved. Washington was pleased and replied to her. Additional information about Wheatley's life, upbringing, and education, including resources for further research. Read more of Wheatley's poems and write a paper comparing her work to some of the poems of her eighteenth-century model.
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