--Anne Bradstreet's poetry is the best known of the Puritan era, but reflects her rather unrepresentative status as a woman. In "The Prologue," she seems to address the inferior status of woman in Puritan life. Does she uphold the Puritan gender hierarchy or question it?
--How does Bradstreet's poem "Verses upon the Burning of Our House" dramatize the conflict of the Puritan's belief in providence?
--Edward Taylor's "Huswifery" is based upon an elaborate poetic figure or conceit which likens the preparation of wool for weaving clothing (work conventionally done by women in the Puritan home) to spiritual life. How does this fit or not fit with the Puritan emphasis on "plain style," the rigid rejection of any kind of figurative language?
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ReplyDeleteIn reading "The Prologue" I wasn't able to truly hone in on Bradstreet's purpose. I feel like she at times she is mocking of the Puritan society, although it may be unintentional. She definitely brings up the idea that women are inferior to men, but after reading through it a second time, I feel like I can sense some form of early sarcasm. For example, Bradstreet writes,
ReplyDelete"And oh ye high flown quills that soar in the skies, And ever with your prey still catch your praise, If e'er you deign these lowly lines your eyes Give thyme or parsley wreath, I ask no bays"(189).
Essentially she is saying that even if a reader were to take her work as something notable, then they should not praise her on the same level as a man, because she is a woman. However, by stating that she is capable of composing poetry as well as a man, isn't she addressing her equality?
-Tim Fischer
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ReplyDelete--Does she uphold the Puritan gender hierarchy or question it?
ReplyDeleteTo say that Anne is questioning the Puritan hierarchy is an understatement. She is blatantly calling out society and bringing its issues with gender roles to the forefront. In 'The Prologue' she addresses not only the men but submissive women as well.
"Who says my hand a needle better fits,
A poet's pen all scorn I should thus wrong,
For such despite they cast on female wits:
If what I do prove well, it wont advance, They'll says its' stol'n, or else it was by chance." (189)
In this excerpt she points out that in the Puritan Era, even the most impressive work would be overlooked or dismissed if not written by the right person (male).
--Alexandra
Mike Flachs
ReplyDeleteIt is noted in the introduction to Bradstreet’s work that her father took special care in making sure that she was well educated especially for a young woman of the time. This education and the resulting wit are visible in “The Prologue” especially in lines 25-30. They read:
“I am obnoxious to each carping tongue
Who says my hand a needle better fits,
A poet’s pen all scorn I should thus wrong,
For such despite they cast on female wits:
If what I do prove well, it won’t advance,
They’ll say it stol’n, or else it was by chance.”(189)
Initially, her writing appears to quietly accept the Puritan gender hierarchy but a few lines down she states, “Preminence in all and each is yours; Yet grant some small acknowledgement of ours.” (189). Here, she is explicitly challenging the established hierarchy. I believe Bradstreet’s status as a formally educated woman did indeed lead her to question the aforementioned hierarchy.
I feel like with Bradstreet's poem about the burning of her house she had mixed feelings about the idea of providence. She describes how she pleaded with God to strengthen her and not to leave her without help while her house was burning, but it didn't really do much. After her house was burned down she "blest His name that gave and took" which kind of led me to think that she fully accepted the fact that God took her house for a reason, but then later on after she "accepts this fact" she goes back into a kind of depression about her house being burned down and losing all her things. It takes a little bit for her to accept again that God did this for a reason.She goes on to be sad about how nothing happy will happen under her roof anymore, and I feel like there's a lot of doubt about providence in that. In the end she brings up how there is a house for her from God in heaven, but the last two lines "the world no longer let me love, my hope and treasure lies above" kind of makes me feel like she thinks of God as stealing these things away from her. Not really that it's just destiny or meant to happen, but she took it personally and doesn't quite see it as justified. More like it's just unfair.
ReplyDeleteAnne Bradstreet absolutely questions her inferior status as a woman. She has almost a sarcastic tone about the way she addresses the issue. Especially in the 5th stanza when she says,
ReplyDelete“I am obnoxious to each capring tongue
Who says my hand a needle better fits,
A poet’s pen all scorn I should thus wrong,
For such despite they cast on female wits:
If what I do prove well, it won’t advance,
They’ll say it’s stol’n, or else it was by chance.”
In this stanza, she addresses that she is inferior, and even if she does a good job, it was either not her work, or just luck.
Emily Miller
--How does Bradstreet's poem "Verses upon the Burning of Our House" dramatize the conflict of the Puritan's belief in providence?
ReplyDeleteWithin Bradstreet's poem "Verses upon the Burning of Our Home," the readers sees the speaker's reaction to, obviously, having his/her house burn down. However, while watching the house burn, the speaker is working hard to resist damning her bad luck ("And to my God my heart did cry / To straighten me in my Distress"). Instead, the speaker has to try and see God's meaning in burning down the house ("And when I could no longer look, / I blest His name that gave and took"). This, to me, is a very clear dramatization of what would have to be one of the more difficult Puritan dilemmas (and is indeed still a problem for some contemporary believers): seeing God's Will in disaster.
The speaker then turns to lamenting all of her lost possessions ("Here stood that trunk, and there that chest, / There lay that store I counted best"), but just a bit later, the speaker is able to see that she has been focusing too much on her earthly possessions ("Then straight I ‘gin my heart to chide, / And did thy wealth on earth abide?"). Instead, the speaker sets herself to no longer want for earthly possessions, because she believes that they cannot compare to the riches God possesses in Heaven (Raise up thy thoughts above the sky / That dunghill mists away may fly. / Thou hast a house on high erect / Frameed by that mighty Architect"). Here, her burnt down house is but a dunghill, and the speaker does not lament it, but wait for spiritual salvation. Bradstreet ends the poem on this note with the finishing couplet, "The world no longer let me love, / My hope and treasure lies above," punctuating that this is the focus of the poem.
For the sake of having at least one comment on Taylor's "Huswifery," the poem does not reject figurative language, but instead the entire thing is a metaphor. The first line ("Make me, O Lord, thy Spining Wheele compleate") makes the speaker into the Lord's "Spining Wheele." The second line asks God to make His Holy Word into a distaff (or a tool used for sewing) for the speaker. The analogy of the poet being a spinning wheel (or an old sewing machine) that merely needs God's Holy Word to be functioning works throughout the poem. The entire poem is figurative language, as the entire poem works off the metaphor that the first two lines set up.
ReplyDelete-Caleb Washburn