Anne Bradstreet's The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up In America

The front cover of Anne Bradstreet’s The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America, a book of poetry, describes Bradstreet as a gentlewoman. This description and Bradstreet’s repeated exclamations that she did not initiate the publication of her works lessened the controversy surrounding the publication of a Puritan woman’s poetry. In the seventeenth-century, it was uncommon for women to write for pleasure, yet Bradstreet was such an accomplished poet that she became the first published author among both men and women writers of the English colonies. Because of the time period, many men doubted that a woman could have written such extraordinary and intelligent poetry. Her writing contains subtle declarations of women’s equal potential and abilities to express and educate themselves. Bradstreet offers her own accomplishments in education and poetry as proof of women’s equality to men. While Anne Bradstreet was a devout Puritan and a …show more content…
“Before the Birth of One of Her Children” is Bradstreet’s reconciliation of her fear of death with God’s plan for her life. Bradstreet writes that “death’s parting blow is sure to meet” because she knows that she cannot escape death (199). Bradstreet knows that her death will end with the glory of heaven, but she continues to fear the possibility of leaving her children and husband behind. After the death of a granddaughter, Bradstreet wrote “In Memory of My Dear Grandchild Anne Bradstreet.” Bradstreet begins the poem describing the grief she feels at her loss, but she ends the poem with hope. Bradstreet addresses her granddaughter when she writes, “My throbbing heart’s cheered up with this: / Thou with thy Savior art in endless bliss” (204). Despite the pain that Bradstreet’s poetry describes, she is confident that God’s sovereign plan will result in the joy and beauty of eternal life in