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University Micrcxilms International 300 N. Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, Ml 48106 8300250 Garcia-Rouphail, Maria ANNE BRADSTREET, HER POETRY, AND THE POLICIES OF EXCLUSION: A STUDY OF THE DEVELOPING SENSE OF POETIC PURPOSE The Ohio State University PH.D. 1982 University Microfilms International300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, MI 48106 Copyright 1982 by Garcia-Rouphail, Maria All Rights Reserved ANNE BRADSTREET, HER POETRY, AND THE POLICIES OF EXCLUSION: A STUDY OF THE DEVELOPING SENSE OF POETIC PURPOSE DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Maria Garcia-Rouphail, B.A., M.A. ********* The Ohio State University 1982 Reading Conmittee: Approved By Robert Jones Mildred Munday Adviser Barbara Rigney Department of Eng1 for my father ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to express my heartfelt appreciation to the following people: to Professors Robert Jones, Mildred Munday, and Barbara Rigney for their generosity and encouragement, as well as for their sound professional guidance; to my dear husband, Nagu-i Rouphail, for his unwavering support and patience; to my sister, Margarita Garcia, for her encouragement; to my friends, Joan Samuel son and Maura Taaffe, for "being there"; and to my father, Roberto Garcia-Gallo, who taught us to love knowledge and ju stic e . VITA September 1, 1948 .............................Born - Bronx, New York 1970 ......................................................... B.A., Barry College, Miami Shores, Florida 1970-1976 ............................................. Teacher, Dade County Public Schools, Miami, Florida 1974 ......................................................... M.A., Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida 1976-81 ................................................. Teaching Associate, Department of English, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio FIELDS OF STUDY Major Field: American L iterature to 1900 Renaissance and Seventeenth-Century Poetry, Prose, Drama Restoration and Eighteenth Century Literature Victorian and Modern Novel iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ..................................................................................................... i i i VITA.............................................................................................................................. iv INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................. 1 Chapter I. Anne Bradstreet and the Readers: A Survey of Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Historical and Critical Attitudes. 27 I I . Gender and C reativity in Seventeenth Century Poetry: Anne Bradstreet's Poetry of Public Voice ..................................... 54 III. City of God, City of Man: Bradstreet's "Histories" and the Puritan Errand ......................................................................... 85 IV. The "Puritanization" of Anne Bradstreet: The Shift to the Private Voice............................................................................. 117 V. "Puritanization" Continued: Poetry as Piety............................. 157 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................. 193 APPENDIX...................................................................................................................... 203 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................. 205 v INTRODUCTION The modern reader of the poetry and prose of Puritan New England in the early seventeenth century typically marvels at the public character of such works. As Earl Miner has observed, public verse —and we may add, public prose—"testifies to a shared world in which words and actions . are harmonious in a real world validated by 1 the experience of many minds." In addressing the community a t larg e, 2 the writer "speaks in many social tones of approbation or censure"; he (or she, as the case infrequently was) aimed at defining comnunal values and encouraging their realization in the structure and behavior of 3 so cie ty , as well as condemning intransigence. At any point in Puritan New England between 1630 (when middle-class English Calvinists planted a colony at Massachusetts Bay) and 1672 (the year in which Anne Bradstreet died), one may hear the reasoned voices of the civil authorities and the fortissimo thunderings of the ministers hammering out a consistent vision of the nature and purpose of the community. The poetry of Anne Bradstreet, however, rarely exhibits these featu res. With the exception of "A Dialogue Between Old England and New" (composed in the early forties) and a fleeting reference to "God's people" in a later poem, Bradstreet's verse is preponderantly private in subject matter and tone, celebrating the circumstances and events of her domestic life. This fact is significant in view of the apparent forcefulness with which the public millennial myth of the New Jerusalem was promulgated In New England, and 1t raises a number of questions concerning the condition of women's participation 1n the social and Intellectual life of the colony and Bradstreet's sense of her place and purpose as a poet. The fact that no other woman 1s on record as having written verse during the first stages of colonization attests to the originality of her efforts. Somethlng Impelled Bradstreet to write; but why did she not write more fully and explicitly about the errand when she was 1n fact living the experiment 1n all of Its dally harshness and uncertainty? Why does she revert, especially after roughly 1650, to the events of her private life for the material of verse? What did she think she was accomplishing by writing verse? At work 1n an age that assigned a place and a function to every being, Bradstreet clearly thought that she had a purpose to fulfill In writing poetry of a public voice between 1638-49, and private verse exclusively after 1650. Old her function as a daughter, a wife, and a mother—which she understood and accepted as essential features of her gender and C hristian vocation—shape her point of view 1n the poems; and i f so, to what q u a lita tiv e effect? These questions need to be more assidu ously addressed than they have been heretofore, especially 1f we are to enlarge our understanding of the kinds of Issues American women have faced as artists, and 1f ultimately we are to obtain a more finely tuned picture of Puritan culture. This dissertation assumes as Its aim to answer these questions. Tracing Bradstreet's progress chronologically, it describes her developing sense of poetic purpose from approximately the late 1630's, until the end of the 1660's, the period in which she wrote virtually all of her verse and prose. The dissertation draws extensively from Bradstreet's verse and her journals* as well as from the sermons, tracts, and poetry of her contemporaries--all in an effort to present Bradstreet's achievement in its historical, social, and literary contexts. In order to visualize Bradstreet's divergence from the New England writers of the period, it is necessary to understand the purpose that Puritans assigned to their efforts at colonization. It is also Important to note that this purpose was persistently reiterated in the writings of magistrates, preachers, and poets—all of whom addressed themselves to a public audience. In 1630, while the people were yet aboard the Arbella, John Winthrop sought to remind them of their divine mission: . fo r the work wee haue in hand,

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