Anne+Bradstreet


 * Biography **

Bradstreet was born Anne Dudley in North Hampton, England in 1612 to Thomas Dudley and Dorothy Yorke. Bradstreet was considered to be well educated as a woman for her time day. She had the privilege of being privately educated by tutors and by her father. Bradstreet came from wealthy and educated family. Bradstreet suffered from rheumatic fever in her younger years which put her on bed rest and also suffered from smallpox which almost killed her. After she recovered, she married Simon Dudley at the age of 16, her father's assistant, who was 25.
 * //Early Life//**

Bradstreet and her husband had 8 children in a matter of 10 years. They all made it through childbirth which was how she feared dying. She remained frequently ill through out her adult lif//e// but she lived to be 60. Bradstreet traveled to the new world with her husband and her parents. Her life in Massachusetts is not well known because there are few evidences of her living there. Bradstreet wrote mainly for herself, her friends, and her family. Once they she and her family made it to the new world she joined the Church at Boston although it wasn't what she really wanted. Bradstreet read Vergil, Plutarch, Livy, Pliny, Suetonius, Homer, Hesiod, Ovid, Sen eca, and Thucydides as well as Spenser, Sidney, Milton, Raleigh, Hobbes, //Divine Weeks and Workes//, and the Geneva version of the Bible. The Tenth Muse was published in England, in 1650 by her brother-in-law. Her other poems weren't published in her lifetime but her family and friends shared them with each other. She is known as the first North American woman to publish a book of poems.
 * //Later Life//**
 * Major Works **

Most of Bradstreet's work comes from two time periods. The first period is structurally and thematically formal, written in the style of Renaissance poetry. The second period was divided into four parts, treat the humors, elements, seasons, and ages of man. Her later poems were described as her "private" poems. They were more personal to her because they were mainly about her life, her family, her husband and the obstacles she had to face with her illnesses. Her works are based mainly on religious and emotional conflicts she had experienced as a woman writer and as a Puritan. She did not want to leave her life on the Earl's manor house. A lot of her work showed that as a Puritan she struggled that with her attachment to her children, husband, and her community was stronger than her attachment with God. //The Truth// and //The Quaternions// are two books that contain her some of her poems. //The Truth// contains more formal and "public" poems where as //The Quaternions// contains more "private" poems. Her best known poem is "To My Dear and Loving Husband"

//TO MY DEAR AND LOVING HUSBAND// //If ever two were one, then surely we.// //If ever man were loved by wife, then thee;// //If ever wife was happy in a man,// //Compare with me, ye women, if you can.// //I prize thy love more than whole mines of gold// //Or all the riches that the East cloth hold.// //My love is such that rivers cannot quench,// //Nor ought but love from thee, give recompense.// //Thy love is such I can no way repay,// //The heavens reward thee manifold, I pray.// //Then while we live, in love let's so persevere// //That when we live no more, we may live ever.//


 * Quotes **

“If ever two were one, then surely we. If ever man were loved by wife, then thee." "Youth is the time of getting, middle age of improving, and old age of spending." "If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome."


 * References **

@http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/eng384/bradbio.htm

@http://www.uncp.edu/home/canada/work/allam/16071783/lit/bradstre.htm

@http://www.enotes.com/literary-criticism/bradstreet-anne

@http://www.bostonphoenix.com/alt1/archive/books/reviews/04-97/BRADSTREET.html

@http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/poets/bradstreet.php

@http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/webtexts/Bradstreet/bradbio.htm

@http://www.google.com/search?q=anne+bradstreet&hl=en&safe=active&client=firefox-a&hs=BTB&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&prmd=ivbo&tbs=tl:1&tbo=u&ei=Dq24TKW3FIS0lQewktTsDA&sa=X&oi=timeline_result&ct=title&resnum=11&ved=0CEsQ5wIwCg

@http://college.cengage.com/english/heath/syllabuild/iguide/bradstre.html

@http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/anne-bradstreet