Women Poets of the Eighteenth Century
Throughout history, women have had to fight hard for equality in many aspects of life. In the early history of the United States, women were not allowed to express themselves about certain societal issues. Therefore, women began to write journals, dialogues, and poetry to get some of their thoughts out in the wind. The Eighteenth Century spawned the arrival of many new women poets. These women opened doors that had never been touched by women before. This new wave of feminine poetry showed the world a female point of view on issues such as childbirth, various political issues, love, women's suffrage, education, and their fight to gain equality. These brave pioneers such as Jane Coleman Turell, Lucy Terry, Annis Boudinot Stockton, Elizabeth Graeme Fergusson, Sarah Wentworth Morton, Phyllis Wheatley, and a multitude of others who have paved the way for the many women writers of the centuries to come. Jane Coleman Turell was the daughter of Jane Clark and Benjamin Colman. Her father was the liberal minister of Boston's Brattle Street Church and president of Harvard College. Due to her father's high education and societal status Jane was an afforded the opportunity to be exposed to many literary
Bridgette Richardson Fletcher was another eighteenth century woman writer. She based her poetry solely on religious topics, women, marriage, and proper conduct. Her hymn number XXXVI, entitled "The Greatest Dignity of a Woman, Christ Being Born of a Woman, was a feminine empowerment plea. This hymn written in 1773, discussed the greatest gift of a woman, which is childbirth. Many people believe that the most magnificent of these is the birth of Jesus Christ. Fletcher stresses that if the Lord Jesus was born of a woman, therefore we must hold woman in the highest esteem (Wilson 99). She should always be respected and treated equality in society. If she can birth a King then she should have treatment like a queen. Fletcher used this poem to challenge mankind with these views. Throughout the eighteenth century there was many women writers who chose to be kept anonymous. This is very understandable because this was a time in which women were sometimes mistreated or ostracized form society for expressing their opinions about certain issues (Wilson 107). Other reasons were that because of the lack of copyright laws, editors were free to use people's works for their own publication purposes. Publishing these works in the various magazines and booklets became very popular and was widely read in British North America (Lauter 710). Even though these people did not have their names on the various writings, their message reached audiences all over.
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2517
Approximate Pages = 10 (250 words per page double spaced)
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