Phillis Wheatley, born in West Africa and sold into slavery as a child, became one of the most famous American poets of the late 18th century. Exceedingly precocious, she took full advantage of the opportunities for education and social connection offered by her enslavers, Susanna and John Wheatley of Boston, Massachusetts. She was still a teenager when her elegy for the English cleric George Whitefield was published in 1770, leading to international recognition.
The elegiac form continued to be important to her throughout her career. In the broadside above, she addressed the Rev. Timothy Pitkin following the death of his wife Temperance Clap Pitkin in 1772. Like much of her work, it blends Christian faith with classical imagery and her own authoritative voice:
Let Grief no longer damp the sacred Fire,
But rise sublime, to equal Bliss aspire;
Thy Sighs no more, be wasted by the Wind,
Complain no more, but be to Heav’n resign’d.
‘Twas thine to shew those Treasures all divine,
To sooth our Woes, the Task was also thine.
Now Sorrow is recumbent on thy Heart,
Permit the Muse that healing to impart,
Nor can the World, a pitying tear refuse,
They weep, and with them, ev’ry heavenly Muse.
Phillis Wheatley. An elegiac poem, : on the death of that celebrated divine, and eminent servant of Jesus Christ, the Reverend and learned George Whitefield. 1770. New-York Historical Society.
William Pendleton, engraver. Phillis Wheatley frontispiece. circa 1830s. Portrait file. New-York Historical Society.
Phillis Wheatley. To the Rev. Mr. Pitkin, on the death of his lady. circa 1772. Broadside. New-York Historical Society.
