Lesson 1.3 · Unit 1 · RL.11-12.4, RL.11-12.2
A private poem inside a public theology
Bradstreet was the first published poet in the American colonies, and her best poems are about grief, marriage and possessions. Watching a doctrine and a feeling disagree inside one poem is the most interesting thing in early American writing.
- Anne Bradstreet lived from about 1612 to 1672 and emigrated to Massachusetts in 1630 on the same fleet as Winthrop.
- Her first book was published in London in 1650 without her consent, arranged by her brother-in-law.
- The best poems were published after her death in 1678 and are the private ones about her family and house.
- Puritan doctrine required detachment from worldly things, which is what makes her attachments interesting.
- The poems perform submission and let the reader see what the submission costs.
- Her line is usually iambic, often in couplets, and the plainness is deliberate.
- "Upon the Burning of Our House" is the clearest example of doctrine and feeling working against each other in one text.
- Reading the conflict rather than the conclusion is the analytical task, since the conclusion is what doctrine required.
Where students lose marks: summarizing the poem's pious ending as its meaning. The poem's ending is what a Puritan poem had to say. What it does on the way there is the part that required a poet.
The text. Anne Bradstreet, "Here Follow Some Verses upon the Burning of Our House, July 10th, 1666", published 1678. Public domain.
And when I could no longer look,
I blest His name that gave and took,
That laid my goods now in the dust.
Yea, so it was, and so 'twas just.
It was his own, it was not mine,
Far be it that I should repine.
Here stood that trunk, and there that chest,
There lay that store I counted best.
My pleasant things in ashes lie,
And them behold no more shall I.
Under thy roof no guest shall sit,
Nor at thy table eat a bit.
Step one: read the first passage as doctrine. It contains the required response entire: God gave, God took, the loss was just, the goods were never hers, and complaint would be wrong. Nothing in it is unorthodox.
Step two: notice the opening clause. "And when I could no longer look." The submission begins only at the point where looking becomes impossible. She blesses God's name after she stops being able to watch, which dates the piety precisely.
Step three: read the second passage. Here stood that trunk, there that chest, there lay that store. She is walking through a house that no longer exists and naming furniture.
Step four: state what the demonstratives do. "That trunk", "that chest", "that store" are pointing words. They require a location, and the location is gone, so the grammar of the passage is reaching for objects that are not there.
Step five: notice the shift in address. "Under thy roof no guest shall sit." She stops describing the house and starts speaking to it. The house has become a person being told what it will no longer do.
Step six: state the conflict. Doctrine says the goods were never hers and that attachment is error. The second passage is an inventory of attachment, written in detail, by someone who remembers exactly where each thing stood. The poem holds both and resolves neither until it is obliged to.
Step seven: state why the ending is not the meaning. The poem closes by turning to a house above, which is what a Puritan poem had to do. Reading that conclusion as the poem's content ignores that the conclusion was mandatory and the middle was not.
Step eight: write the analysis sentence. "Bradstreet supplies the doctrinal response immediately and then spends the center of the poem pointing at furniture that is no longer there, so the orthodoxy is stated once and the loss is enacted at length, which lets a reader see what the submission cost without the poet ever saying that it cost anything."
Questions 1 to 5 are recall. Questions 6 to 10 ask for reasoning.
- When did Bradstreet emigrate, and with whom?
Show the full solution
1630, on the same fleet as John Winthrop
- How was her first book published?
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In London in 1650, without her consent, arranged by her brother-in-law
- What does Puritan doctrine require regarding worldly things?
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Detachment from them
- What does Bradstreet say about the goods in the first passage?
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That they were God's own and never hers, and that the loss was just
- Name three objects she points at in the second passage.
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A trunk, a chest, and the store she counted best
- What does the clause "when I could no longer look" reveal?
Show the full solution
It dates the submission. She blesses God's name at the point where watching becomes impossible, not before, so the piety arrives when looking runs out rather than when conviction arrives. One subordinate clause tells the reader how long she stood there, and the poem never says anything further about it. The piety begins where watching becomes impossible
- What are the demonstratives doing in the second passage?
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"That trunk", "that chest" and "that store" are pointing words, and pointing requires something to point at. She is walking through a house that no longer exists and using grammar that reaches for objects that are not there. The syntax enacts the absence, which is a more exact representation of loss than any adjective would be. Pointing words reaching for objects that no longer exist
- What changes when she says "under thy roof"?
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She stops describing the house and begins addressing it. The building becomes a second person being told what it will never do again, which is the poem's only moment of direct address and is spent on a thing rather than on God. For a poem whose doctrine requires attachment to be directed elsewhere, that is a significant place to put it. She addresses the house directly, spending her only direct address on a thing
- State the conflict the poem contains.
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Doctrine holds that the goods were never hers and that attachment to them is error. The center of the poem is a detailed inventory of attachment, written by someone who remembers exactly where every object stood. The poem contains both and does not reconcile them until the closing lines oblige it to, which is what makes it a poem rather than a statement of belief. Required detachment against a detailed inventory of attachment
- Why is the pious ending not the poem's meaning?
Show the full solution
Because it was mandatory. A Puritan poem about loss had to close by turning to the house above, and any competent believer could have supplied that ending. The middle was not required: nothing obliged her to walk through the rooms naming furniture. Reading the conclusion as the content credits the poet with the one part she had no choice about. The ending was required and the middle was not