Phillis Wheatley: Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral and A Memoir of Phillis Wheatley, a Native African and a Slave

In 1773, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral became the first book of poetry by an African—American author to be published. At the tender age of seven, Phillis had been brought to Massachusetts as a slave and sold to the well—to—do Wheatley family. There, she threw herself into education, and soon she was devouring the classics and writing verse with whatever she had to hand – odes in chalk on the walls of the house. Once her talent became known, there was uproar, and in 1772 she...