Anne Bradstreet: a Rebel, Resentful of Her Gender

Is Anne Bradstreet a rebel, resentful of her gender? This is possible, but it needs to be noted that Anne Bradstreet was exploring concepts and ideas from a Puritan context. Misunderstanding of Puritan ideas and values can lead to Bradstreet's intentions in her writings being misunderstood as well. Her poetic nature can make it difficult to come to a crystal clear conclusion to this question. Throughout this critical analysis components of her poems and other literary works shall be considered and analyzed to answer the question of if Anne Bradstreet was indeed resentful of her gender.

The New England Puritan Anne Bradstreet is important among generation of women in literature. The written poetry of Bradstreet was published in The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America in 1650, and after her death, poems and documents were printed. Historians are effectively silent about her voice and the voices of women on both sides of the Atlantic by widespread appropriation of Bradstreet's 'state of mind.” English Puritanism has been a literate movement. It drew readers and writers of all types from its origins among the academic reformers, and while its main supporters and opponents were combating each other through law, literature was often their preferred tool. Writers of Puritan communities are active in many respects. Anne Bradstreet wrote in 1642: 'A Dialogue Between Old England and New”With regard to their present troubles, 'in which she exalted the leaders of the Puritan Parliament and encouraged godliness as a solution to the bloodshed. Through her 1999 monograph, Women through Early American Religion 1600-1850, Marilyn Westerkamp answers somewhat of the above posed question. She states, ”women have been lauded for submissive filling spiritual roles.” (Westerkamp). She argues that Puritanism dignified and granted spiritual status to women as wives and mothers in their communities. She acknowledges the active voice of Bradstreet but in her subsequent verse indicates unconscious revolt. Acknowledging this, categorizing the perspective of Bradstreet as 'feminist' here would be a misunderstanding. Her works show a strong devotion to Puritan religion and culture, and she is identified with historical, theological, and ellizabethan authorship. Nevertheless, for this cause, her viewpoint on gender issues may be more significant: she is a strong feminist author energized by her Puritan heritage which stands in sharp contrast to the constructs of the twenty-first century. Puritanism, from the point of view of Bradstreet, presents her narrative with a perfectly legitimate meaning.

Bradstreet wrote a lot on faith as well like most Puritan authors. But what makes her different (besides being a feminist) is the way she talks about the role of a female in society. While her discussion of gender roles in her prose could be read as merely expressing the world's realities in which she worked, without any feminist agenda. Nevertheless, her poem 'In Memory of the High and Mighty Goddess, Queen Elizabeth' reinforces Bradstreet as a woman. In this poem, Bradstreet praises Queen Elizabeth to the highest degree. As a monarch, she goes over her accomplishments thus remembering that she was an extremely successful female dictator. Throughout one stanza she states, 'There can be no thoughts, not numbers, The Nine Olympics of Her Happy Reign, Who was so sweet, so just, so smart, so wise, She won the prize from all the Kings on Earth.' Literally, she claims Queen Elizabeth is greater than any male monarch. This work reflects a patriarchal environment. It does not just recognize and respect another woman who has defied sex roles, as she has (Queen Elizabeth as a monarch, and Bradstreet as a female writer, who is published), it does suggest that this revolt will proceed with traditional gender roles. She maintains that Queen Elizabeth was simply a feminist hero who changed the way the world was thinking about women, and that she put this notion in print for the whole world to see during a time so close to gender issues.

In the perspective of “To My Dear and Loving Husband” this points out another aspect of Anne Bradstreet’s opinion towards gender roles, in relation to marriage. She starts the poem with a proclamation, “If ever two were one, then surely we”. It shows her deep love for her husband by saying that if any two persons in the marital past have ever been bound together as if they were one entity, then she and her husband would certainly be bound together in this deep and intimate manner. In the second one line, Bradstreet reassures her husband of her own love and commitment to him by claiming that she loves him way more than any female as ever loved a man. This is a splendid claim, as there are endless lovers in the world. In the third and fourth lines, she reassures her husband that she wants to be with him. She compares herself to the other females and exclaims that she herself is happiest of all girls because she is married to him. In the fifth and sixth lines, she pronounces to her husband that his love is more to her than any sum of money. She claims that she values his love and even more than “all of the riches that the East doth hold”. This indicates that she values the human feeling of affection in connection and dedication with another man or woman a ways greater than she ought to ever fee any amount of fabric wealth. In the seventh line, she exhibits that even though she is happiest, she does not consider herself absolutely satisfied, because the nature of her love for him is such that she feels she can never get enough. This is why she says. “My love is such that rivers can't quench”. She ends To my Dear and Loving Husband claiming that they may persevere in love till the end. Bradstreet has no doubt that she and her husband will live married and in-love till one passes from this life to the next. This is found out when she says, “Then whilst we live, in love let’s so persevere”. She did now not, apparently, personally sense the oppression many girls need to have felt at her time. This poem especially shows that, as Anne appears to were in a loving and true marriage wherein her husband did no longer oppress her, however loved and esteemed her. This poem also explores the idea in relation to gender that it is perfectly okay to have puritan views on outlooks like this and still be a good wife. The female role is to love their husband and that should not be looked down upon in anyway. It may be misinterpreted as you shall be submissive to your husband and only be there to love him and nothing more, but what Bradstreet's point is that you can be a strong female and loving at the same time.

Although there are not too many 'major' female writers in American Literature, and writing, traditionally, it has usually been viewed as a masculine activity. Indeed, Bradstreet's poems are filled with woman presence. However, I also feel that Bradstreet's feminism is held in check by way of her Puritan values, and there is a warfare created throughout her writing between this society of Puritan patriarchy that she lived in and her identification as a woman. Bradstreet's poems are focused at the simple pleasures found within the realities of the present. She rejoices within the presence of nature and rather than that in the delight of Jesus and her Puritan religion (like Phyllis Wheatley does). Part of the reality for Bradstreet is dwelling as a female in a male-dominated society. Bradstreet embraces this, however at the same time questions the views in the direction of females. Women in Puritan society performed a subordinate function in a traditional patriarchal family structure, and were exceedingly limited of their opportunities. As a girl in a relatively patriarchal society, Anne Bradstreet uses the reverse psychology technique to show the factor of her notion of unfair and unequal treatment of ladies in her community. Bradstreet believed that girls in her society were dealt with unfairly, and that gender have to be insignificant. Bradstreet asserts the rights of girls to studying and expression of thought, addressing broad and common themes throughout her poems to not be rebellious about her gender, but rather pose questions and assert female presence in the world.