Theme On Emily Dickison Essay, Research Paper

As a female in a highly patriarchal society, Anne Bradstreet uses the reverse

psychology technique to prove the point of her belief of unfair and unequal

treatment of women in her community. Women who wrote stepped outside

their appropriate sphere, and those who actually published their work

frequently faced social censure. Compounding this social pressure, many

women faced crushing workloads and struggled with lack of leisure for

writing. Others suffered from an unequal access to education, while others

were dealing with the sense of intellectual inferiority offered to them from

virtually every authoritative voice, that voice usually being male. Bradstreet

was raised in an influential family, receiving an extensive education with

access to private tutors and the Earl of Lincoln’s large library. She was part

of an influential family who encouraged her writing and circulated it in

manuscript with pride. That kind of private support did much to offset the

possibility of public disapproval. Bradstreet believed that women in her

society were treated unfairly, and that gender should be insignificant. In her

“Prologue” she addresses conflict and struggle, expressing her opinion toward

women’s rights, implying that gender is unimportant and male dominance is

wrong. Bradstreet asserts the rights of women to learning and expression of

thought, addressing broad and universal themes. The “Prologue” has a humble

tone with slightly hidden surprises, containing a muted declaration of

independence from the past and a challenge to male authority. Bradstreet also

uses a rather apologetic tone to draw in the reader so that they will form an

interest in her writing despite her gender. In the beginning she refers to

“wars,” “captains,” and “epics,” written specifically by male writers, worrying

that her poems will shame the art of poetry. Continuing her self-demotion

with an apologetic tone she talks about the “Great Bartas”, admiring his

works, and sarcastically admitting that she will never be as talented as he is.

The sarcastic tone of these lines cause the typical reader to reconsider that

maybe women are not as bad as she portrays them to be, which is exactly

what she has schemed for the reader to think. Continuing, Bradstreet

mentions regret for her lack of skill, in which she laments the fact that “A

weak or wounded brain admits no cure” (stanza 4, line 24). As the reading

progresses, she discusses the prejudice against women, knowing that if she

expresses her true feelings, no one will look at her poem. Stanza 5, lines

25-30 implies that she despises anyone who thinks that women are better as

housewives, and that if their work “proves well,” men will say it is stolen or is

“by chance,” explaining unfair treatment of women. Following, she mentions

the Greeks as appreciative of women, blaming the current society for the

manipulation of women. She laments that the Greeks had fewer arguments on

women’s rights and were more peaceful, contrasting it with the current values

of society, namely that the Greeks are wrong and women are inferior.

Bradstreet uses sarcasm to express her emotions toward the male dominant

society, saying that men are eternally correct, and women are inferior to

them. She sarcastically says that men are better than women, implying the

exact opposite, that women are in fact, equal in ability. She ends by stating

that she does not think her work is worth a critic’s time, telling us that

although she thinks women are not inferior, she cannot do anything about it,

and that her works making men’s “glist’ring gold [work] but more to shine.”

Bradstreet was a very gifted and talented poet, recording early stirrings of

female resistance to a social and religious system that was prevalent at the

time. She used different tones, moods, and sarcasm to bring her poetry to

life, giving a vivid, clearly worded image of what she wants her reader to

know, a strikingly radical notion that her writing could be as competent as

any male’s. Although much of her work was conventional puritan poetry, it

shows a sensitivity to beauty that male writers of the time lacked.

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