The following is a review of Vincent Carretta's recent biography of Phillis Wheatley, the famous African American poet. It was composed in the spring of 2013 for Dr. Brad Austin's course on slavery in New England at Salem State University in Salem, Massachusetts.
Vincent Carretta’s Phillis Wheatley: Biography of a Genius in Bondage tells the story of Phillis Wheatley, the famous African American poet, from her arrival in Boston at the age of seven in 1761 to her death in 1784. Carretta’s is the first full-length biography of Phillis Wheatley, though it relies upon a shorter biographical account of Wheatley authored by William Henry Robinson in 1984.
Upon her arrival in Boston, Wheatley was purchased by Boston merchant John Wheatley as a gift for his wife Susanna. (Carretta notes that there is no evidence that John Wheatley sold slaves. (17)) Phillis “was treated more like a member of the Wheatley family than as a servant, let alone as a slave.” (22) For the Wheatleys, their ownership of Phillis was a manifestation of status, and they therefore not only permitted, but facilitated and encouraged, her writing. (23) When Phillis’s elegy on the Methodist preacher George Whitefield in 1770 earned her fame on both sides of the Atlantic, the Wheatleys desire to capitalize on the market for “exotic authors” led to the publication of Phillis Wheatley’s first collection of poems in 1773, entitled Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral. (83) Phillis’s fame brought her to the attention of many famous and powerful people, including George Washington, with whom she corresponded; the Countess of Huntingdon, who provided funding for the publishing of her book; and Benjamin Franklin, who she met during her brief trip to London in 1773. She was manumitted by the Wheatley’s after her trip to London and married a freedman named John Peters in 1778. (172) Unable to secure a publisher for her second collection of poems, Phillis Wheatley died in poverty and obscurity in 1784.
Throughout, Carretta counters less favorable portrayals of Wheatley, such as the portrayal of her as a “race traitor” by black critics in the 60s and 70s. (2) In his discussion of her famous and controversial poem “On Being Brought from Africa to America,” in which Wheatley expresses gratitude at having been taken as a slave from Africa because she was as a consequence introduced to Christianity, Carretta proposes interpreting Wheatley as subtly challenging the racist attitudes of white Christians and points out that many enslaved African American authors viewed their enslavement as part of a divine plan while simultaneously turning the tenets of their new faith against the hypocrisy of their enslavers. (60-64)
Carretta’s biography emphasizes Wheatley’s participation in many of the decisions that affected her life—an emphasis that comports with the tendency within recent scholarship to rescue the agency of the enslaved from obscurity. The most important instance of this is Carretta’s portrayal of the events that immediately preceded her emancipation. Having failed to find a publisher in Boston for her collected poems, Phillis and Nathaniel Wheatley (John Wheatley’s son) sailed to London to find a publisher for a collection of Phillis’s poems. This trip was made just after the Mansfield decision in 1772, which established that an enslaved person brought to England could not be forced to leave England as a slave. Carretta insinuates that Phillis knew of this decision prior to the trip and that it may have been a factor in motivating her to travel to England, a factor which she would have concealed from the Wheatleys. (95, 109) Carretta also suggests that Phillis Wheatley negotiated with Nathaniel Wheatley for her freedom—perhaps she threatened to remain in England if the Wheatley’s refused to manumit her. (137)
Carretta claims to have made many discoveries about Wheatley, including Phillis Wheatley’s first poem. (46) However, some of these “discoveries” are little more than speculative suggestions. For instance, in the preface, Carretta refers to having discovered “new information about…the way [Phillis Wheatley] gained her freedom.” (x) However, this “new information” seems to consist primarily in interpreting two poems with which historians were already familiar as suggesting that Wheatley had slavery on her mind when she went to England. (130-138) Carretta can provide only “circumstantial evidence” that Wheatley even knew of the Mansfield decision before traveling to England. (128) And as regards evidence that she negotiated her freedom, Carretta simply does not provide any. In many other instances, Carretta has no choice but to speculate as to where Wheatley was and when she was there, the starkest example being when Wheatley disappears from the public record in the early 1780s. (182-3)
Much of Phillis Wheatley’s life remains mysterious even after Vincent Carretta’s biography. This is the consequence of a paucity of evidence, however, and is no fault of the author’s. Carretta has in fact provided a tremendous service in bringing together all of the available evidence and both contextualizing and reconstructing (insofar as possible) the events of the life of “the mother of African American literature.”
Vincent Carretta’s Phillis Wheatley: Biography of a Genius in Bondage tells the story of Phillis Wheatley, the famous African American poet, from her arrival in Boston at the age of seven in 1761 to her death in 1784. Carretta’s is the first full-length biography of Phillis Wheatley, though it relies upon a shorter biographical account of Wheatley authored by William Henry Robinson in 1984.
Upon her arrival in Boston, Wheatley was purchased by Boston merchant John Wheatley as a gift for his wife Susanna. (Carretta notes that there is no evidence that John Wheatley sold slaves. (17)) Phillis “was treated more like a member of the Wheatley family than as a servant, let alone as a slave.” (22) For the Wheatleys, their ownership of Phillis was a manifestation of status, and they therefore not only permitted, but facilitated and encouraged, her writing. (23) When Phillis’s elegy on the Methodist preacher George Whitefield in 1770 earned her fame on both sides of the Atlantic, the Wheatleys desire to capitalize on the market for “exotic authors” led to the publication of Phillis Wheatley’s first collection of poems in 1773, entitled Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral. (83) Phillis’s fame brought her to the attention of many famous and powerful people, including George Washington, with whom she corresponded; the Countess of Huntingdon, who provided funding for the publishing of her book; and Benjamin Franklin, who she met during her brief trip to London in 1773. She was manumitted by the Wheatley’s after her trip to London and married a freedman named John Peters in 1778. (172) Unable to secure a publisher for her second collection of poems, Phillis Wheatley died in poverty and obscurity in 1784.
Throughout, Carretta counters less favorable portrayals of Wheatley, such as the portrayal of her as a “race traitor” by black critics in the 60s and 70s. (2) In his discussion of her famous and controversial poem “On Being Brought from Africa to America,” in which Wheatley expresses gratitude at having been taken as a slave from Africa because she was as a consequence introduced to Christianity, Carretta proposes interpreting Wheatley as subtly challenging the racist attitudes of white Christians and points out that many enslaved African American authors viewed their enslavement as part of a divine plan while simultaneously turning the tenets of their new faith against the hypocrisy of their enslavers. (60-64)
Carretta’s biography emphasizes Wheatley’s participation in many of the decisions that affected her life—an emphasis that comports with the tendency within recent scholarship to rescue the agency of the enslaved from obscurity. The most important instance of this is Carretta’s portrayal of the events that immediately preceded her emancipation. Having failed to find a publisher in Boston for her collected poems, Phillis and Nathaniel Wheatley (John Wheatley’s son) sailed to London to find a publisher for a collection of Phillis’s poems. This trip was made just after the Mansfield decision in 1772, which established that an enslaved person brought to England could not be forced to leave England as a slave. Carretta insinuates that Phillis knew of this decision prior to the trip and that it may have been a factor in motivating her to travel to England, a factor which she would have concealed from the Wheatleys. (95, 109) Carretta also suggests that Phillis Wheatley negotiated with Nathaniel Wheatley for her freedom—perhaps she threatened to remain in England if the Wheatley’s refused to manumit her. (137)
Carretta claims to have made many discoveries about Wheatley, including Phillis Wheatley’s first poem. (46) However, some of these “discoveries” are little more than speculative suggestions. For instance, in the preface, Carretta refers to having discovered “new information about…the way [Phillis Wheatley] gained her freedom.” (x) However, this “new information” seems to consist primarily in interpreting two poems with which historians were already familiar as suggesting that Wheatley had slavery on her mind when she went to England. (130-138) Carretta can provide only “circumstantial evidence” that Wheatley even knew of the Mansfield decision before traveling to England. (128) And as regards evidence that she negotiated her freedom, Carretta simply does not provide any. In many other instances, Carretta has no choice but to speculate as to where Wheatley was and when she was there, the starkest example being when Wheatley disappears from the public record in the early 1780s. (182-3)
Much of Phillis Wheatley’s life remains mysterious even after Vincent Carretta’s biography. This is the consequence of a paucity of evidence, however, and is no fault of the author’s. Carretta has in fact provided a tremendous service in bringing together all of the available evidence and both contextualizing and reconstructing (insofar as possible) the events of the life of “the mother of African American literature.”
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