{"product_id":"complete-writings-isbn-9780140424300","title":"Complete Writings","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe extraordinary writings of Phillis Wheatley, a formerly enslaved woman turned published poet\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eIn 1761, a young girl arrived in Boston on a ship of enslaved people, was sold to the Wheatley family, and given the name Phillis Wheatley. After studying English and classical literature, geography, the Bible, and Latin, Phillis published her first poem in 1767 at the age of 14, winning much public attention and considerable fame. When Boston publishers who doubted its authenticity rejected an initial collection of her poetry, Wheatley sailed to London in 1773 and found a publisher there for \u003ci\u003ePoems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003eThis volume collects both Wheatley's letters and her poetry: hymns, elegies, translations, philosophical poems, tales, and epyllions--including a poignant plea to the Earl of Dartmouth urging freedom for America and comparing the country's condition to her own. With her contemplative elegies and her use of the poetic imagination to escape an unsatisfactory world, Wheatley anticipated the Romantic Movement of the following century. The appendices to this edition include poems of Wheatley's contemporary African-American poets: Lucy Terry, Jupiter Harmon, and Francis Williams.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.\u003ci\u003eEdited with an Introduction and Notes by Vincent Carretta\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cp\u003eIntroduction by Vincent Carretta\u003cbr\u003eSuggestions for Further Reading\u003cbr\u003eA Note on Money\u003cbr\u003eAcknowledgments\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePoems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDEDICATION\u003cbr\u003ePREFACE\u003cbr\u003eCopy of a LETTER sent by the Author's Master to the Publisher.\u003cbr\u003eTo the PUBLICK.\u003cbr\u003eTo MAECENAS.\u003cbr\u003eOn VIRTUE.\u003cbr\u003eTo the University of CAMBRIDGE, in NEW-ENGLAND.\u003cbr\u003eTo the KING'S Most Excellent Majesty. 1768.\u003cbr\u003eOn being brought from AFRICA to AMERICA.\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of the Rev. Dr. SEWELL. 1769.\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of the Rev. Mr. GEORGE WHITEFIELD. 1770.\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of a young Lady of Five Years of Age.\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of a young Gentleman.\u003cbr\u003eTo a Lady on the Death of her Husband.\u003cbr\u003eGOLIATH of GATH.\u003cbr\u003eThoughts on the WORKS of PROVIDENCE.\u003cbr\u003eTo a Lady on the Death of Three Relations.\u003cbr\u003eTo a Clergyman on the Death of his Lady.\u003cbr\u003eAn HYMN to the MORNING.\u003cbr\u003eAn HYMN to the EVENING.\u003cbr\u003eIsaiah lxiii. 1-8.\u003cbr\u003eOn RECOLLECTION.\u003cbr\u003eOn IMAGINATION.\u003cbr\u003eA Funeral POEM on the Death of C.E. an Infant of Twelve Months.\u003cbr\u003eTo Captain H-D, of the 65th Regiment.\u003cbr\u003eTo the Right Honourable WILLIAM, Earl of DARTMOUTH, His Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for North-America, \u0026amp;c.\u003cbr\u003eODE to NEPTUNE. On Mrs. W-'s Voyage to England.\u003cbr\u003eTo a LADY on her coming to North-America with her Son, for the Recovery of her Health.\u003cbr\u003eTo a LADY on her remarkable Preservation in an Hurricane in \u003ci\u003eNorth-Carolina\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003eTo a LADY and her Children, on the Death of her Son and their Brother.\u003cbr\u003eTo a GENTLEMAN and LADY, on the Death of the Lady's Brother and Sister, and a Child of the Name \u003ci\u003eAvis\u003c\/i\u003e, aged one Year.\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of Dr. SAMUEL MARSHALL. 1771.\u003cbr\u003eTo a GENTLEMAN on his Voyage to \u003ci\u003eGreat-Britain\u003c\/i\u003e for the Recovery of his Health.\u003cbr\u003eTo the Rev. Dr. THOMAS AMORY on reading his Sermons on DAILY DEVOTION, in which that Duty is recommended and assisted.\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of J.C. an Infant.\u003cbr\u003eAn HYMN to HUMANITY. To S.P.G. Esq;\u003cbr\u003eTo the Honourable T.H. Esq; on the Death of his Daughter.\u003cbr\u003eNIOBE in Distress for her children slain by APOLLO, from \u003ci\u003eOvid's\u003c\/i\u003e Metamorphoses, Book VI. and from a view of the Painting of Mr. \u003ci\u003eRichard Wilson\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003eTo S.M. a young \u003ci\u003eAfrican\u003c\/i\u003e Painter, on seeing his Works.\u003cbr\u003eTo His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor, on the Death of his Lady. \u003ci\u003eMarch\u003c\/i\u003e 24, 1773.\u003cbr\u003eA Farewel to AMERICA. To Mrs. S.W.\u003cbr\u003eA REBUS, by \u003ci\u003eI.B.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAn ANSWER to the \u003ci\u003eRebus\u003c\/i\u003e, by the Author of these POEMS.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eExtant Poems Not Published in \u003ci\u003ePoems on Various Subjects\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAtheism.\u003cbr\u003eAn Address to the Atheist.\u003cbr\u003eDeism.\u003cbr\u003eAn Address to the Deist - 1767 -\u003cbr\u003eOn Messrs Hussey and Coffin.\u003cbr\u003eAmerica\u003cbr\u003eTo the Hon.ble Commodore Hood on his Pardoning a Deserter\u003cbr\u003eOn Friendship\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of Mr. Snider Murder'd by Richardson\u003cbr\u003eOcean\u003cbr\u003eAn ELEGY, To Miss. Mary Moorhead, on the DEATH of her Father, \u003ci\u003eThe Rev. Mr.\u003c\/i\u003e JOHN MOORHEAD.\u003cbr\u003e[To a Gentleman of the Navy.]\u003cbr\u003eThe Answer [By the Gentleman of the Navy.]\u003cbr\u003ePhilis's [sic] Reply to the Answer in our last by the Gentleman in the Navy.\u003cbr\u003eTo His Excellency General Washington.\u003cbr\u003eOn the Capture of General Lee\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of General Wooster\u003cbr\u003eTo Mr. and Mrs.-, on the Death of their Infant Son\u003cbr\u003ePrayer\u003cbr\u003eAn Elegy Sacred to the Memory of the Rev'd Samuel Cooper, D.D.\u003cbr\u003eAN ELEGY, SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF THAT GREAT DIVINE, THE REVEREND AND LEARNED DR. SAMUEL COOPER.\u003cbr\u003eLIBERTY AND PEACE, A POEM.\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eAn ELEGY on Leaving-.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eVariants of Poems Published in \u003ci\u003ePoems on Various Subjects\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo the University of Cambridge, wrote in 1767-\u003cbr\u003eTo The King's Most Excellent Majesty on his Repealing the American Stamp Act\u003cbr\u003eOn the Decease of the Revd Doctr Sewall [variant 1].\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of the rev'd Dr. Sewell [variant 2].\u003cbr\u003eOn the Decease of the Rev'd Doctr Sewall, 1769. [variant 3].-\u003cbr\u003eAN ELEGIAC POEM, On the DEATH of that celebrated Divine, and eminent Servant of JESUS CHRIST, the late Reverend, and pious GEORGE WHITEFIELD, Chaplain to the Right Honourable the Countess of Huntingdon, \u0026amp;c \u0026amp;c. [variant 1].\u003cbr\u003eAn Ode of VERSES On the much-lamented Death of the REV. MR. GEORGE WHITEFIELD, Late Chaplain to the Countess of \u003ci\u003eHuntingdon\u003c\/i\u003e [variant 2].\u003cbr\u003eTo Mrs. Leonard, on the Death of her Husband.\u003cbr\u003eOn the Death of Dr. Samuel Marshall [variant 1].\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eOn the Death of Doctor\u003c\/i\u003e SAMUEL MARSHALL. [variant 2]\u003cbr\u003eRecollection.\u003cbr\u003eRECOLLECTION. \u003ci\u003eTo Miss A- M-.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo the Rev. Mr. \u003ci\u003ePitkin\u003c\/i\u003e, on the DEATH of his LADY.\u003cbr\u003eA POEM ON THE DEATH OF \u003ci\u003eCHARLES ELIOT\u003c\/i\u003e, AGED 12 MONTHS [variant 1]\u003cbr\u003eA Poem the death of Charles Eliot aged 12 months. [variant 2]\u003cbr\u003eTO THE RIGHT HONL. WILLIAM LEGGE, EARL OF DARTMOUTH [variant 1]\u003cbr\u003eTO THE RIGHT HONL WILLIAM LEGGE, EARL OF DARTMOUTH [variant 2]\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eTo the Hon'ble\u003c\/i\u003e Thomas Hubbard, \u003ci\u003eEsq; On the Death of Mrs.\u003c\/i\u003e Thankfull Leonard.\u003cbr\u003eTo the Empire of America, Beneath the Western Hemisphere. Farewell to America. To Mrs. S.W. [variant 1]\u003cbr\u003eFAREWELL TO AMERICA [variant 2]\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLetters\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo the Countess of Huntingdon (October 25, 1770).\u003cbr\u003eTo Abigail May? (November or December 1771).\u003cbr\u003eTo John Thornton (April 21, 1772).\u003cbr\u003eTo Arbour Tanner (May 19, 1772).\u003cbr\u003eTo Arbour Tanner (July 19, 1772).\u003cbr\u003eTo the Earl of Dartmouth (October 10, 1772).\u003cbr\u003eTo the Countess of Huntingdon (June 27, 1773).\u003cbr\u003eTo the Countess of Huntingdon (July 17, 1773).\u003cbr\u003eTo David Worcester (October 18, 1773).\u003cbr\u003eTo Obour Tanner (October 30, 1773).\u003cbr\u003eTo John Thornton (December 1, 1773).\u003cbr\u003eTo the Reverend Samuel Hopkins (February 9, 1774).\u003cbr\u003eTo Samson Occom (February 11, 1774).\u003cbr\u003eTo Obour Tanner (March 21, 1774).\u003cbr\u003eTo John Thornton (March 29, 1774).\u003cbr\u003eTo Obour Tanner (May 6, 1774).\u003cbr\u003eTo the Reverend Samuel Hopkins (May 6, 1774).\u003cbr\u003eTo John Thornton (October 30, 1774).\u003cbr\u003eTo George Washington (October 26, 1775).\u003cbr\u003eTo Obour Tanner (May 29, 1778).\u003cbr\u003eTo Mary Wooster (July 15, 1778).\u003cbr\u003eTo Obour Tanner (May 10, 1779).\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eVariant Letters\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo the Countess of Huntingdon (October 25, 1770).\u003cbr\u003eTo the Earl of Dartmouth (June 3, 1773).\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eProposals for Volumes of Poetry\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eProposal for Printing by Subscription (February 29, 1772).\u003cbr\u003eProposals (April 16, 1773)\u003cbr\u003eProposals (October 30, 1779).\u003cbr\u003eWheatley's Final Proposal (September 1784).\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNotes\u003cbr\u003eAppendix A: Possible Wheatley variant of \"Hymn to Humanity\"; Possible new Phillis Wheatley poem, \"The Voice of Freedom\"\u003cbr\u003eAppendix B: Lucy Terry Prince: Bars Fight.\u003cbr\u003eAppendix C: Jupiter Hammon: \u003ci\u003eAN Evening THOUGHT. SALVATION BY CHRIST, WITH PENETENTIAL CRIES.; AN ADDRESS to Miss PHILLIS WHEATLY [sic]\u003c\/i\u003e; \"A Poem for Children with Thoughts on Death\"; \u003ci\u003eA DIALOGUE ENTITLEDD the KIND MASTER and DUTIFUL SERVANT\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003eAppendix D: Francis Williams: An ODE.\u003c\/p\u003e\"What a marvelous edition of Phillis Wheatley's COMPLETE WRITINGS Vincent Carretta has produced for Penguin Classics. Here are all her poems including extant verse not included in her first volume as well as variants of others. Here are also her letters and the important proposals for her volumes of poetry. Additionally, Carretta has added work by her black contemporaries Lucy Terry Prince, Jupiter Hammon, and Francis Williams to help readers contextualize black literary activity in the late eighteenth century.  Carretta has also written an illuminating introduction and included suggestions for further read and notes. In short, this is a fantastic edition for the specialist, the student, and the informed general reader. It will be widely used.\" --\u003cb\u003eKathryn Zabelle Derounian-Stodola\u003c\/b\u003e, Univ of Arkansas at Little Rock\u003cp\u003e\"Vincent Carretta's edition of the works of Phillis Wheatley is the definitive collection of her work.  Expertly edited, it is a masterpiece of textual scholarship. Every scholar and student seeking to understand Wheatley's life and work will want to obtain this book.\" --\u003cb\u003eHenry Louis Gates\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003ePhillis Wheatley \u003c\/b\u003e(1753?-1784) was born in western Africa, most likely in present-day Gambia or Ghana. Having failed to find an American publisher for a second volume of her works, Wheatley died in Boston largely forgotten and impoverished.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eVincent Carretta\u003c\/b\u003e is professor of English at the University of Maryland, College Park. He is the editor of the Penguin Classics editions of the \u003ci\u003eComplete Writings of Phillis Wheatley\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eLetters of the Late Ignatius Sancho, an African\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eThoughts and Sentiments on the Evil of Slavery and Other Writings\u003c\/i\u003e by Ottobah Cugoano.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePREFACE\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePOEMS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEXTANT POEMS NOT PUBLISHED IN  POEMS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eVARIANTS OF POEMS PUBLISHED IN  POEMS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLETTERS\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eVARIANT LETTERS\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePROPOSALS FOR VOLUMES OF POETRY\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNOTES\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAPPENDIX A\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAPPENDIX B\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAPPENDIX C\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAPPENDIX D\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFrom the INTRODUCTION\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBorn around 1753 somewhere in west Africa, probably between present-day Gambia and Ghana, the little girl who would become Phillis Wheatley was brought to Boston, Massachusetts, on July 11, 1761, aboard the \u003ci\u003ePhillis,\u003c\/i\u003e a slave ship commanded by captain Peter Gwin and owned by Timothy Fitch. At the time, approximately one thousand of Boston’s more than fifteen thousand residents were slaves, with perhaps twenty free people of African descent in the total population. About seven or eight years old (her front teeth were missing), the sickly child was soon bought from the slave dealer John Avery by John Wheatley, a prosperous Boston merchant, for his wife, Susanna. Named after her new owners and the vessel that had brought her to America, Phillis Wheatley was taken to the Wheatley home at the corner of King Street and Makerel Lane (present-day State and Kilby Streets) to help the Wheatleys’ few other domestic slaves care for their mistress and master, as well as their eighteen-year-old twins, Mary and Nathaniel. The Wheatleys were members of the New South Congregational Church. Susanna was also an active supporter of the evangelical missions of the Calvinist Methodist minister George Whitefield and others. John was gradually turning over to his son the management of his real estate, warehouse, wharf, and wholesale businesses, and the  \u003ci\u003eLondon Packet,\u003c\/i\u003e a three-masted schooner, used to trade between Boston and London.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMainly through the tutelage of Mary Wheatley, the obviously precocious Phillis gained an extraordinary education for a woman of the time, and an unprecedented one for a female slave. According to John Wheatley, within sixteen months Phillis was proficient enough in the English language to be able to read even “the most difficult Parts of the Sacred Writings.” She was taught English and Classical literature (especially poetry), geography,  and history, as well as the Bible, some Latin, and Christianity. Her poems and letters show that she became familiar with works by Alexander Pope (her principal poetic model for the use of heroic couplets), John Milton (her most admired modern poet), William Shenstone, Horace, Virgil, Ovid, Terence, and Homer (the last through Pope’s translations). None of Wheatley’s surviving writings, however, indicates a familiarity with Classical sources that could not have been gained from translations alone.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePhillis’s first known piece of writing, a now-lost letter to the Mohegan minister, Samson Occom, was written in 1765, when she was about twelve years old. A Wheatley family friend, Occom had gone with Nathaniel Whitaker, another minister, to England and Scotland in 1766 to raise money for the education of Occom’s fellow Native Americans in New England. The school that resulted from their efforts was Dartmouth College, named after William Legge, Earl of Dartmouth, another of Phillis’s correspondents and the subject of one of her poems. Her first published work, the poem “On Messrs. Hussey and Coffin,” appeared on December 21, 1767, in a newspaper, the  \u003ci\u003eNewport Mercury,\u003c\/i\u003e no doubt through the support and contacts of Susanna Wheatley. The poem’s combination of Christian piety and Classical allusions anticipates the themes and expression found in most of her subsequent verse. The subscription proposal for Phillis’s first volume of poetry indicates that she was composing poetry as early as 1765. The surviving variant versions of many of her poems demonstrate her desire to improve her verses and her ability to fit them for various audiences. For the next several years, Phillis published a number of occasional poems, that is, poems on recent events, culminating in her 1770 funeral elegy addressed to Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon, on the death of her chaplain, Whitefield. Wheatley probably heard Whitefield at least one of the four times he preached at the Old South Church in August 1770, a month before his sudden death in Newburyport, Massachusetts. Since Susanna Wheatley corresponded with the Countess, Whitefield may well have been a guest in the Wheatley house. On August 18, 1771, Phillis was baptized by Samuel Cooper into the Congregationalist Old South Church (not the Wheatley family church).\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePhillis Wheatley’s elegy brought her both international fame  and the Countess’s attention when it was published in London, as well as in Boston, in 1771. Her reputation was reinforced by the publication of her poem “Recollection,” initially in March 1772, in the \u003ci\u003eLondon Magazine: Or, Gentleman’s Monthly Intelligencer,\u003c\/i\u003e and subsequently in both American and English periodicals. Wheatley’s community of women supporters soon extended beyond her American and English patrons to include her fellow Bostonian poet, Jane Dunlap. In her \u003ci\u003ePoems Upon Several Sermons Preached by the Rev’d and Renowned George Whitefield While in Boston\u003c\/i\u003e (Boston, 1771), Dunlap mentions Wheatley’s elegy, referring to “a young Afric damsel’s virgin tongue.” In \u003ci\u003eAn Address to the Inhabitants of the British Settlement in America, upon Slave-Keeping\u003c\/i\u003e (Boston, 1773), mistaking her status and how long she had been “in the country,” Benjamin Rush observed that “[t]here is now in the town of Boston a Free Negro Girl, about 18 years of age, who has been but 9 [sic] years in the country, whose singular genius and accomplishments are such as not only do honor to her sex, but to human nature. Several of her poems have been printed, and read with pleasure by the public.” In France, Voltaire told Baron Constant de Rebecq in a 1774 letter than Wheatley’s very fine English verse disproved Fontenelle’s contention that no black poets existed. Wheatley, however, was neither the first black woman poet, the first published black poet, nor the first black poet to gain international notice in British America. Those honors belong, respectively, to Lucy Terry, whose poetry remained unpublished until the nineteenth century; Jupiter Hammon, who published his first poem at the end of 1760; and Francis Williams, who wrote poetry in Latin. (The poems of Terry, Hammon, and Williams are included in the Appendices to this Penguin edition.) But in contemporaneous and subsequent recognition, reputation, and influence Wheatley far surpassed her black predecessors, whose works she appears not to have known: unpublished, Terry was almost completely unknown until the following century; never published in London, Hammon remained a provincial poet; and unpublished and untranslated, Williams was largely unknown and inaccessible, especially before 1774.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBy 1772 Wheatley had written enough poems to enable her to try to capitalize on her growing transatlantic reputation by  producing a book of previously published and new verse. Consequently, subscriptions were solicited, probably by Susanna Wheatley, in the \u003ci\u003eBoston Censor\u003c\/i\u003e on February 29, March 14, and April 18, 1772, for a proposed volume of Phillis’s poems to be published in Boston. Unfortunately, despite Wheatley’s local reputation as a poet, sufficient support for the project was lacking. Having failed to find backing in Boston, Susanna turned to London for a publisher, using Robert Calef, captain of the Wheatleys’ \u003ci\u003eLondon Packet,\u003c\/i\u003e to seek out Archibald Bell, a relatively minor publisher and bookseller of primarily religious texts in the City of London, in the fall of 1772. Bell agreed to publish Wheatley’s \u003ci\u003ePoems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral\u003c\/i\u003e in 1773, on the condition that the volume be prefaced by a document signed by Boston worthies certifying the authenticity of the poems for an English audience. Through Bell, Wheatley gained the patronage of the Countess of Huntingdon, who agreed to allow Phillis to dedicate the book to her. As Phillis and her mistress knew, Huntingdon had already sponsored the publication of James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw’s A \u003ci\u003eNarrative of the Most Remarkable Particulars in the Life of ... an African Prince, as Related by Himself,\u003c\/i\u003e published in Bath at the end of 1772. Huntingdon subsequently supported the publication of religiously oriented works by other black authors, including John Marrant’s A \u003ci\u003eNarrative of the Lord’s Wonderful Dealings with John Marrant, a Black ... Taken down from His Own Relation\u003c\/i\u003e (London, 1785), and Olaudah Equiano’s \u003ci\u003eThe Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Written by Himself\u003c\/i\u003e (London, 1789). Gronniosaw, Marrant, and Equiano all knew Whitefield, as well as Huntingdon, having heard him preach, either in England or during one of his seven trips to North America. In a letter Wheatley wrote to Huntingdon during her six-week visit to London, she acknowledges Gronniosaw as her literary predecessor, thus recognizing a tradition of English-speaking writers of African descent, as well as Huntingdon’s role in enabling such writers to gain access to print.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWheatley went to England to recover her health, to meet her aristocratic patron, and presumably to see her book through the press. She achieved none of those goals. After Susanna Wheatley  had written to the Countess asking her advice about finding proper housing for Phillis in London, Phillis left Boston with captain Calef aboard the \u003ci\u003eLondon Packet\u003c\/i\u003e on May 8, 1773. They reached London on June 17, just as the publicity campaign for the forthcoming book, coordinated by Susanna Wheatley and Bell, was beginning in the London press. Before she had a chance to meet the Countess, who had retired to her home in Wales for reasons of health, and before her \u003ci\u003ePoems\u003c\/i\u003e was published, Wheatley left England with Calef on July 26 to return to Boston to nurse her ailing mistress.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e. . .\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Penguin Classics","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46303590121701,"sku":"NP9780140424300","price":16.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780140424300.jpg?v=1767724005","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/complete-writings-isbn-9780140424300","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}