Anne Bradstreet was born in Northampton, England in 1612. She was the daughter of Governor Thomas Dudley and Dorothy Yorke Dudley. At the age of 16, she married Simon Bradstreet, an employee and future governor of the Massachusetts Bay Company. Anne and Simon emigrated to America along with Anne's parents in 1630 aboard the Arabella. They became members of John Winthrop's party, and amongst the first settlers on Massachusetts Bay. The life was there was primitive and rude and she found that it was hard to survive but soon she settled as her husband took over some political duties. He was an assistant in the Massachusetts Company and was twice governor of the colony. Simon and Anne had eight children after moving to Massachusetts Bay. She was a devoted wife and mother as well as a busy one.
For Anne Bradstreet, the burning of her home and belongings in July, 1866 was a great loss for someone so devoted to her family and domestic pleasures.
English: "The Tenth Muse," a collection of poems a...
one of the more common paintings of anne bradstree...
Second edition title page of Anne Bradstreet's poe...Anne Bradstreet felt that her love of the pleasant thing of life was unchristian. Anne Bradstreet loved Simon Bradstreet and her children and God with a troubled realization that she fell short of Gods. Anne Bradstreet's poetry shows a merging of the private life with the religious life, but also a rebellious, inquiring spirit. Anne Bradstreet was one of the first poets to write an English verse in the American colonies. Her poems were written for her family and she had no incentive to publish them unlike male poets of the time. She wrote many of the poems that were eventually published after her brother-in-law took her manuscript back with him to England and had it printed without her knowledge. She was in fact the first North American to publish a book of...