Complete Comparisons Of Wheatley And Poe - 870 Words

Complete Comparisons of Wheatley and Poe Throughout American literature, two poets emerge as very unlikely candidates for poetic comparisons. Phillis Wheatley and Edgar Alan Poe’s writings in many ways reflect the unique lives that they lived, and having an understanding of the two poets’ backgrounds can assist a reader in dissecting their manuscripts. Comparing works from the two is an easy task to handle if an avid reader decides to pursue it, and even though they lived under adverse conditions they have a way of shaping history into an intricate fashion of delicate, dark and sophisticated writing. Phillis Wheatley and Edgar Alan Poe are different in persona and literacy, but when a reader processes more of their works, one can understand how these two writers helped shape poetry for generations after and still possess an impact on the literary world. Phillis Wheatley was a young African American girl, brought to America at the age of seven to be a slave. In her time maturing in the Wheatley household, young Phillis grew rapidly intellectually and spiritually. Her faith in God and His divine nature is what inspired Wheatley to write- a prominent subject in her poem â€Å"On Being Brought from Africa to America.† Another example of God being the backbone of her literary career is in her letter â€Å"To the University of Cambridge in New England.† Though Wheatley was a slave, she is known as one of the most prominent poets in the pre-nineteenth century America. Mr. Edgar Alan Poe,