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Anne Bradstreet - Colonial Poet Anne Bradstreet was born Anne Dudley in 1612 in England. She married Simon Bradstreet when she was 16 and they both sailed with her family to America in 1630. The difficult, cold voyage to America took 3 months to complete. John Winthrop was also a passenger on the trip. The voyage landed in Boston and the passengers joined the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
“To My Dear and Loving Husband”“Upon the Burning of Our House, July 10th 1666”-Anne Bradstreet- “To My Dear and Loving Husband” is both a love poem and a tribute to Anne Bradstreet’s husband. Written many years into their marriage, it is one of the poems that Bradstreet did not want published because she did not consider it appropriate for public view. Both her husband and her father served as governor of Massachusetts and as such were very public figures. This poem is a private testimony to the profound love she knew with her husband. “Upon the Burning of Our House, July 10th 1666” is the poet’s chronicle of a domestic tragedy. “To My Dear and Loving Husband” is an example of the Puritan belief that domestic bliss was a blessing that came from God. “Upon the Burning of Our House” reveals Bradstreet’s struggle to reconcile herself with a devastating material loss.
To My Dear and Loving Husband If ever man were lov'd by wife, then thee;If ever wife was happy in a man,Compare with me ye women if you can.I prize thy love more than whole Mines of gold,Or all the riches that the East doth hold.My love is such that Rivers cannot quench,Nor ought but love from thee, give recompence.Thy love is such I can no way repay,The heavens reward thee manifold I pray.Then while we live, in love let's so persever,That when we live no more, we may live ever.
Analysis • "To My Dear and Loving Husband" has several standard poetic features. One is the two line rhyme scheme. Another is the anaphora, the repetition of a phrase, in the first three lines. A third is the popular iambic pentameter, and a fourth is the use of metaphors in the middle quatrain. • Iambic pentameter is characterized by an unrhymed line with five feet or accents. Each foot contains an unaccented syllable and an accented syllable, as in "daDah, daDah, daDah, daDah, daDah."
The first stanza presents her heartfelt feelings within a logical argument, the repeated use of if/then statements. The second stanza releases the logical argument and becomes truly heartfelt with its metaphors and religious imagery. The last stanza returns to the reasoned nature of the first stanza and concludes with a unique logical element, a paradox. Their love is so enduring that even in death it will survive, a paradox consistent with puritan theology and with great love poems.
The subject of Anne Bradstreet’s love poem is her professed love for her husband. She praises him and asks the heavens to reward him for his love. The poem is a touching display of love and affection, extraordinarily uncommon for the Puritan era of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in which Anne Bradstreet lived.
Puritan women were expected to be reserved, domestic, and subservient to their husbands. They were not expected or allowed to exhibit their wit, charm, intelligence, or passion. John Winthrop, the Massachusetts governor, once remarked that women who exercised wit or intelligence were apt to go insane.
