American Literature Annotations
© Copyright 1999-2000, Skylar Hamilton Burris

These notes go with the American Literature Timeline.

Sir Walter Raleigh (1552-1618): In The History of the World he talks about the angelic, rational (man), and brutal (beast) worlds. "The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd" is Raleigh's response to Marlowe's "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love." Some quotes from his poetry:

"Only we die in earnest--that's no jest."

"Tell zeal it wants devotion
Tell love it is but lust
Tell time it is but motion
Tell flesh it is but dust,
And wish them not reply
For thou must give the lie."

Anne Bradstreet (1612-1672):  An American female poet, she wrote such famous poems as "The Author to Her Book," "The Flesh and the Spirit," and "Upon the Burning of Our House" (which is about the importance of spiritual rather than material things). From "The Prologue":

I am obnoxious to each carping tongue
Who says my hand a needle better fits...
Let Greeks be Greeks, and women what they are,
Men have precedence and still excel.
It is but vain unjustly to wage warre,
Men can do best, and women know it well.
Preeminence in all and each is yours--
Yet grant some small acknowledgement of ours.