Anne Bradstreet

NAME Anne Bradstreet (née Dudley)

WHAT FAMOUS FOR First woman and first resident of Britain’s North American colonies to publish a book of original English-language poetry, The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America (London, 1650)

BIRTH Born around March 20, 1612 in Northampton, Northamptonshire, England. No exact birth record survives, but a reference in one of her poems indicates this year.

FAMILY BACKGROUND Anne Bradstreet was the daughter of Thomas Dudley and Dorothy Yorke. Her father, Thomas Dudley, was a well-educated Puritan who served as a steward to the Earl of Lincoln and later became a prominent figure and governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Her mother, Dorothy, was also literate. 

The family valued books and learning, and they claimed kinship to the more prominent Dudley family, including Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, and the family of Philip Sidney, a famed English poet.

CHILDHOOD Anne grew up in a household that fostered intellectual curiosity and religious devotion. She was exposed to literature from a young age, likely reading extensively from the 800-plus library of the Earl of Lincoln's estate. In her youth, she confessed to experiencing "carnal" desires, which she struggled with in the context of her Puritan upbringing. At age sixteen, she suffered from smallpox, which may have left her face scarred.

EDUCATION Anne Bradstreet did not attend formal school or university, which was typical for women of her era. However, she received an excellent education at home from her father, Thomas Dudley, who was widely read and described as a "devourer of books," as well as estate chaplains. She read Latin, French, history, theology and natural philosophy—the broad Elizabethan curriculum normally reserved for boys.

Anne also engaged in extensive self-education through her access to the Earl of Lincoln's extensive library, where she read works by ancient writers like Virgil, Plutarch, Livy, Pliny, Suetonius, Homer, Ovid and Seneca, as well as English literary greats such as Edmund Spenser, Sir Philip Sidney, Marlowe, Jonson, Bacon, Milton, Herbert, and Shakespeare. (1)

CAREER RECORD 1630: emigrated to Massachusetts aboard the Arbella with husband and parents

1650: Poems taken to London by brother-in-law Rev. John Woodbridge and printed as The Tenth Muse without her foreknowledge

1650–72: Continued writing in Ipswich and Andover; shorter, intensely personal lyrics such as “Contemplations,” “Verses upon the Burning of Our House” and “To My Dear and Loving Husband” circulate in manuscript

1678: Post-humous expanded American edition Several Poems … establishes her lasting reputation

APPEARANCE No authenticated portrait survives; contemporaries noted youthful beauty, which was later marred by smallpox scars. Her chronic ill-health gave her a slight, delicate frame.

Nineteenth century depiction of Anne Bradstreet by Edmund H. Garrett. 

FASHION As a Puritan gentlewoman, Anne would have worn modest, dark wool gowns and a linen coif, avoiding ostentation in keeping with religious norms.

CHARACTER She was devout, introspective, intelligent, and courageous. Her poetry reveals a woman of strong faith and emotional depth, grappling with personal loss, illness, and religious doubt. There were occasional flashes of ironic self-assertion (“Men can do best, and women know it well”).

SPEAKING VOICE Her poems show a lucid, persuasive prose style and poetic diction ranging from learned classical allusion to homely New England speech.

SENSE OF HUMOUR Anne was self-deprecating in “The Author to Her Book,” where she scolds her published verses as a “rambling brat,” and playfully needlies male critics in “The Prologue”.

RELATIONSHIPS Anne married Cambridge educated Simon Bradstreet, a fellow Puritan and future colonial governor, when she was just sixteen, most likely in Northamptonshire. Their marriage was marked by deep affection and mutual respect, as captured in her famous poem "To My Dear and Loving Husband." Though Simon was often away on colonial affairs, Anne managed their home and eight children in his absence—responsibilities that helped her grow in confidence and independence.

Anne had eight children—Samuel, Dorothy, Sarah, Simon, Hannah, Mercy, Dudley, and John. Her poetry often reflects her maternal experience, celebrating the joys of childbirth and grappling with the pain of loss, particularly the deaths of grandchildren.

As a respected member of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Anne was part of a close-knit Puritan intellectual and religious community. Her brother-in-law, Reverend John Woodbridge, played a crucial role in bringing her poetry to the public—taking her manuscript to England and arranging for the 1650 publication of The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America.

Title page, The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America, printed at London, 1650

MONEY AND FAME Anne lived comfortably thanks to family estates and Simon’s lucrative colonial offices. Though her book royalties were negligible, The Tenth Muse won admiring transatlantic readership and a place in King George III’s library. Fame grew sharply after 20th-century critical revaluation.

FOOD AND DRINK As a Puritan living in 17th-century New England, her food and drink would have been typical of the colonial period, focusing on staples like corn, beans, squash, various meats (often preserved), fish, and seasonal fruits and vegetables. Water, cider, and possibly small beer would have been common beverages.

Her poems liken worldly delights to “fading things,” reflecting the plain diet and temperance of Puritan households. (1)

MUSIC AND ARTS Anne Bradstreet was raised in a cultivated aristocratic environment where the arts were valued. Her early life at the manor of the Earl of Lincoln exposed her to a milieu of highly educated individuals familiar with music, languages, and various artistic pursuits

In her celebrated poem “Contemplations.” Bradstreet compares the sounds of insects and birds—grasshoppers, crickets, and nightingales—to music, describing how their songs “bear a second part” and set “hundred notes unto thy feathered crew,” drawing other creatures (and listeners) into a kind of spiritual choral experience. Bradstreet longs “To sing some Song my mazed Muse thought meet,” expressing both a desire for, and an appreciation of, song as part of both nature and worship. She refers to this natural music as a “little Art” that praises the Creator, which reveals her valuation of both music and artistry in the natural and spiritual world.

POETRY Anne Bradstreet, who somehow managed to juggle being the first published poet in the American colonies, raising eight children, battling smallpox, and keeping house without so much as a dishwasher, remains one of the most quietly astonishing figures in early American literature. Her journey as a poet unfolds in several unexpectedly remarkable phases.

Born Anne Dudley in England in 1612, she grew up surrounded by books—one of those rare Puritan girls more likely to be found quoting Virgil than embroidering samplers. In 1630, she boarded the Arbella for Massachusetts, an undertaking about as comfortable as riding in a wooden box across a very large washing machine. Despite the misery of frontier life (cold winters, poor health, endless chores, and religious scrutiny), she somehow found the time and mental space to write poetry. Not just the occasional wistful verse about the scenery, but long, intricate works laced with classical references and philosophical musings—all composed while tending to what must have been a never-ending stream of laundry.

In 1650, without telling her (possibly fearing she'd say no), her brother-in-law, the Rev. John Woodbridge, took a bundle of her poems to London and had them published as The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America. It was the literary equivalent of your family posting your diary online. Yet, to everyone’s surprise, it was a hit. Learned readers in both England and the colonies were impressed by her polished, European-style poems, full of quaternions (sets of four lengthy poems) on things like the four elements, the four ages of man, and the four humors—which sounds like a Monty Python sketch but wasn’t. The point is, she could match the intellectual heavyweights of her time line for line, stanza for stanza.

Then something rather wonderful happened. Having earned her place among the men with their classical themes and theological essays, Bradstreet quietly started writing about things closer to home. Literally. She turned to her own experiences—love for her husband, the birth of a child, the loss of a grandchild, even the burning down of her house—and she wrote about them in plain, heartfelt verse. Poems like “To My Dear and Loving Husband” and “Verses upon the Burning of Our House” show her evolution from dutiful colonial poet to lyrical chronicler of inner life. These works were more private, circulated in manuscripts rather than published. But they’re the ones that have endured.

Anne Bradstreet died in 1672, still largely known for her more public-facing poems. But six years later, a new, much richer volume of her work appeared—Several Poems Compiled with Great Wit and Learning. It included the more personal, more powerful verses she never expected to be published. Over the centuries, readers and scholars have come to appreciate the quiet brilliance of those later poems. By the mid-20th century, with John Berryman’s Homage to Mistress Bradstreet and a general cultural reawakening, she was finally recognized not just as a historical curiosity but as a genuinely gifted and emotionally resonant poet.

Title page, second (posthumous) edition of Bradstreet's poems, 1678

LITERATURE Literature was central to Anne Bradstreet's life. She was an avid reader from a young age, exposed to classical and contemporary English poets. Her own poetry evolved from more formal, historical, and political themes (influenced by male poets like Du Bartas and Sidney) to more personal, intimate, and meditative works reflecting her experiences as a wife, mother, and Christian in the New World. She is celebrated for her ability to blend Renaissance literary styles with Puritan theological concerns, creating a unique and enduring voice in American literature.

NATURE “Contemplations” offers rapt descriptions of autumn woods, rivers and celestial motions. Anne found in New England landscapes both beauty and theological insight.

HOBBIES AND SPORTS Her primary "hobby" was undoubtedly writing poetry, which she pursued despite the demanding daily life of a colonial woman and mother of eight. Beyond her intellectual pursuits, her life would have been largely consumed by domestic duties, child-rearing, and religious observance.

SCIENCE AND MATHS Bradstreet demonstrated an interest in science, incorporating scientific observations and knowledge into some of her early, more formal poems. She was known to have an "encyclopedic knowledge" that touched on science, history, and politics, which was unusual for women of her time. 

PHILOSOPHY & THEOLOGY Anne Bradstreet was a devout Puritan, and her theology deeply influenced her worldview and poetry. She embraced Calvinist theology, which emphasized God's sovereignty and predestination. However, her writings also reveal a lifelong struggle to reconcile her earthly affections and experiences with the strictures of Puritan doctrine, particularly the dangers of becoming too attached to worldly things. She explored themes of sin, redemption, physical and emotional frailty, death, and immortality, often grappling with the conflict between human desires and divine will. Her poetry can be seen as a form of theological meditation and argumentation, where she worked through her faith and doubts. (2)

POLITICS Bradstreet was interested in the political issues of her time, both in England and the colonies. Her early work included poems on historical and political events, such as the English Civil War ("The Dialogue Between Old England and New"). She lived in a time of significant political and religious upheaval and her father and husband were deeply involved in the governance of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Some scholars describe her as a "progressive conservative," navigating the societal norms while subtly asserting her intellectual and artistic voice.

SCANDAL The mere fact of publishing as a woman drew some clerical censure, but family prestige shielded her from Anne Hutchinson-style persecution.

MILITARY RECORD She had no military involvement, though she lived during times of frontier conflict and referenced the dangers of colonial life in her writing.

HEALTH AND PHYSICAL FITNESS Anne Bradstreet faced significant health challenges throughout her life. As a teenager, she contracted smallpox, which left her scarred. In her later years, she suffered from paralysis in her joints. Despite these ailments, she bore and raised eight children and managed a demanding household in the challenging colonial environment.

HOMES Anne Bradstreet lived in several homes throughout her life:

Northampton, England: Her birthplace.

Boston, Lincolnshire, England: Where her father served as steward to the Earl of Lincoln.

New Towne (later Cambridge), Massachusetts: Her first home in the Massachusetts Bay Colony after arriving in 1630.

Ipswich, Massachusetts: Her family moved here during her second pregnancy to expand the colony.

Andover (now North Andover), Massachusetts: She and her husband helped found this settlement, which was even more remote. 

On the night of July 10, 1666, their North Andover family home burned in a fire leaving the Bradstreets homeless and with few personal belongings. Her poem, “Verses upon the Burning of our House, July 10th, 1666,” provides a firsthand account of the fire and its emotional aftermath. 

TRAVEL Anne Bradstreet’s journey across the Atlantic in 1630 was both a personal odyssey and a pivotal moment in American literary history. At just 18 years old, she left behind the comforts of England to sail into an uncertain future. Her passage to the New World—undertaken as part of the Puritan “Great Migration”—would not only shape her life but also lay the groundwork for her emergence as the first significant poet in English from the American colonies.

Like many Puritans, Anne and her husband Simon Bradstreet joined the exodus to escape the mounting religious and political tensions under King Charles I. They were part of a larger movement driven by the desire to practice Puritanism free from the constraints of the Church of England. This movement coalesced into the Winthrop Fleet, a carefully organized convoy of eleven ships led by John Winthrop, carrying between 700 and 1,000 settlers determined to found a godly society in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

The Bradstreets traveled on the Arbella, the fleet’s flagship, named in honor of Lady Arbella Johnson. After delays caused by unfavorable weather, the fleet finally departed from Yarmouth, Isle of Wight, on April 8, 1630. The journey across the Atlantic was grueling. The ships were cramped and overcrowded, food was limited to hardtack and salted meat, and fresh water was rationed. Passengers endured rough seas and damp, unsanitary conditions that fostered illness. Scurvy, dysentery, and other diseases spread quickly, and many passengers arrived in Massachusetts sick and malnourished.

Image by Perplexity

The crossing took nearly three months. Upon arriving in Salem in June 1630, the Arbella passengers found themselves in a raw, unsettled land. There were few buildings, limited food stores, and a great deal of uncertainty. Disease continued to claim lives, and within the first year, roughly 200 settlers died. Another 200, unable to face the harshness of the new environment, returned to England. Those who stayed—including the Bradstreets—faced the backbreaking task of building homes, establishing farms, and laying the foundations of what would become colonial New England.

For Anne, the journey and its aftermath took a profound emotional and physical toll. She was young, newly married, and in a harsh land far from the libraries and comforts of her English childhood. But these hardships also gave her material to reflect on in her poetry. The themes of suffering, endurance, faith, and adaptation that run through her later writings were rooted in these early experiences.

Historically, this Atlantic crossing is remembered not just for its role in founding the Massachusetts Bay Colony, but also for marking the beginning of Anne Bradstreet’s literary legacy. Her writings offer a rare, intimate portrait of colonial life from a woman’s perspective—one shaped by the perils of sea travel, the rigors of settlement, and the inner strength it took to thrive in a new world.

Within New England, she traveled as her family moved to help establish new settlements, including Ipswich and Andover. Her husband, Simon, frequently traveled for colonial business, sometimes across the Atlantic, but Anne's travels were primarily within the colony. Simon’s frequent diplomatic journeys inspired her “Letter to her Husband, Absent upon Publick Employment.”

DEATH Anne Bradstreet died on September 16, 1672, at the age of 60, in Andover, Massachusetts Bay Colony (now North Andover, Massachusetts), probably of tuberculosis.

The precise burial site of Anne Bradstreet is not definitively known, but the strong consensus among historians and local authorities is that she is most likely buried in the Old Burying Ground (also called Old North Parish Burial Ground) on Academy Road in North Andover, Massachusetts. This location is near where she lived at the end of her life and where she died in 1672

APPEARANCES IN MEDIA  Anne is the subject of John Berryman’s long poem Homage to Mistress Bradstreet" (1956)

She is the central figure in numerous scholarly biographies and the 2024 documentary series America’s First Voices (regional PBS release).

Anne Bradstreet is frequently included  in U.S. school curricula and anthologies

She is commemorated by the Anne Bradstreet Early Childhood Center in North Andover.

ACHIEVEMENTS First published poet of America and first English-language woman poet in print 

Pioneered a distinctly female Puritan lyric voice, influencing later writers from Emily Dickinson to Adrienne Rich

Helped legitimise women’s intellectual labour within a patriarchal society, earning posthumous recognition as a proto-feminist literary pioneer

Sources: (1) Poetry Foundation (2) Place For Truth