Anne Bradstreet Essay

In the three poems Anne Bradstreet writes in memory of her grandchildren−Elizabeth, Anne, and Simon−she expresses grief and sorrow and doubts the intention of God’s will. Her emotion evolves in each poem from quiet acceptance to thinly veiled sarcasm. This progression represents Bradstreet’s ongoing struggle to embrace the traditional Puritanical view of accepting God’s will as final explanation of all things. Throughout her life, Bradstreet suffers her share of personal tragedy, and in the Puritan tradition, she attributes it to evidence of God’s will. Leonard Unger notes: “For the Puritan, of course, every personal trial had its theological significance” (100). However, in dealing with the deaths of her grandchildren, it is her intense
However, she strategically constructs her phrases and carefully chooses her words, successfully conveying her sense of betrayal without crossing the dangerously thin line that separates piety and heresy within the Puritanical society. She demonstrates this by naming him merciful and just, albeit without sincerity or conviction. In Bradstreet’s closing lines, it is revealing that she does not refer to Simon being with God. Instead she writes, “Go pretty babe, go rest with sisters twain” (11). Bradstreet finds comfort not from the thought that Simon is with God, but that he is now with his sisters. Here she is outright refusing to accept comfort from a God who she deems unjust and unfair. Anne Bradstreet reveals through these three moving elegies dedicated to her beloved grandchildren the emotional and spiritual journey she traveled in seeking answers to her questions of faith. These poems symbolize Bradstreet’s mourning the loss of her grandchildren and the conflict she experiences in attempting to define her faith in God and in the Puritan religion. According to Martin, “Anne Bradstreet finally managed to believe in God,” (76) but, “her faith was based on a profound desire to remain connected to life, whether in this world or the next”