The Author to Her Book

“Huswifery” by Edward Taylor (1685)

Like Anne Bradstreet, Taylor was a Puritan poet. “Huswifery” is built around an extended metaphor between weaving and creation. The speaker in this poem is content to be a vessel whose work, if it is beautiful, will bring greater glory to God. The term "huswifery" is the good management of one’s household and disciplined use of one’s material goods, something Puritans valued as expressions of faith. In comparison to “Huswifery,” Bradstreet paints a more worldly picture of the relationship between the writer and their work. “The Author to Her Book” is more subversive in the context of Taylor’s notion of the role of the artist.

“The Poet and His Book” by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1921)

Like the speaker of “The Author to Her Book,” this poem's speaker also directly addresses his book. In this case, the male speaker is concerned about the poem as his legacy after death. However, here, the idea that his work may assume meanings and be read in contexts he cannot imagine is a comfort rather than a threat to his autonomy.

“I Stop Writing the Poem” by Tess Gallagher (1999)

Tess Gallagher’s poem shows the tension between gendered expectations that women remain in domestic spaces and the ability of women to be writers and artists. This poem's speaker worries about the legacy she is creating for her daughter—a biological child, unlike Bradstreet's metaphorical one—who watches her stop writing to attend to household chores. The answer is to transform the mundane task of ironing into a poem, asserting her autonomy in the end.