Phillis Wheatley Peters, also spelled Phyllis and Wheatly was an American author who is considered the first African-American author of a published book of poetry. Born in West Africa, she was kidnapped and subsequently sold into slavery at the age of seven or eight and transported to North America, where she was bought by the Wheatley family of Boston. After she learned to read and write, they encouraged her poetry when they saw her talent.
Portrait of Phillis Wheatley, attributed by some scholars to Scipio Moorhead
Phillis Wheatley
Phillis Wheatley's church, Old South Meeting House
Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, 1773
Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral
Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral by Phillis Wheatley, Negro Servant to Mr. John Wheatley, of Boston, in New England is a collection of 39 poems written by Phillis Wheatley, the first professional African-American woman poet in America and the first African-American woman whose writings were published.
Title page and frontispiece of the 1st edition
Reverend George Whitefield Church of England preacher, evangelist, founder of Methodism and subject of a eulogistic poem by Wheatley from which she gained her first fame as a poet.