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A Voice of Her Own: The Story of Phillis Wheatley, Slave Poet
A Voice of Her Own The Story of Phillis Wheatley Slave Poet Author:Kathryn Lasky, Paul Lee (Illustrator) In 1761, a young African girl was sold to the Wheatley family in Boston. The family named her Phillis after the schooner that transported her to slavery. Kidnapped from her home in Africa and shipped to America, she had everything taken away from he -- her family, her name, her language. — But Phillis Wheatley was no ordinary girl. She had an int... more »ense desire to learn, and the family encouraged her in this passion, breaking with an unwritten rule in New England to keep slaves illiterate.
She became a poet, and had a book of verse published. With the publication of this book, Phillis Wheatley established herself as the first black woman poet America had ever known. She also found what had been taken away from her and from slaves everywhere: a voice of her own.« less