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Bibliography
Course Hero. "The Author to Her Book Study Guide." Course Hero. 13 Feb. 2020. Web. 1 Oct. 2023. <https://www.coursehero.com/lit/The-Author-to-Her-Book/>.
In text
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Bibliography
Course Hero. (2020, February 13). The Author to Her Book Study Guide. In Course Hero. Retrieved October 1, 2023, from https://www.coursehero.com/lit/The-Author-to-Her-Book/
In text
(Course Hero, 2020)
Bibliography
Course Hero. "The Author to Her Book Study Guide." February 13, 2020. Accessed October 1, 2023. https://www.coursehero.com/lit/The-Author-to-Her-Book/.
Footnote
Course Hero, "The Author to Her Book Study Guide," February 13, 2020, accessed October 1, 2023, https://www.coursehero.com/lit/The-Author-to-Her-Book/.
Anne Bradstreet
1678
Poem
Philosophy, Women's Studies
The first-person speaker of "The Author to Her Book" is a female author who claims to be disgruntled because her poems have been published without her permission. She engages with the work as if she were a mother and the work were her child.
Most of "The Author to Her Book" is written in the past tense as the speaker develops the poem's extended metaphor. She switches to the present tense in lines 19–23 when she gives advice to the newly published work, as she might give advice to a child leaving home for the first time to go to work.
"The Author to Her Book" presents a speaker who addresses her own work and seemingly apologizes for its defects. English American poet Anne Bradstreet (c. 1612–72) uses the extended metaphor of a mother and her child to convey the complex, loving relationship that an author has with her work and the difficulty of publication.
This study guide for Anne Bradstreet's The Author to Her Book offers summary and analysis on themes, symbols, and other literary devices found in the text. Explore Course Hero's library of literature materials, including documents and Q&A pairs.
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