Comparing Bradstreet's The Author To Her Book

In both "XLVI from Black Riders” by Stephen Crane and Anne Bradstreet's poem, “The Author to Her Book” the authors are describing two different perspectives of the emotional challenges faced by authors when writing a poem. Bradstreet's speaker seems to be highly insecure about her writing, and, in her poem, substantiates some of the challenges that this insecurity has caused her. Crane's speaker, in contrast, seems to be less critical of his writing, and, instead, while he is aware of his literary imperfections, he views them as important regardless of what he or his readers think. Both Stephen Crane and Anne Bradstreet use metaphors and dynamic language to convey the message that sometimes our self-perceived literary imperfections are realistically

Bradstreet's speaker compares herself to being a mother, and considers her writing to be, "Thou ill-formed offspring of my feeble brain"(line 1), which is a metaphor of her feelings toward her writing. She clearly has a desire to write, yet she is so self-critical and concerned about what others think that she develops an aversion to it. After she is apparently embarrassed by having her writing made public, she takes it back and again, and maintains the metaphor of her writing being her child as she states, "Yet being mine own, at length affection would / Thy blemishes amend, if so I could" (11-12). However, she seems to overanalyze her work and only find more fault in it, as she notes, "I washed thy face, but more defects I saw / And rubbing off a spot, still made a flaw" (13-14). Crane's speaker also uses a metaphor to substantiate his message. In contrast to Bradstreet's speaker, however, Crane's speaker notices the flaws in his writing but recognizes that the flaws are actually what makes his work meaningful. Crane compares the words that he writes to "red devils" (1) creating a metaphor between that and his words. He notes that his writing might be considered imperfect when he states that what he writes is "red muck" (9). However, he notes that the words were "wise than true" (4) even if they were not quite

Bradstreet's speaker tells the reader that her friends took her writing, and, "abroad exposed to public view" (4) When describing this event, she utilizes sharp, hesitant words such as, "snatched" (3) and "halting" (5), to demonstrate the uneasiness, uncertainty, and insecurity that her speaker feels about showing her literary works to the world. Similarly, Crane uses sharp words such as "mash" (5), and, when speaking of the words he writes, he states that "many struggled in the ink" (6) which indicate to the reader the conflict that the author himself faces when writing. He clearly recognizes the challenge faced by writers as they struggle with accepting their literary imperfections. Yet, in contrast to Bradstreet's speaker, his speaker also introduces the idea that what he writes are "things from my heart" (10) regardless of whether they are perfect. This statement is significant, because it stands in stark contrast to how Bradstreet's speaker felt toward her