Whittier founded the antislavery Liberty party in 1840 and ran for Congress in 1842. During his tenure as editor of the Pennsylvania Freeman, in May 1838, the paper’s offices burned to the ground and were sacked during the destruction of Pennsylvania Hall by a mob. He moved in 1836 to Amesbury, Massachusetts, where he worked for the American Anti-Slavery Society. In 1834 he was elected as a Whig for one term to the Massachusetts legislature mobbed and stoned in Concord, New Hampshire, in 1835. In 1833 he wrote Justice and Expedience urging immediate abolition. His first book, Legends of New England in Prose and Verse, was published in 1831 from then until the Civil War, he wrote essays and articles as well as poems, almost all of which were concerned with abolition. Whittier was active in his support of National Republican candidates he was a delegate in 1831 to the national Republican Convention in support of Henry Clay, and he himself ran unsuccessfully for Congress the following year. In Boston, he edited American Manufacturer and Essex Gazette before becoming editor of the important New England Weekly Review. A Quaker devoted to social causes and reform, Whittier worked passionately for a series of abolitionist newspapers and magazines. By the time he was twenty, he had published enough verse to bring him to the attention of editors and readers in the antislavery cause. He then attended Haverhill Academy from 1827 to 1828, supporting himself as a shoemaker and schoolteacher. His first published poem, “The Exile’s Departure,” was published in William Lloyd Garrison’s Newburyport Free Press in 1826. The son of two devout Quakers, he grew up on the family farm and had little formal schooling. It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit.Īn American poet and editor, John Greenleaf Whittier was born December 17, 1807, in Haverhill, Massachusetts. So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit. When he might have won had he stuck it out ĭon’t give up though the pace seems slow-Īnd you never can tell just how close you are, Life is strange with its twists and turns When the funds are low and the debts are highĪnd you want to smile, but you have to sigh, When the road you’re trudging seems all up hill, When things go wrong as they sometimes will, This week I will be sharing one of John Greenleaf Whittier’s poems which I love and hope motivates you too. I hope that you enjoy reading and listening to our thoughts, feelings and rants and in many ways relate to some of them. If you are interested in sharing some of your poetry, feel free to buzz me and we can work something out. I will be sharing my written and spoken word poems in addition to poems by other wonderful Poets both past and present. Word Play Wednesday is a weekly feature of written and spoken word poetry.
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