orig. Anne Dudley
born 0441; 1612, Northampton, Northhamptonshire?, Eng.
died Sept. 16, 1672, Andover, Massachusetts Bay Colony
English-born American poet, one of the first poets of the American colonies.
At age 18 she sailed from England with her husband, her parents, and other Puritans to settle on Massachusetts Bay. She wrote many of her poems while rearing eight children. Without her knowledge, her brother-in-law took her poems to England, where they were published in 1650. She won critical acceptance in the 20th century, particularly for "Contemplations," a sequence of religious poems first published in the mid 19th century. Her prose works include "Meditations," a collection of aphorisms.