FRANCIS E. W. HARPER
A Real Success
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"So close is the bond between man and woman that you can not raise one without lifting the other. The world can not move ahead without woman's sharing in the movement, and to help give a right impetus to that movement is woman's highest privilege."-Francis E. W. Harper
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HARPER
The author
The first African-American women to publish a short story and co-founded the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs, Harper was a leading poet and writer. She was also an ardent activist in the abolitionist and women's rights movements. In 1845, Harper published her first collection of poetry, titled Forest Leaves. She moved to Ohio five years later to teach domestic skills, such as sewing, at Union Seminary. The school was run by leading abolitionist John Brown. Similar to the other women on this exhibit, Harper did something that was a first for women. Her short story Two Offers was the first short story published by an African-American. She is known for her works like Forest Leaves, Bury me in a Free Land, Iola Leroy, Sketches of a Southern Life, Two Offers, and others. Harpers works are still read today and she is considered impactful and is known for her writings as well as challenging the patriarchy put before her.
Popular Works by Harper
When Harper writes things like Sketches of a Southern Life and Bury Me in a Free Land, along with her other works, she is challenging the Patriarchy set in place. Sketches of a Southern Life is poems about slavery, the horrors and the challenges they face. There are exerts below:
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"Apparent failure may hold in its rough shell the germs of a success that will blossom in time, and bear fruit throughout eternity." -Francis E. W. Harper
Poems from Sketches of a Southern Life:
Aunt Chloe
I remember, well remember,
That dark and dreadful day,
When they whispered to me, "Chloe,
Your children's sold away!"
It seemed as if a bullet
Had shot through and through,
And I felt as if my heart-strings
Was breaking right in two.
And I says to cousin Milly,
"There must be some mistake:
Where's Mitus?" "In the great house crying-
Crying like her heart would break.
"And the lawyer's there with Mistus;
Says he's come to 'ministrate,
'Cause when masted died he just left
Heap of debt on the estate.
"And I thought'would do you good
To bid your boys good-bye-
To Kiss them both and shake their hands,
And have a hearty cry."
Bury Me in a Free Land
Make me a grave where'er you will,
In a lowly plain, or a lofty hill;
Make it among earth's humblest graves,
But not in a land where men are slaves.
I could not rest if around my grave
I heard the steps of a trembling slave;
His shadow above my silent tomb
Would make it a place of fearful gloom.
I could not rest if I heard the tread
Of a coffle gang to the shambles led,
And the mother's shriek of wild despair
Rise like a curse on the trembling air.
I could not sleep if I saw the lash
Drinking her blood at each fearful gash,
And I saw her babes torn from her breast,
Like trembling doves from their parent nest.
I'd shudder and start if I heard the bay
Of bloodhounds seizing their human prey,
And I heard the captive plead in vain
As they bound afresh his galling chain.
If I saw young girls from their mother's arms
Bartered and sold for their youthful charms,
My eye would flash with a mournful flame,
My death-paled cheek grow red with shame.
I would sleep, dear friends, where bloated might
Can rob no man of his dearest right;
My rest shall be calm in any grave
Where none can call his brother a slave.
I ask no monument, proud and high,
To arrest the gaze of the passers-by;
All that my yearning spirit craves,
Is bury me not in a land of slaves.