美国英语听力80篇3 Lesson52
Phillis Wheatley (A)
The girl who became known as Phillis Wheatley was born about 1753 in Senegal, Africa.
She was kidnapped and brought to the New England colonies in North America on a ship that carried slaves.
The ship's name was Phillis.
The girl was between seven and eight years old.
She was weak and sickly.
So her price was not very high.
She was sold in a Slave market in the city of Boston, Massachusetts in August, 1761.
John Wheattey, an international Businessman,bought her to serve his wife, Susannah.
Phillis came from a culture that was very different from that of The Wheatleys.
She found the food, customs and beliefs to be new and strange.
The other slaves in the house taught her many things about America.
Phillis quickly learned the rules of slavery.
She learned that Slaves could not beat drums because slave owners
feared that secret messages were being passed to slaves on other farms.
She learned that in southern states it was a crime to teach a slave to read and (write).
In northern states in the 1700s, black slaves were treated better than they were in the southern states.
Restrictions against the education of slaves were not as severe as they were in the south.
Many of the slaves in New England were even urged to learn to read, especially the Bible,
the major book of the Christian religion.
Many people thought that slaves should read the Bible so they could become better believers of the Christian religion.
In New England, blacks were free to meet with each other in groups,
Many times male slaves were accepted as members of the Community for special projects.
These included gatherings to clean corn or to build a farmhouse.
Female slaves cooked for the groups.
From her earliest days as a slave, Phillis was a happy,busy person.
She liked to keep busy.
She especially liked to do things with her hands.
She quickly learned how to clean around the Wheatley house and how to dry the dishes.
But her mind seemed to move even faster than her hands.
She wanted to do everything.
Phillis's new family had unusual beliefs for the times.
John Wheatley and his wife were educated people.
Susannah Wheatley believed that all human beings, including African slaves, could learn if given the chance.
She believed that all people, of any skin color, should love and respect each other.
She treated Phillis more as a daughter than as a slave.
Mrs. Wheatley said, "You're my black child. You're my Phillis."
Susannah Wheatley soon recognized Phillis's intelligence and desire to learn.
Mrs. Wheatley observed how Phillis loved books and the care she took with them.
At times, Phillis would smell the pages of the Books and hold them close to her.
One day, one of the slaves in the Wheatley home found Phillis writing on the wall of Mrs.Wheatley's room with a piece of coal.
Phillis had been cleaning the dust from a book.
She decided to copy the letters from the cover of the book.
The slave brought Mrs.Wheatley to inspect the marks on the wall.
But Susannah Wheatley did not get angry.
Instead,she smiled.
Mrs.Wheatley gave Phillis a pencil and paper and a little table on which to write.
She showed the writing on the wall to her daughter Mary.
Mary was as surprised as her mother at how well Phillis had copied the letters.
Mary told Phillis she would teach her to write--on paper, not on walls.
Mary Wheatley began to teach Phillis to read and write English,She also taught Phillis the Christian religion.
Phillis learned quickly.
She learned the English alphabet in a few weeks.
In a year and one-half after she arrived in America,Phillis could read English.
And she could read and understand difficult parts of the Bible.
Phillis loved to learn new words.
She enjoyed the new feelings that went with the sounds.
She especially liked writing and creating new ways of saying things.
Mary taught Phillis about writings from other countries.
America was a young nation.
It had not yet produced writers and poets like older nations.
So Phillis studied the writings of EuroPean Writers.
She read the work of the Greek poet Homer,
the English poets Keats and Pope and the plays and poetry of Shakespeare.
She read and re-read the Bible.
Phillis was about twelve years old when she began to write poetry.
One of her earliest poems was about her religious faith.
It questioned how a person could not believe in God.
"Thou who dost daily feel his hand, and rod.
Darest thou deny the essence of a God!
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