Delphi Complete Works of Jupiter Hammon

by Jupiter Hammon, Delphi Classics (editor)

The first published African American poet, Jupiter Hammon was born into slavery in 1711 on Long Island, New York. Over the years he became a well-respected preacher and clerk-bookkeeper, as his poems were circulated widely. His poetry is composed in hymn stanzas and is noted for its rhythmic and passionate expression. In later years, attending the 1786 inaugural meeting of the African Society in New York, he delivered ‘An Address to Negros in the State of New-York’ — his most influential work. Only in more recent times have critics started to recognise Hammon’s important contribution to the development of black American literature. The Delphi Poets Series offers readers the works of literature’s finest poets, with superior formatting. For the first time in digital publishing, this volume presents Hammon’s complete works, with related illustrations and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1)

* Beautifully illustrated with images relating to Hammon’s life and works
* Concise introduction to Hammon’s life and poetry
* Rare recently discovered poems
* Images of how the poetry was first printed, giving your eReader a taste of the original texts
* Excellent formatting of the poems
* Includes Hammon’s complete prose — with rare essays digitised here for the first time
* A brief biography — discover Jupiter Hammon’s world
* Ordering of texts into chronological order and genres



The Life and Poetry of Jupiter Hammon
Brief Jupiter Hammon
An Evening Thought (1760)
Dear Hutchinson is Dead and Gone (1770)
An Address to Miss Phillis Wheatley (1778)
A Poem for Children with Thoughts on Death (1782)
A Dialogue, Entitled, the Kind Master and the Dutiful Servant (1783)
An Essay on Slavery (1786)

The Prose
A Winter Piece (1782)
An Evening’s Improvement (1783)
An Address to the Negroes in the State of New-York (1786)

The Biography
The Negro’s Heritage of Song (1923) by Robert Thomas Kerlin

200 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 11, 2024

About the author

Jupiter Hammon was born October 17, 1711, a slave of Henry Lloyd of Lloyd’s Manor (Queens Village), Long Island, New York. His 88-line poem “An Evening’s Thought: Salvation by Christ, with Penitential Cries,” was published at Hartford, Connecticut, and dated “December 25, 1760,” making it the first poem published by an American of African descent. He published a total of nine pieces of verse and prose, all of a pietistic Christian nature. After the death of Henry Lloyd in 1763, he became the property of John Lloyd, Jr., and accompanied him to Stamford and Hartford, Connecticut, during the Revolutionary War to escape the British occupation of Long Island. His “An Address to Miss Phillis Wheatly” was issued in Hartford, dated August 4, 1778. His Address to the Negroes in the State of New-York, published in New York City in 1787, was reprinted the same year in Philadelphia and again in New York in 1806. The date of his death is uncertain: the latest recorded mention of him is in 1790, and he was deceased at the time of the 1806 reissue of the Address.