{
 "id": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper/learning-to-read",
 "title": "Learning to Read",
 "poet": "Frances Ellen Watkins Harper",
 "poet_slug": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Sketches of Southern Life",
 "book_slug": "sketches-of-southern-life",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 4,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1872,
  "venue": "Sketches of Southern Life (1872)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/frances-ellen-watkins-harper_sketches-of-southern-life-1872",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69249"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/frances-ellen-watkins-harper_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://scalar.lehigh.edu/african-american-poetry-a-digital-anthology/frances-ew-harper-poems-on-miscellaneous-subjects-1857",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsonmiscellan00harp",
   "https://scalar.lehigh.edu/african-american-poetry-a-digital-anthology/frances-ew-harper-poems-1871",
   "https://archive.org/details/poems01harp",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69249",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/007491600",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69248",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100774124",
   "https://scalar.lehigh.edu/african-american-poetry-a-digital-anthology/frances-ew-harper-poems-full-text-1895",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100488369",
   "https://scalar.lehigh.edu/african-american-poetry-a-digital-anthology/frances-ew-harper-idylls-of-the-bible-1901",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100319488",
   "https://archive.org/details/historyofafrican00payn",
   "https://archive.org/details/WeeklyAngloAfricanI",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_liberator_1858-05-14_28_20",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000500702",
   "https://archive.org/details/undergroundrailr00stil",
   "https://archive.org/details/frances-ellen-watkins-harper_sketches-of-southern-life-1872",
   "https://archive.org/details/25th-annual-report-of-the-board-of-managers-of-the-home-etc",
   "https://archive.org/details/frances-ellen-watkins-harper_light-beyond-the-darkness",
   "https://archive.org/details/ame-church-review-1900-04"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 44,
  "n_stanzas": 11,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 39,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Very soon the Yankee teachers",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Came down and set up school;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But, oh! how the Rebs did hate it⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It was agin’ their rule.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Our masters always tried to hide",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Book learning from our eyes;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Knowledge didn’t agree with slavery⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "’Twould make us all too wise.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "But some of us would try to steal",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A little from the book,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And put the words together,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And learn by hook or crook.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I remember Uncle Caldwell,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who took pot-liquor fat",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And greased the pages of his book,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And hid it in his hat.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And had his master ever seen",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The leaves upon his head,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "He’d have thought them greasy papers,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But nothing to be read.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And there was Mr. Turner’s Ben,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who heard the children spell,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And picked the words right up by heart,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And learned to read ’em well.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Well, the Northern folks kept sending",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Yankee teachers down;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And they stood right up and helped us,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though Rebs did sneer and frown.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And, I longed to read my Bible,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For precious words it said;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But when I begun to learn it,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Folks just shook their heads,",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And said there is no use trying,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Oh! Chloe, you’re too late;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But as I was rising sixty,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I had no time to wait.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So I got a pair of glasses,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And straight to work I went,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And never stopped till I could read",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The hymns and Testament.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then I got a little cabin",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A place to call my own⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And I felt as independent",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As the queen upon her throne.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}