Printer's Fist

Melissa Range is the author of Scriptorium, winner of the 2015 National Poetry Series competition, and Horse and Rider, a finalist for the Kate Tufts Discovery Prize. Her recent poems have appeared in Ecotone, The Hopkins Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Nation, and Ploughshares. Range has received awards and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rona Jaffe Foundation, the American Antiquarian Society, the Fine Arts Work Center, and MacDowell. Originally from East Tennessee, she teaches creative writing and American literature at Lawrence University in Wisconsin.

• To the PublicJunoRighteousness Exalteth a NationIn the Years Before the Antislavery Societies FormedFort MoseFrom the SubscriberIndex: Gabriel’s ConspiracyThomas Branagan Sends His Poem The PenitentialTyrant to Thomas JeffersonThe Gradualists WaitWilliam Lloyd Garrison Apprentices as a Printer’s Devil at the Newburyport HeraldWinny v. Whitesides, Decided for the PlaintiffAt Denmark Vesey’s ChurchOur Country Is the World—Our Countrymen Are All MankindBenjamin Lundy Relocates the Genius of Universal EmancipationJohn B. Russwurm, Editor of Freedom’s Journal, Reverses his PositionDavid Walker’s Appeal to the Coloured Citizens of the World Goes SouthAngelina Grimké Ruins Her ClothesAnother Southern Manumission Society DisbandsJames Forten, Sailmaker, Sends William Lloyd Garrison Twenty-Seven Paid Subscriptions for the First Issue of the LiberatorElizabeth Margaret Chandler Passes on DessertGarrison Issues the Call in the LiberatorLiberty is the Word for Me—Above All, LibertyNoyes AcademyJames G. Birney, Editor of the Philanthropist, is Fairly Egged Off the GroundThe Philadelphia Female Antislavery Society’s Third Annual Petition DriveThe House of Representatives Passes the “Gag Rule”Reverend Elijah P. Lovejoy, Editor of the Alton ObserverSarah Louisa Forten Does Not Speak from the ArchivesAbby Kelley Lectures Against Slavery in a One-Room SchoolhouseThe Grimké Sisters at Work on American Slavery As It IsThe American Antislavery Society Splits after Abby Kelley is Elected to the Business Committee Right Is of No Sex—Truth Is of No ColorCome-OutersAfter the Split, The National Antislavery Standard Publishes Its First IssueBlack Women Split OffJulia Williams Garnet Collaborates with Reverend Henry Highland Garnet on an Address to the Slaves of the United States of AmericaThe National Colored Convention Subcommittee Votes 19-18 Not to Endorse An Address to the Slaves of the United States of AmericaFrederick Douglass Publishes the First Issue of the North StarBlack and White Women Continue Working TogetherPreparations for Another Antislavery Bazaar ContinueMinutesWithout Concealment, Without CompromiseMinty, MosesWilliam Wells Brown Performs from The Antislavery HarpCottonocracyThe Train from MaconPublic Opinion Shifts After the Passing of the Fugitive Slave LawClementine Averill Writes to Senator Jeremiah ClemensHarriet Beecher Stowe Writes Chapter Nine of Uncle Tom’s CabinMary Ann Shadd Advocates Emigration in Notes of Canada WestFrederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison Officially SplitNo Union with SlaveholdersWilliam Still, General Vigilance Committee Secretary, Takes NotesMartin R. Delany Writes in to Frederick Douglass’ Paper about Uncle Tom’s CabinFourth of July with the Massachusetts Antislavery SocietyColporteurFrances Ellen Watkins Lodges Two Weeks with Mary BrownTo the Slave PowerEnter the Wide-Awakes“Written by Herself” (I)Devoted to the Rights of All MankindJohn Greenleaf Whittier Argues with Himself about the Use of ForceFirst SouthHarriet Jacobs Writes in to the Liberator about the Condition of the Freed PeopleSpecial Edition: Lincoln’s Proclamation of EmancipationBlack Teachers Mobilize, All Parts SouthQuartermaster Sergeant James H. Payne, 27th U.S.C.T., Ohio, Writes in to the Christian RecorderGeorge Moses Horton, PoetLevy Done Places an “Information Wanted” Ad in the Colored Tennessean“Written by Herself” (II)For the Abolitionist DeadNotes

“I celebrate Range’s meticulously researched reverie on abolitionist history, woven with the passion of an artist deeply attuned to the power of language. Each superb poem contemplates and amplifies the resilience and humanity of those who fought for freedom. In lines that stitch together archival fragments and lyric vision, this writing ‘proof[s] a seam’ that joins history, justice, and memory.”—Kiki Petrosino, author of White Blood: A Lyric of Virginia