Phillis Wheatley Passes Examination by Eighteen Boston Scholars

Before her book can be published in London, Phillis Wheatley is examined by a panel of 18 prominent Boston men — including John Hancock and the governor's lieutenant — to verify that an enslaved girl actually authored the poems. She passes the examination. The attestation published in her 1773 book is itself a document of both her genius and her society's disbelief.