i think that the world that susanna and john wheatley played makes it more possible for us to do that. i hope that answers you. others? yes. >> poetry question. [laughter] what do you like about wheatley's poetry? what do we have to gain by studying wheatley as a poet? i happen to be a wheatley fan. prof. lewis: her work is kind of prismatic in the sense that different ages have interpreted her differently. some ages have said, oh my god, she wasn't black -- all that religion stuff, alexander pope and all of that classic stuff, where is the blackness in that? she totally divorced herself from her roots. other generations have said, you have to look below the surface. her times were such that she had to conform to the times. one of the things that really struck me about phillis and her poetry is how politically adept she was. it was like she was creating this pecan, a nut with a shell that was perfectly conformed to the times, but had a different meat inside. i truly appreciate her ability to continuing herself in relation to what she understood as the politics of then. but as time mov