The Trials of Phillis Wheatley by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

In this book, which Professor Gates developed from a lecture he gave, Gates looks at the critical reception of Phillis Wheatley from her own day (both her trial in front of eighteen of Boston's most upstanding citizens, who concluded that she did write her own poetry and Thomas Jefferson's disparaging assessment of her work) to the present. I appreciated both the reading of Wheatley's poetry and the placement of Wheatley in a larger cultural context. Also, because the book is based on a lecture, it was a quick read.