Negro's Complaint and Other Poems

William Cowper was an English poet and Anglican hymn writer. He was a forerunner of the Romantic movement in English poetry and strongly influenced the writing of nature poems. His work was admired by Coleridge, Wordsworth and Anne Bronte among others. Cowper was a strong supporter of the campaign for the abolition of slavery and wrote his most famous poem "The Negro's Complaint" to try to raise people's awareness of the horrors and injustices of the system.