FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102  
103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   >>   >|  
soul_. Thither came, also, Sarah Margaret Fuller, the most intellectual woman of her time in America, an eager student of Greek and German literature and an ardent seeker after the True, the Good, and the Beautiful. She threw herself into many causes--such as temperance and the higher education of women. Her brilliant conversation classes in Boston attracted many "minds" of her own sex. Subsequently, as literary editor of the _New York Tribune_, she furnished a wider public with reviews and book notices of great ability. She took part in the Brook Farm experiment, and she edited the _Dial_ for a time, contributing to it the papers afterward expanded into her most considerable book, _Woman in the Nineteenth Century_. In 1846 she went abroad, and at Rome took part in the revolutionary movement of Mazzini, having charge of one of the hospitals during the siege of the city by the French. In 1847 she married an impecunious Italian nobleman, the Marquis Ossoli. In 1850 the ship on which she was returning to America, with her husband and child, was wrecked on Fire Island beach and all three were lost. Margaret Fuller's collected writings are somewhat disappointing, being mainly of temporary interest. She lives less through her books than through the memoirs of her friends, Emerson, James Freeman Clarke, T. W. Higginson, and others who knew her as a personal influence. Her strenuous and rather overbearing individuality made an impression not altogether agreeable upon many of her contemporaries. Lowell introduced a caricature of her as "Miranda" into his _Fable for Critics_, and Hawthorne's caustic sketch of her, preserved in the biography written by his son, has given great offence to her admirers. "Such a determination to _eat_ this huge universe!" was Carlyle's characteristic comment on her appetite for knowledge and aspirations after perfection. To Concord also came Nathaniel Hawthorne, who took up his residence there first at the "Old Manse," and afterward at "The Wayside." Though naturally an idealist, he said that he came too late to Concord to fall decidedly under Emerson's influence. Of that he would have stood in little danger even had he come earlier. He appreciated the deep and subtle quality of Emerson's imagination, but his own shy genius always jealously guarded its independence and resented the too close approaches of an alien mind. Among the native disciples of Emerson at Concord the most notew
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102  
103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Emerson

 

Concord

 

Fuller

 

Margaret

 

Hawthorne

 

afterward

 

influence

 

America

 
offence
 

written


appetite

 

admirers

 
universe
 
Carlyle
 

characteristic

 

determination

 

comment

 

introduced

 

strenuous

 

overbearing


individuality
 

personal

 

Clarke

 
Higginson
 

impression

 

Critics

 

caustic

 

sketch

 

preserved

 

Miranda


caricature

 

agreeable

 

altogether

 
contemporaries
 

Lowell

 
biography
 

Though

 
imagination
 
quality
 

genius


subtle
 

earlier

 
appreciated
 

jealously

 

native

 

disciples

 

approaches

 

guarded

 
independence
 

resented