Margaret Fuller: A Powerful Public Voice - Part One
Over the next few weeks, I look forward to sharing excerpts with youfrom the display I just created on Margaret Fuller for her bicentennialcelebration in 2010. What an inspiring woman she was. Fuller thoughtbig, acted big, and changed the world -- all before she died in ashipwreck at the age of 40. Hers is a compelling story. Please read on,and enjoy!
Excerpted from the Margaret Fuller Bicentennial display, written and designed by Bonnie Hurd Smith.
Introduction
Author, editor, journalist, literary critic, educator, friend of theTranscendentalists, social commentator, women's rights advocate, andpolitical revolutionary, Margaret Fuller left an indelible mark onWestern civilization during her short forty years.
Today we consider Margaret Fuller one of the guiding lights of thefirst wave of feminism. She helped educate the women of her day byleading a series of Conversations in which she empowered women to read,think, and discuss important issues of the day. She influencedgenerations to follow through her classroom teaching, groundbreakingwritings, especially her landmark book Woman in the Nineteenth Century,and through her personal example of independence and courage.
Fuller's bold public voice began to emerge in New England, but in herwork for the New-York Tribune, which she transplanted to Europe,Fuller's calls for liberty and equality for all people internationallyestablished her as a transcontinental literary ambassador.
Among her accomplishments:
• First American to write a book about equality for women
• First woman foreign correspondent and first woman war correspondent
to serve under combat conditions
• First woman journalist for Horace Greeley's New-York Tribune, and first
woman literary editor of a major American newspaper
• First editor of the Dial, the Transcendentalist journal, making her the first
woman in America to edit an intellectual publication
• First woman literary critic who also set literary standards for American writers
• First woman to enter the Harvard College library to pursue research
Margaret Fuller matters because her all-encompassing, inspiring, andstill unrealized vision--aimed at the future--challenges us to continueher work and honor her legacy.
Quote:
From Woman in the Nineteenth Century:
"If you ask me what office women may fill; I will reply--any. I do notcare what case you put; let them be sea-captains if you will ... Wewould have every arbitrary barrier thrown down. We would have everypath laid open to woman as freely as to man ... Can we wonder that manyreformers think that measures are not likely to be taken in behalf ofwomen, unless their wishes could be publicly represented by women?"
Excerpted from the Margaret Fuller Bicentennial display, written and designed by Bonnie Hurd Smith.
Introduction
Author, editor, journalist, literary critic, educator, friend of theTranscendentalists, social commentator, women's rights advocate, andpolitical revolutionary, Margaret Fuller left an indelible mark onWestern civilization during her short forty years.
Today we consider Margaret Fuller one of the guiding lights of thefirst wave of feminism. She helped educate the women of her day byleading a series of Conversations in which she empowered women to read,think, and discuss important issues of the day. She influencedgenerations to follow through her classroom teaching, groundbreakingwritings, especially her landmark book Woman in the Nineteenth Century,and through her personal example of independence and courage.
Fuller's bold public voice began to emerge in New England, but in herwork for the New-York Tribune, which she transplanted to Europe,Fuller's calls for liberty and equality for all people internationallyestablished her as a transcontinental literary ambassador.
Among her accomplishments:
• First American to write a book about equality for women
• First woman foreign correspondent and first woman war correspondent
to serve under combat conditions
• First woman journalist for Horace Greeley's New-York Tribune, and first
woman literary editor of a major American newspaper
• First editor of the Dial, the Transcendentalist journal, making her the first
woman in America to edit an intellectual publication
• First woman literary critic who also set literary standards for American writers
• First woman to enter the Harvard College library to pursue research
Margaret Fuller matters because her all-encompassing, inspiring, andstill unrealized vision--aimed at the future--challenges us to continueher work and honor her legacy.
Quote:
From Woman in the Nineteenth Century:
"If you ask me what office women may fill; I will reply--any. I do notcare what case you put; let them be sea-captains if you will ... Wewould have every arbitrary barrier thrown down. We would have everypath laid open to woman as freely as to man ... Can we wonder that manyreformers think that measures are not likely to be taken in behalf ofwomen, unless their wishes could be publicly represented by women?"
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