"The animating influences of Discord": Margaret Fuller in 1844

Abstract

On 20 December 1844, readers the New York Tribune, engaged by the usual miscellany a newspaper--an article on prison reform by Lydia Maria Child, news anti-slavery activities in Kentucky, and notices about lectures and amusements--would have also noticed two items, appearing side by side in columns on page two. In column appears an indignant letter from Ralph Waldo Emerson protesting what he saw as the Tribune's inadequate coverage Massachusetts Judge Samuel Hoar's expulsion from South Carolina. Hoar, an emissary sent by the Massachusetts government, had failed in his efforts to lobby the South Carolina legislature to stop the practice imprisoning free black sailors aboard ships from Massachusetts and then selling them into slavery. Emerson and others from Massachusetts were incensed by Hoar's treatment in South Carolina and unhappy with the initial coverage in the Tribune. In the next column appears Margaret Fuller's enthusiastic review the New York performance Niagara by the popular Norwegian violinist and composer, Ole Bornemann Bull, then completing a tour the United States. The juxtaposition the two columns is a suggestive moment in the histories the intellectual lives both Emerson and Fuller and raises important questions about their emerging and differing interests in social reform. Emerson, the scholar writing from his home in Concord, was deeply committed to self-reliance and suspicious reform movements. Here he publicly supports organized protest and offers a spirited defense Hoar, whom he perceived as taking heroic action against a slave state. Fuller, in her new position as an editor for the New-York Tribune, was on the verge embracing the social causes that would become her central concern in both New York and Europe. At this moment, however, she is deeply involved in writing a series articles on literature and culture. What professional experiences Fuller's in 1844 shaped the writing this and other articles? What does her correspondence, especially with Emerson, reveal about her intellectual concerns during the year? In this essay, I argue that Fuller's primary preoccupation during this crucial year in her life was in defining the proper role the scholar in a society in need reform. In her journal, her letters to Emerson and others and eventually in her articles for the New-York Tribune, Fuller tests a variety propositions and positions that pave the way for the sophisticated social critic she would eventually--but not immediately--become. A study her journal, letters, and articles during this year also reveals new insights into the vexed question when and how Fuller became interested in the most pressing reform issue the day: abolition. THE ESPECIAL IMPORTANCE OF 1844 Scholars have increasingly regarded the year 1844 as a transformative moment for Fuller, often seeing it as an annus mirabilis, a time spiritual and conversion, as well as a time deep personal disappointment about the men in her life. (1) Jeffrey Steele, for example, sees the late spring 1844 as a crisis for Fuller in terms her life as a woman. That three the important women in her life gave birth, he suggests, reminded her of the personal expense the unconventional lifestyle she had chosen for (170). In addition, 1844 marked the end the most intense years the friendship between Fuller and Emerson; afterwards, she and Emerson would see another less and exchange far fewer letters. At the same time, Fuller clearly gloried in many aspects her life, especially in her freedom as she contemplated the difficulties a number the marriages her friends and especially that her sister. Fuller herself noted in her journal for 1844 that she felt this time her life was one especial importance (J 56). (2) In our efforts, however, to mark particular moments in Fuller's life as pivotal and especially to respond to the recent push to convert her swiftly from Transcendentalist to sophisticated social critic, scholars may be smoothing over the complexities and fluctuations Fuller's intellectual development, especially during this important year. …