The Magnetism of a Photograph: Daguerreotypy and Margaret Fuller's Conceptions of Gender and Sexuality

François Pascal Simon Gérard, artist, Porträt der Madame Récamier (1805). Oil on canvas, 225 cm x 145 cm. Musée Carnavalet. PD-Art.

In early March 1845, Margaret Fuller received a letter from her friend Caroline Sturgis that ranged over a number of subjects: gossip about their acquaintances, Sturgis's thoughts on mesmerism, and her ambivalent responses toward Fuller's just published text, Woman in the Nineteenth Century. Along with the letter, Sturgis sent Fuller a daguerreotype portrait of their mutual friend Anna Loring.¹ Whatever Fuller's feelings about Sturgis's letter, she was charmed by the portrait, writing to Sturgis: "With Anna's picture I am delighted. . . . It will be a cause of true happiness to have it."² Fuller was living in New York City at the time, away from her family and friends, and working for Horace Greeley at the Tribune. She had brought some daguerreotypes with her to New York but seldom mentions them in her letters. For about three months, however, her correspondence keeps coming back to the portrait of Anna. To her brother Richard she writes, "[It] is one of my dearest companions" (L, 4:64); to Anna herself she writes: "The picture of you is very precious to me. I look at it often; it is a loved companion" (L, 4:66).

The daguerreotype of Anna Loring cast a kind of spell on Fuller. A small group of Fuller's friends, including Emerson, Sturgis, and Lydia Maria Child, were likewise charmed and wanted the portrait for themselves. Fuller kept it in her room among her most treasured possessions, which included a little crucifix, a drawing by Sam Ward (with whom Fuller had been

F. de Villain, artist, Emilia Plater. PD-Art.

in love), and a picture of the Countess Emily Plater, one of the heroines of Woman in the Nineteenth Century (L, 4:127). Yet for all that she cherished the daguerreotype, Fuller was not especially intimate with Anna. Rather than writing to Anna herself, for instance, she instructs her brother Richard, "Give my love to Anna Loring, say I want her to write to me one of these beautiful days: tell her I look at her picture often; it lies near me in my delightful chamber" (L, 4:119). Nor did the portrait inspire communication with its subject. Instead, as Fuller confides to Richard: "Last night I thought of writing Anna L. the promised note, but did not feel like it, so read a German book instead. I take great pleasure in the Daguerreotype they have sent me of her . . . and some night, when I have been looking at it, I shall write" (L, 4:64). These comments suggest that, far from calling up a longing for Anna, the portrait was a perfectly adequate companion for Fuller, giving her pleasure in its own right while not interfering with such favorite activities as reading German books.

Fuller and Loring were certainly friends, but if the letters are any indication, the daguerreotype drew Fuller more than did the woman herself. Fuller writes to Anna: "It surprizes me to find how much I love you. I was not aware how much when I used to see you often, but your image comes up before me oftener than that of almost any other person" (L, 4:66). By triggering these thoughts, the portrait exerts an effect on Fuller that exceeds the power of Anna's presence. Whether this effect arises from the way Loring looks in the image, her pose, the composition of the image, or something else is impossible to say with certainty. For all of Fuller's rhapsodizing about the portrait, she comments neither on its appearance nor on Loring's, and if the portrait still exists, I have not been able to locate it.³

In order to understand the magnetism—the possible eroticism—of the daguerreotype portrait of Anna Loring, this essay examines the ways in...