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[115] d [Journal Comments on Fuller in 1851 and 1852] Caroline Healey Dall [3 February 1851] In the evening I went to Mr Alcott’s with quite a large party. As a discussion of “Margaret Fuller” or of “Woman” it was entirely a failure but it was a fine talk. Mr. [Thomas Wentworth] Higginson of Newburyport, Ralph Emerson, and Miss Hunt were there in addition to the usual company. There were some facts stated about the severity of her early training, the wonderful character of her mind. Mr. Alcott said she was no New England woman—she might as well have been born in Greece or Rome. Greece and Rome were wherever she was. He spoke of the great ability of the letters to the Tribune. Anna Parsons spoke of the great power of love in her, to which Mr List objected the cutting severity of remark to which those who attended her conversations were exposed. He attributed this to her self-love. I objected to this expression. I did not think it right to assume a reason for it. I had heard her speak to others when the tears came to my eyes, and my throat swelled at the bitterness of her words. But she had been long an invalid, suffered intensely, and it seemed to me that half of her irritation was physical whenever it occurred. Mr Alcott thought there was no doubt she was born under Scorpio, but she knew it, and strove to conquer it—She had confessed to having been a very unamiable child. Ednah [Dow Cheney] said that she had attended her last three winters’ conversations, that in them all, but one instance of such severity, and for that she immediately Here, Dall describes one of Bronson Alcott’s Conversations. Unlike Fuller’s Conversations, where she did hold forth herself a good deal but still involved the group in a socratic dialogue, Alcott generally monologued until a brave participant interrupted him. Perhaps Alcott was more willing to share the stage here because so many audience members knew Fuller personally. Dall’s second journal entry recalls her reaction to reading Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli. Here, as elsewhere in her writings, it is clear how much Dall identifies herself and her trials with Fuller’s own life and actions. fuller in her own time [116] and amply apologized. I said I felt that she would become capable of that, but she was not when I knew her. General conversation occurred on the subject of woman. Higginson spoke of Margaret’s great intellectual activity . I spoke of her want of serenity, said what I had hoped from the influence of marriage and motherhood on her—Mr Alcott believed that she became nobler after it. The news of her marriage was a surprise to her friends but they were soon resigned to it. She was always more feminine, than he had expected to find her. At moments—she was the ideal Woman. Mr Emerson had with him a daguerreotype taken from a picture, made after her marriage, which answered all my questions.1 The love and serenity in it were—beautiful. It is an admirable likeness and yet I have never seen her look so. . . . I wish Mr Emerson had said what he thought of Margaret. I want to know that she had warmth and geniality. Perhaps however he thought our (frivolous conversation) filagree hardly fit to set a jewel in. The gentle men seemed unwilling to talk about Margaret. Mrs [Abigail] Alcott came and thanked me for the help I had given Mr. A. He had felt it deeply—I had done what no one but Margaret Fuller had ever before done. My eyes filled with tears—for in truth Margaret’s death was a private grief to me, and there is no American woman that stands near her. Others followed Mrs Alcott’s example after the conversation was over. Mr Alcott said that Margaret could carry a title well. It belonged to her, she was born a queen—Victoria wherever she went. The failure of this conversation was owing in part to the fact, that gentlemen seemed unwilling to criticize a woman—and women could not do her justice alone. . . . [20 March 1852] In Margaret Fuller’s Autobiography [that is, the Memoirs ] I see my own life renewed. . . . Neither of us appears to have had natural childhood. Her father and mine were alike impatient, and we were both injured, by the imperative demand for...

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