Finding Margaret Fuller: A Novel

Margaret Fuller was a well-known figure during her lifetime, so her absence from the pantheon of American literary greats is perplexing. Any survey course on American literature will undoubtedly include Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Herman Melville, Edgar Allan Poe, and Nathaniel Hawthorne as required reading. However, Fuller, who was fully embedded in the transcendentalist circle, typically isn’t even mentioned. Her book Woman in the Nineteenth Century launched the first wave of feminism in the US, yet she’s rarely credited with that achievement. After attending Fuller’s Conversations series, Elizabeth Cady Stanton was inspired to stage the Seneca Falls Convention of 1848, eventually attracting the support of Susan B. Anthony. These two women alone are usually considered the mothers of American feminism.

Allison Pataki’s Finding Margaret Fuller is a fictional account of Fuller’s life that seeks to raise her profile among contemporary readers. Pataki uses the genre of historical fiction rather than factual biography to tell the tale of Fuller’s life. In doing so, she takes some liberties that might color our understanding of her subject. Because Pataki wants to make Fuller relatable to modern readers, she renders her as a woman tragically longing for love in a culture that denies intellectual women that right. This characterization of Fuller is in some ways more consistent with depictions of emotionally vulnerable heroines in romance novels than with the “most well-read person in America” (22).

While Pataki describes Fuller’s fiery romance with Giovanni Ossoli, which culminated in their secret marriage, the reality of these star-crossed lovers was quite different. Rather than the handsome and dashing soldier of the Civic Guard, Ossoli was described by contemporaries as nondescript. The descendent of impoverished Italian nobility, he may also have been illiterate. Although Fuller and Ossoli traveled as a married couple for the sake of propriety during their voyage to the US, no record of a marriage certificate was ever found. Furthermore, a letter from Fuller’s mother suggests that she knew her daughter became pregnant and gave birth out of wedlock.

Pataki’s representation of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s second wife, Lidian, may also be at odds with historical fact. As the novel presents her, Lidian is a long-suffering domestic drudge who resents Fuller’s brilliance and fails to grasp her genius. In reality, Lidian was a formidable intellect in her own right. She was actively involved in the abolition of slavery, advocated for the rights of women and Indigenous Americans, and championed animal welfare. Despite her poor health throughout life, she remained a fervent social reformer and often contributed ideas to her husband’s work. While the novel portrays Fuller as Emerson’s muse, Lidian actually might have performed that role. It was Lidian who first introduced her husband to the works of Emanuel Swedenborg, whose philosophy had a great influence on Emerson’s work. However, the novel portrays Lidian as a jealous wife who doesn’t understand her husband.

Given that the book is a work of fiction, it’s understandable that Pataki would wish to populate Fuller’s love life with jealous spouses, love triangles, and dashing soldiers. However, she remains faithful to the general sequence of events in Fuller’s life. Given how little attention this luminary of first-wave feminism has received, any focus on her life and work is welcome.