Toward a Female Genealogy of Transcendentalism

513 Pages·2014·2.966 MB·English

by  Jana Argersinger, Phyllis Cole (eds.)

toward a
Female Genealogy
of Transcendentalism
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toward a
Female Genealogy
of
Transcendentalism
edited by
Jana L. Argersinger
and Phyllis Cole
The University of Georgia Press
athens and london
© 2014 by the University of Georgia Press
Athens, Georgia 30602
www .ugapress .org
All rights reserved
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Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Toward a female genealogy of transcendentalism /
edited by Jana L. Argersinger and Phyllis Cole.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978- 0- 8203- 4339- 6 (hardcover : alk. paper) —
isbn 0- 8203- 4339- 0 (hardcover : alk. paper) —
isbn 978- 0- 8203- 4677- 9 (pbk. : alk. paper) —
isbn 0- 8203- 4677- 2 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. American literature—19th century—History and criticism.
2. American essays—Women authors—History and criticism.
3. Transcendentalism in literature. 4. Women and literature—United States—
History—19th century. 5. Transcendentalism (New England)
I. Argersinger, Jana L., 1957– editor of compilation.
II. Cole, Phyllis, editor of compilation.
ps217.t7.t69 2014
810.9'384—dc23
2014001808
British Library Cataloging- in- Publication Data available
ISBNfordigitaledition:978-0-8203-4697-7
all contributors
join in dedicating
this collection
to the memory of
Charlie Argersinger
1951‒2013.
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Contents
List of Primary Interludes ix
Acknowledgments xi
List of Abbreviations for Frequently Cited Texts xiii
Phyllis Cole, with Jana Argersinger Introduction 5
section 1
Early Voices, Origins, Influences
Noelle A. Baker “Let me do nothing smale”:
Mary Moody Emerson and Women’s “Talking” Manuscripts 35
Ivonne M. García “With the Eyes That Are Given Me”:
Early Transcendentalism and Feminist Colonial Poetics in
Sophia Peabody’s Cuba Journal 59
Carol Strauss Sotiropoulos Fuller, Goethe, Bettine:
Cultural Transfer and Imagined German Womanhood 81
Gary Williams What Did Margaret Think of George? 105
Phyllis Cole Elizabeth Peabody in the Nineteenth Century:
Autobiographical Perspectives 131
section 2
Transcendentalist Circles
Sarah Ann Wider “How It All Lies before Me To- day”:
Transcendentalist Women’s Journeys into Attention 157
Sterling F. Delano “We have abolished domestic servitude”:
Women and Work at Brook Farm 179
vii
viii contents
Jeffrey Steele Sentimental Transcendentalism and
Political Affect: Child and Fuller in New York 207
Monika Elbert (S)exchanges: Julia Ward Howe’s
The Hermaphrodite and the Gender Dialectics of Transcendentalism 229
section 3
Wider Circles of Vision and Action
Daniel S. Malachuk Green Exaltadas: Margaret Fuller,
Transcendentalist Conservationism, and Antebellum Women’s
Nature Writing 253
Eric Gardner “Each Atomic Part”: Edmonia Goodelle Highgate’s
African American Transcendentalism 277
Helen R. Deese Caroline Healey Dall and the American
Social Science Movement 303
Dorri Beam Transcendental Erotics, Same- Sex Desire,
and Ethel’s Love- Life 327
section 4
Late Voices and Legacies
Mary De Jong Required to “Speak”: Caroline Healey Dall and
the Defense of Margaret Fuller 353
Susan M. Stone “A Woman’s Place”: The Transcendental Realism
of Mary Wilkins Freeman 377
Katherine Adams Black Exaltadas: Race, Reform,
and Spectacular Womanhood after Fuller 399
Laura Dassow Walls The Cosmopolitan Project of
Louisa May Alcott 423
Selected Bibliography 447
Contributors 467
Index 471
Primary Interludes
1 Lydia Maria Child, from Letter 13, in Letters from New York, Second Series
(New York: C. S. Francis, 1845), 125–30.
33 Eliza Clapp, from “Spirit,” in Studies in Religion (New York: C. Shepard,
1845), 9–10.
57 Sophia Peabody, from “Letters from Cuba” (Cuba Journal), 3:10–11,
journal MS in 3 volumes, Sophia Peabody Hawthorne papers, Berg
Collection of English and American Literature, New York Public
Library, Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundations.
79 Karoline von Günderode, “Apocalyptical Fragment,” from Die
Günderode, by Bettina von Arnim, trans. Margaret Fuller (Boston: E. P.
Peabody, 1842), 14–16.
103 George Sand, from Spiridion (London: Charles Fox, 1842), 225–26.
129 Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, from “A Vision,” Pioneer 1 (March 1843): 97.
155 Ellen Sturgis Hooper, untitled poem (“I walk the busy street”), in Poems
(published privately [Edward William Hooper, 1872]), in The Tappan
Papers, bMS Am 1221, call no. AC8.H7663.872p, MH- H.
177 Sarah Helen Whitman, from “Emerson’s Essays, by a Disciple,” United
States Magazine and Democratic Review 16 (June 1845): 600.
203 Margaret Fuller, from “The Liberty Bell,” in The Liberty Bell, by Friends of
Freedom, ed. Maria Weston Chapman (Boston: Anti- Slavery Fair, 1846),
80–88.
227 Elizabeth Oakes Smith, from Bertha and Lily; or, the Parsonage of Beech
Glen (New York: Phillips, Sampson, 1854), 282–83.
251 Eliza W. Farnham, from the preface to Life in Prairie Land (New York:
Harper Brothers, 1846), iii–vii.
273 From The Journals of Charlotte Forten Grimké, ed. Brenda Stevenson, in
The Schomburg Library of Nineteenth- Century Black Women Writers
(New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1988), 113, 154, 174–75, 181–82, 229–30.
301 Elizabeth Bancroft, from Letters from England, 1846–49 (London: Smith,
Elder, 1904), 26–28, 85–88, 169–70.
ix