Politics and legacy

From "My Heart is a Large Kingdom: Selected Letters of Margaret Fuller"

Be so good as not to speak of my intended work-- it is known only to a few persons. Precarious health, the pressure of many ties make me fearful of promising what I will do.-- I may die soon-- you may never more hear my name. But the earnest aspiration, the sympathy with greatness never dies-- Es lebt im Asche ["It lives in ashes."]--

Margaret Fuller, Letter to Anna Jameson, Dec. 22, 1837

Ms. Fuller wrote this to a pupil when she was only 27 years old. She is today considered to be one of the greatest American women of the 19th Century. She was a feminist, a very learned partner of the Transcendentalist community of letters; she corresponded with Emerson, Goethe and European political leaders. Margaret Fuller cultivated an independent spirit and had high aspirations for like women in a society where women were restricted to few professional enterprises. Fuller indeed lives today, widely read as an example of studied greatness.

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