Margaret Fuller was America’s first true feminist. She was also a social reformer, critic, and teacher whose words enriched the lives of many people. Margaret received a good classical education, which was very unusual for a young girl at that time.
As an adult, Margaret Fuller worked as a teacher, and felt the need to give public lectures. As there were local laws against women giving public addresses, she billed her lectures as ‘conversations’, and in 1839, at the age of 29, began offering them at a bookshop in Boston. For two years, in the early 1840’s, Fuller was the editor of, the magazine ‘The Dial’. It was in the pages of The Dial that she published one of her significant early feminist works, ‘The Great Lawsuit: Man vs. Men, Woman vs. Women’.
Margaret later became a book reviewer and correspondent for the New York Tribune. She worked for the Tribune from 1844 to 1846, often writing about reformist ideas such as improving conditions in prisons. In 1846, she became the first female foreign correspondent in America. Fuller published several books, and edited a magazine before dying tragically at the age of 40. Her writings and the conduct of her life served as an inspiration to later advocates for women’s rights, for she was a feminist at a time when the role of women in society was severely limited.
