Episode 03: Transcendentalists: Replace Emerson, Thoreau & Whitman with Frances E.W. Harper, Sojourner Truth & Margaret Fuller
The white men (Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman) credited with all things Transcendental and who also fancied their white-as-hell selves being ‘abolitionist heroes’ for doing the bare minimum of ‘supporting the cause’ are, as usual, not the primary nor most important point of study of what was truly going on in 19th century America. Join us in the realm of reality and fact with these glorious ladies, actual abolitionists and their more accurate, visceral works of Abolition and Transcendentalism. Spoiler: Not one of these women took time off work to lounge around and navel-gaze in a tiny house on borrowed land and then act all serene and self-congratulatory about it, as they were too busy saving lives and changing the world. Okay, Ladies:
Frances E.W. Harper * Complete Poems of Frances E.W. Harper * Lola Leroy
Sojourner Truth * On Women’s Rights * Narrative of Sojourner Truth
Margaret Fuller * Women in the Nineteenth Century * The Essential Margaret Fuller
Additional Sources
Johanna Ortner * Commonplace: The Journal of early American Life * Lost No More: Recovering Francis Ellen Walker Harper’s Forest Leaves
Sharon Presely, PHD. Sojourner Truth
The Sojourner Truth Project thesoujournertruthproject.com
Wiki We Love You
Goodreads