Author
Michel de Montaigne is documented in Fuller’s letters (1850). One work is named, all in Letter to Ralph Waldo Emerson, and the most intensive engagement recorded is “mentioned”.
Additional passages preserved in the Memoirs (1852)
Reprints, Memoirs passages, and repeat notes within a single manuscript are shown but never counted twice. Evidence for this author is selective, not exhaustive. Methodology →
This page brings together documented engagements currently identified within the Fuller Reading Worlds catalog.
Selected passages from Fuller’s own writings, in chronological order.
“When you send this way, will you let me have the vol of Montaigne in which he speaks of his friend”
Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. VI. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1988.
Passages surviving only in the posthumous Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, compiled by Emerson, Channing, and Clarke.
“Margaret was struck with the singular fineness of his perceptions...”
Inferred Margaret Fuller engaged deeply with Michel de Montaigne's Essais, finding resonance with his "singular fineness of his perceptions." Her enjoyment of his works, described by Emerson as almost an "equal ground" reception, placed him alongside esteemed literary figures like Homer, Dante, and Goethe, suggesting her profound appreciation for Montaigne's introspective and philosophical insights.
“These witty Frenchmen, Rabelais, Montaigne, Molière, are great as were their marshals and preux chevaliers”
Inferred Margaret Fuller places Michel de Montaigne alongside Rabelais and Molière, characterizing them as "witty Frenchmen." This grouping suggests Fuller engaged with Montaigne's essays, recognizing his significant contribution to French literature and wit, a sentiment echoed in her appreciation for the era's intellectual figures.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, William Henry Channing, and James Freeman Clarke, eds. Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli. 2 vols. Boston: Phillips, Sampson and Company, 1852.