1820—
Letter to Amelia Greenwood
read
“Have you finished Delphine?”
Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. I. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983.
Author
Germaine de Staël(1766–1817)
Germaine de Staël is documented in Fuller’s letters, books, published essays, journals, reading notebooks, and manuscripts (1820–1846). 6 distinct works are named, most often in Letter to Susan Prescott, and the most intensive engagement recorded is “translated”.
- Engagement
- TranslatedExcerptedAnalyzedQuotedReadMentioned
- Present in
- Letters · Books · Essays · Journals · Notebooks · Manuscripts
- Documented
- 1820–1846
Additional passages preserved in the Memoirs (1852)
Totals count documented engagements, once at the earliest witness. How we count →
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 →
Confirmed reading
Passages where the evidence goes beyond allusion to indicate that Fuller had Germaine de Staël’s work in hand — an explicit statement of reading, sustained excerpting or translation, or a specific reading episode recorded by those who knew her.
- Dated
- 1826Corinne / Delphine / De l'AllemagneAttested
“I am studying Madame de Stael, Epictetus, Milton, Racine, and Castilian ballads, with great delight.”
Letters of Margaret Fuller ed. Hudspeth · Cambridge, 14 May 1826
MERGED 2026-10-11: absorbed duplicate witness(es) re41 (Mem-2 Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli (sections), Mem-2-01 l.2186-2188, letter dated May 14 1826; tier A; same passage); re39 (Mem-3 Reminiscences of Edna Cheney, p.199; tier C; same passage) — counted once here. Explicit first-person statement 'I am studying Madame de Stael...with great delight'.
- 1831De l'AllemagneAttested
“I read a quantity of Allemagne in town but could not find Werner.”
Letters of Margaret Fuller ed. Hudspeth · Tuesday eveg[11 October 1831]
"I read a quantity of Allemagne in town" is an explicit reading statement.
- 1836Work not namedAttested
“I have, for the time, laid aside De Stael and Bacon, for Martineau and Southey.”
Letters of Margaret Fuller ed. Hudspeth · 1836
Explicit 'I have, for the time, laid aside De Stael and Bacon' documents active prior reading.
In Fuller’s words
“Passion, when we contemplate it through the medium of imagination, is like a ray of light transmitted through a prism; we can calmly and with undazzled eye, study its complicate nature and analyze its variety of tints but passion brought home to us in reality, through our own feelings and experience, is like the same ray transmitted through a lens _ blinding, burning, consuming, where it falls”
When Fuller engaged with Germaine de Staël
This page brings together documented engagements currently identified within the Fuller Reading Worlds catalog.
Staël in Fuller’s reading world
Documentary evidence
Selected passages from Fuller’s own writings, in chronological order.
1826—
Reading Notebook 1825–1827
p. 119excerpted · quoted · readSearch Digital Fuller (page unverified)
“Il faut encore plus veiller sur soi quand on loue, que / quand on blâme, si l'on veut se faire honneur en / defendant ses amis … Toutes les fois qu'on mêle un calcul à une action / honnête, le calcul ne remplit pas." / De Stael._”
Fuller, Margaret. "Reading Notebook 1825–1827." Houghton Library, Harvard University.
Fuller attributes a French passage to 'De Stael' but gives no specific work title. Attributed 'De Stael.' at the end. The specific work by De Staël is not identified; possible sources include De l'influence des passions (1796), De la littérature (1800), or Corinne (1807). Confidence PROBABLE (author certain, work not identified).
1826—
Letter to Susan Prescott
p154analyzed · read
“I am studying Madame de Stael, Epictetus, Milton, Racine, and Castilian ballads, with great delight.”
Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. I. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983.
1827—
Letter to Susan Prescott
p154analyzed · read
“Miss Francis and I think of reading Locke, as introductory to a course of English metaphysics, and then De Stael on Locke's system.”
Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. I. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983.
Inferred Fuller writes of reading "De Stael on Locke's system"; Hudspeth identified this specifically as the section "De la philosophie angloise" in book 2, part 3, chapter 2 of De l'Allemagne, which discusses Locke's empiricism.
1831—
Letter to James F. Clarke
p182analyzed · read2 selected passages
“I read a quantity of Allemagne in town but could not find Werner.”
Fuller writes "I read a quantity of Allemagne in town"; Hudspeth identified this as Madame de Staël's De l'Allemagne, her influential survey of German culture, literature, and philosophy, and note she was looking for material on Werner within it.
“I should not like Delphine now-”
Fuller states "I should not like Delphine now," implying she has previously read the novel but would not enjoy it given her current critical response to passionate self-abandonment; Hudspeth identified the work as Madame de Staël's Delphine and confirm the novel was published in 1802.
Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. VI. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1988.
1834—
Fragmentary Reading Notes and Autobiographical Reflections
p1“Passion, when we contemplate it through the medium of imagination, is like a ray of light transmitted through a prism; we can calmly and with undazzled eye, study its complicate nature and analyze its variety of tints but passion brought home to us in reality, through our own feelings and experience, is like the same ray transmitted through a lens _ blinding, burning, consuming, where it falls”
Inferred Fuller quotes this passage at length and attributes it to de Staël (abbreviated as 'Mad. The passage on passion-through-imagination is characteristic of de Staël's treatise on the passions (Lausanne, 1796). Fuller immediately contrasts de Staël's view with Byron's.
Fuller quotes this passage at length and attributes it to de Staël (abbreviated as 'Mad.
“Me de Staël, à moi, approaches the truth in her remarks on the nature of Tasso's imagination Corinne 2d vol's.”
Fuller, Margaret. "Fragmentary Reading Notes and Autobiographical Reflections." Houghton Library, Harvard University.
1836—
Letter to Unknown
p242read
“I have, for the time, laid aside De Stael and Bacon, for Martineau and Southey.”
Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. I. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983.
1836—
Journal December 1836
p7–8mentionedManuscript page
“Seemed to know little of Jacobi except from Me de Stael.”
Fuller, Margaret. "Journal December 1836." Houghton Library, Harvard University; MS Am 1086; Box 3.
Inferred De l'Allemagne (1813) is unambiguously identified by context: it is the work in which Mme de Staël surveys German Romantic philosophy including Jacobi at length (Part II, Ch.
1839—
Letter to Unidentified
p97analyzed · read
“I never had the feeling I dreaded, of display, of a paid Corinne.”
Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. II. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1984.
1842—
Journal Fragments, 1842
p43mentioned
“There is no picture except one of De Recamier herself as Corinne, this is absurd. … You imagine her to have been reading one of De Stael's books.”
Fuller, Margaret. "Journal Fragments, 1842." Margaret Fuller Family Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard University.
1845—
Woman in the Nineteenth Century
p83analyzed · quoted · read2 selected passages
“De Stael's name was not so clear of offence; the woman in the thought; she could not forget while she was instructing you as a mind, she wished to be admired as a woman”
“Madame Necker is the cousin of Madame de Stael, and has taken from her works the motto prefixed to this. "Cette vie n'a quelque prix que si elle sert a' l'education morale de notre coeur.”
Quoted motto 'Cette vie n'a quelque prix que si elle sert a l'education morale de notre coeur' attributed to Madame de Staël; prefixed to Necker de Saussure's book. The motto is attributed to de Staël by Necker; Fuller repeats this attribution. Exact source within de Staël's works not identified.
Fuller, Margaret. Woman in the Nineteenth Century. New York: Greeley & McElrath, 1845.
1845—
Review.
“Review.”mentioned
“Madame de Stael was not wrong in receiving a high delight from the mere cadence of verses that she did not understand.”
Fuller, Margaret. "Review." New-York Daily Tribune, 21 January 1845. · 21 January 1845
Preserved in the Memoirs (1852)
Passages surviving only in the posthumous Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, compiled by Emerson, Channing, and Clarke.
1852—
Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli
p142analyzed · read4 selected passages
“I should not like Delphine now.”
Inferred This entry identifies Germaine de Staël's 1802 epistolary novel Delphine, a work Margaret Fuller likely encountered earlier in her life.
The context, which contrasts fictional ardor with the real-life passionate letters of Mme de Lespinasse, strongly supports the attribution to de Staël’s influential novel.
“In a passionate love-struggle she wrestled thus with the genius of De Staël, of Rousseau, of Alfieri, of Petrarch.”
Inferred Fuller's passionate engagement with de Staël's work, identified here through inference as likely being De l'Allemagne and/or Corinne, is situated within her broader engagement with key figures of European literature.
“Madame De Stael, though not deep, is tasteful.”
Inferred This entry addresses an unnamed work by Germaine de Staël, likely Corinne or De l'Allemagne.
“never had the feeling I dreaded, of display, of a paid Corinne.”
Inferred In this passage, Margaret Fuller references Germaine de Staël's seminal novel Corinne, ou l'Italie (1807). The heroine, Corinne, served as a potent cultural touchstone for educated women of Fuller's era, embodying the image of a brilliant female artist performing for an audience.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, William Henry Channing, and James Freeman Clarke, eds. Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli. 2 vols. Boston: Phillips, Sampson and Company, 1852.