Blogrolling Margaret Fuller

[chanaleh]

So, as previously noted, I'm in one more play this summer: The Margaret Ghost, about the 19th-century feminist, journalist, social organizer, and Transcendentalist, not to mention Cambridge native, Margaret Fuller. (Performances: June 17-20 in Belmont, MA. Order tickets now. :-)

theatreatfirst originally did this play back in 2006, but 2010 is the bicentennial of Margaret's birth (in fact this past Sunday, May 23, was her actual birthday), so the Margaret Fuller Bicentennial Committee came to theatreatfirst saying, "Wouldn't you like to revive this production for us as part of the bicentennial?" Well, sure, says we, and thus all 9 of the original cast members are reprising their roles this June!

Prior to this play, I had, as it happens, only ever heard of Margaret from the Margaret Fuller Neighborhood House -- her ancestral home, right across Central Square from where I used to live -- because there's a food pantry there at which I volunteered for some years. [waves to Jess, my old volunteering buddy!]

From Wicked Local (Cambridge): "Buried twice: Rediscovering Cambridge icon Margaret Fuller"
http://www.wickedlocal.com/cambridge/news/x1070015810/Guest-commentary-Buried-twice-Rediscovering-Cambridge-icon-Margaret-Fuller

From this Sunday's Globe: "A writer, thinker, and trailblazer"
http://www.boston.com/yourtown/cambridge/articles/2010/05/24/a_writer_thinker_and_trailblazer/?page=full

Other dramatizations of Margaret's life include a reenactment by local character actress Jessa Piaia, and the play Charm, by Utah playwright Kathleen Cahill, which was recently premiered in Salt Lake City.

The Bicentennial festivities also include a number of exhibits and a monthly series of "Conversations" ("modeled after the “Conversations” that Margaret Fuller offered for women (and later men) in Boston in the late 1830’s and early 1840’s").

Amusingly, Victorian Trading Co. is selling a "Margaret Fuller Coat"?? Note that the body copy carefully does not say that it is actually modeled on anything Margaret personally owned or wore. >:-)
http://www.victoriantradingco.com/store/catalogimages/1a/i156552X.html

And: Never before published, the script of The Margaret Ghost is now available in a limited, commemorative edition in honor of the Bicentennial. This beautiful trade paperback (designed by gilana!) includes an Introduction by our director and an Afterword by the playwright.
http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/the-margaret-ghost/10969781

Shortly after the last production closed, I found a book called Emerson among the Eccentrics: A Group Portrait, which talked a fair bit about the various relationships among our motley cast of characters, including Margaret and the Hawthornes. I eventually gave this to my dad, who is very interested in Transcendentalism (more Thoreau, but still), and he LOVED it.

Incidentally, I'm playing Sophia Peabody Hawthorne, wife of Nathaniel. I'm reading a book that desireearmfeldt lent me months ago, Megan Marshall's The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism. It's interesting reading (for instance, Sophia was the invalid of the family, suffering debilitating headaches -- likely due to having been dosed medicinally with mercury in early childhood!). But I think I'm going to have to do some serious contemplating in order to integrate any of it into my sense of the character. I will try to write something more about this in the coming weeks for the TMG Producer's Blog!

I think I might also need to read The Blithedale Romance, just for authenticity. It figures significantly into one of my 2 scenes. :-)