Read The Adventures of Allegra Fullerton Online
Authors: Robert J. Begiebing
Hardscrabble BooksâFiction of New England
Laurie Alberts,
Lost Daughters
Laurie Alberts,
The Price of Land in Shelby
Thomas Bailey Aldrich,
The Story of a Bad Boy
Robert J. Begiebing,
The Adventures of Allegra Fullerton; Or, A Memoir of Startling and Amusing Episodes from Itinerant Life
Anne Bernays,
Professor Romeo
Chris Bohjalian,
Water Witches
Dona Brown,
A Tourist's New England: Travel Fiction, 1820â1920
Joseph Bruchac,
The Waters Between: A Novel of the Dawn Land
Joseph A. Citro,
Shadow Child
Sean Connolly,
A Great Place to Die
Dorothy Canfield Fisher (Mark J. Madigan, ed.),
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Joseph Freda,
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Castle Freeman, Jr.,
Judgment Hill
Frank Gaspar,
Leaving Pico
Ernest Hebert,
The Dogs of March
Ernest Hebert,
Live Free or Die
Sarah Orne Jewett (Sarah Way Sherman, ed.),
The Country of the Pointed Firs and Other Stories
Lisa MacFarlane, ed.,
This World Is Not Conclusion: Faith in Nineteenth-Century New England Fiction
Kit Reed,
J. Eden
Rowland E. Robinson (David Budbill, ed.),
Danvis Tales: Selected Stories
Roxana Robinson,
Summer Light
Rebecca Rule,
The Best Revenge: Short Stories
Theodore Weesner,
Novemberfest
W. D. Wetherell,
The Wisest Man in America
Edith Wharton (Barbara A. White, ed.),
Wharton's New England: Seven Stories and
Ethan Frome
Thomas Williams,
The Hair of Harold Roux
Also by Robert J. Begiebing
CÂ RÂ IÂ TÂ IÂ CÂ IÂ SÂ M:
Acts of Regeneration: Allegory and Archetype in the Works of Norman Mailer
(
1981
)
Toward a New Synthesis: John Fowles, John Gardner, and Norman Mailer
(
1989
)
The Literature of Nature: The British and American Traditions
(
1990
) (a critical anthology with V. Owen Grumbling)
FÂ IÂ CÂ TÂ IÂ OÂ N:
The Strange Death of Mistress Coffin
(
1991
)
The Adventures of Allegra Fullerton
Or, A Memoir of Startling and Amusing Episodes from Itinerant Life
a novel by
Robert J. Begiebing
University Press of New England
Hanover and London
UNIVERSITY PRESS OF NEW ENGLAND
publishes books under its own imprint and is the publisher for Brandeis University Press, Dartmouth College, Middlebury College Press, University of New Hampshire, Tufts University, and Wesleyan University Press.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Begiebing, Robert J., 1946â
The adventures of Allegra Fullerton; or, A memoir of startling and amusing episodes from itinerant life: a novel/by Robert J. Begiebing.
p. cm.â(Hardscrabble books)
ISBN
0â87451â947â0 (cloth: alk. paper)
ISBN
978â1â61168â374â5 (ebook)
I. Title. II. Title: Adventures of Allegra Fullerton.
III. Title: Memoir of startling and amusing episodes from itinerant life. IV. Series.
PS3552.E372A65
1999
813'.54âdc21 | 99â34280 |
Published by University Press of New England, Hanover, NH
03755
©
1999
by Robert J. Begiebing
All rights reserved
For my daughters,
Brie and Kate,
the two other painting
women in my life.
I recollect bestowing some vituperation on female authors lately. ⦠Generally, they write like emasculated men, and are only to be distinguished from male authors by greater feebleness and folly; but when they throw off the restraints of decency, and come before the public stark naked, as it wereâthen their books are sure to possess character and value. Can you tell me anything about this “Fanny Fern”? If you meet her, I wish you would tell her how much I admire her.
âNathaniel Hawthorne to William Ticknor
Writing is worthless except as the record of a life.
âMargaret Fuller
Contents
Acknowledgments
1Â Â
The onset of my captivity
2Â Â
How I became an itinerant painter
3Â Â
First enterprises
The persecution of a bearded man
5Â Â
Recherché dramas
6Â Â
Little Effie again, and women who discovered independence
7Â Â
Boston and my associations with artists
This strange captivity begins
8Â Â
A mysterious opportunity for liberty
9Â Â
Eden in Massachusetts
Et in Arcadia ego
10Â Â
Precious reunion
11Â Â
Doubts and quandaries
12Â Â
A murderous instance
13Â Â
A Canterbury tale from our retreat to Connecticut
14Â Â
To Springfield and beyond
Mr. Stock tells a curious tale
15Â Â
Far travels and new resolutions
16Â Â
Temptation in the shape of a man
17Â Â
My return
18Â Â
Chas returns to me
19Â Â
My italian adventure
20Â Â
Our Pelasgian Arcady
21Â Â
The rival
22Â Â
Mr. Ruskin terminates his visit
23Â Â
Miss Fuller embraces Italy
24Â Â
My leave-taking
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank the New Hampshire Council on the Arts and the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Fund's Fellowship for Creative and Performing Artists and Writers at the American Antiquarian Society for their financial support for research and travel. I thank the
Staatliche Antikensammlugen und Glyptothek Muchen
for permission to use the photo by H. Koppermann.
My thanks also for the help and honesty of the following friends and readers: Robert Craven, Merle Drown, Bob Hoddeson, Larry Kinsman, Loftus Jestin, Moira Sieker, and Wesley McNair. I also owe a debt of gratitude to the many helpful professionals at the American Antiquarian Societyâwith special thanks to Georgia Barnhill, Joanne Chaison, Thomas Knoles, Caroline Sloat, and Laura Wasowicz. And Dick Pantano, Library Director at New Hampshire College, helped (auf Duetsch) with a particularly difficult permission.
Many books, articles, periodicals, and manuscripts provided grist for my fictional mills, but no one working on the subject of itinerant painters in the early years of the Republic could avoid two books especially: Clara Sears's ground-breaking
Some American Primitives: A Study of New England Faces and Folk Portraits
(1941) and Caroline Sloat's
Meet Your Neighbors: New England Portraits, Painters, & Society, 1790â1850
(1992). Both texts provided the basis for several characters and incidents along Allegra's journey; I am deeply grateful to the work of these two authors.
And my deepest gratitude to my wife, Lindaâthe first and last of my readers.
R. J. B.