Redheaded Reviews: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Set during and in the years after the Civil War, this novel depicts four strong young women who grow up to become productive adults. There is Meg, the oldest who is sixteen and concerned with propriety and hopes to marry a rich husband in order to afford to fine things her family used to have when they were in better circumstances. Then there is Jo, who is fifteen and a tomboy who is the writer of the family and dreams of becoming a famous author and providing a good life for her family with the money from her writings. Then there is sweet Beth who is fourteen who is the musician of the family and plays the piano and sings beautifully. Then there is Amy who is twelve who is an artist who dreams of becoming famous for her art and wants to belong to high society and marry a rich man one day if her art does not make her rich.

For the first half of the book, the Civil War rages and their father is off acting as a chaplain to the troops. Their mother, or Marmee, takes care of them with help from the servant Hannah. Meg has a job as a governess that she hates and Jo spends her time keeping the rich Aunt March company which is a trial in and of itself. Beth helps out at home and does school work there and Amy for a while goes to school, but can't handle the teasing and eventually after a particular incident of discipline involving the teacher they pull her from school and have her home taught.

Laurie, or as Jo calls him, Teddy, is Mr. Lawerence's grandson and their neighbor. He is sixteen and very rich and very lonely and soon the five of them become close friends with Jo and Laurie becoming especially close as they have a lot in common. They have adventures and spats as when Amy burns Jo's book that she is writing when Jo and Meg don't let her go with them and Laurie to a theatre program one day. Jo refuses to forgive Amy until something drastic happens.

Then they get the telegram that their father is ill and their mother leaves immediately to go to Washington D.C. to be with him to nurse him back to health. Mr. Brooks, Laurie's tutor goes with her. While there he asks if he can marry Meg when he has enough money to support them and they agree but he has to wait three years and Meg, of course, has to agree. Meanwhile, Beth has taken ill and is dying and might not make it.

The second half of the book is taken up with Meg's married life and marrying off everyone else. I would be very happy if the book ended in the first half, which is how it originally ended. The second half tends to tick me off as none of it goes the way I think it should. I should add that I hate Amy as a character. She is shallow and vain and cares about what other people think too much. I'm not too wild about Meg either. She is so concerned with propriety and wants fine things above all else sometimes. No one could help but love Beth who has a self-esteem problem and is chronically shy but oh so good. But the character we are supposed to love and which I do is Jo. She is full of life and fun and love. For those that don't want to be preached at, and be preached at I mean given life lessons, this book does a little bit much of it, but it can be forgiven because the writing is good and the story is good. Towards the end, I began to skim when they began to moralize the most. Overall I recommend this book because it is a classic and worth reading to make up your own mind about it. Maybe you'll like the ending that I hate so much.

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