Louisa May Alcott
--the “good daughter”--
and Little Women
LMA at 25
Abba Alcott
• Abolition of slavery
• Women’s rights
• Critic of fashion
extremes
Both Parents:
Social responsibility
Non-material values
Christian compassion
Self-sacrifice
Bronson
Alcott
• Transcendentalism
• Fruitlands
• Educational Reform
•The Pilgrim’s Progress
Abba Alcott: Abolitionist
• How does this issue enter Little Women?
Abba Alcott:
Advocate of Women’s Independence
• Women at work
How viewed in Little Women?
• Restrictive gender
expectations
– Lady-like appearance and
behavior
Jo’s “burden” transformed
– Wifely duty
Meg: the new wife
– The “house-band”
Abba Alcott:
Critic of Ostentatious Fashion
Abba republished John Owen’s
The Fashionable World Displayed
Extreme Fashion:
• Enforces social inequities
• Uses exploitive
manufacture
– sweat shops
– cotton: slaves
• Promotes egotism and selfindulgence
Silk afternoon dress, 1868-78
New Year’s Eve Ball
(Ch. 3)
• Marches disapprove
of vain fashion
• But without some
show, the family
would have no social
presence
• Good breeding not
enough
Winona Ryder in Little Women 1994
Meg and Fashion
• Meg’s Wedding?
• The “violet silk”?
Cinoline period silks, 1863-67
Bronson Alcott:
Transcendental Philosopher
• Nature (including
people) is rooted in
God
• People can know
God through
nature and intuition
• Self-reliance,
compassion, selfsacrifice
Asher B. Durand’s Kindred Spirits 1849
Bronson Alcott:
Educational Reformer
• Education should draw
out of the child his innate
nobility and wisdom
“My father taught in the wise way which
unfolds what lies in the child's nature, as
a flower blooms, rather than crammed it,
like a Strasbourg goose, with more than
it could digest.” LMA
Where is Bronson Alcott’s educational
philosophy strongly reflected in LW?
Fruitlands
“The entrance to paradise is still through the strait and narrow
gate of self-denial” Bronson Alcott
• Experimental commune 1840s
• Dress code:
– simple work clothes
– non-exploitive manufacture
• no cotton, wool, or silk
•
•
•
•
Vegan diet (fruit-lands)
No animal labor or provision (manure, honey)
No trade with outer world; no surpluses
Failed: insufficient crops without animals; some
members failed to perform equal labor
“Experiments” (Ch. 11)
• “You may try your experiment for a week, and see
how you like it. I think by Saturday night you will
find that . . .” (LW 109)
• What did the girls try and what did they learn?
• How did their “utopian
community” compare to
Fruitlands?
The Pilgrim’s Progress
(Bronson Alcott’s Favorite Book)
• The Pilgrim’s Progress from This World to That
Which Is to Come: Delivered Under the Similitude
of a Dream (1675)
• John Bunyan (1628-1688): poor,
uneducated tinker
• Imprisoned 12 years/1 year
as unlicensed Nonconformist
preacher
• Wrote PP during 2nd prison term
The Pilgrim’s Progress Opening
“As I walked through the
wilderness of this world,
I lighted on a certain
place where was a Den,
and I laid me down in
that place to sleep; and,
as I slept, I dreamed a
dream. I dreamed, and
behold I saw a man
clothed with rags . . . a
book in his hand, and a
great burden upon his
back . . . As he read, he
wept, and trembled . . .
saying, ‘What shall I
do?’”
Christian’s Journey
William Blake’s illustration of Christian
• Christian, instructed by the
Evangelist, sets out for the
Celestial City to escape
destruction of world.
• Bogs down in the Slough of
Despond; pulled out by
Help
• Visits the House Beautiful,
the Valley of Humiliation,
Doubting Castle, Vanity Fair
(show of worldliness,
materialism, feasting, etc.)
How does Little Women reflect the
structure and themes of The Pilgrim’s
Progress?
Mrs. March’s Proposal
“Do you remember how you used to play Pilgrim’s Progress
when you were little? Nothing delighted you more than to
have me tie my piece-bags on your backs for burdens, give
you hats and sticks, and rolls of paper, and let you travel
through the house from the cellar, which was the City of
Destruction, up, up, to the house-top, where you had all the
lovely things you could collect to make a Celestial City. . . .
Now, my little pilgrims, suppose you begin again, not in
play, but in earnest, and see how far on you can get before
father comes home” (10-11)
Burdens
“I think too much of my
• Meg’s burden
try to be . . .
• Jo’s “I’ll
burden
looks and hate to work”
a ‘little woman,’ not rough and wild.”
“Mine is dishes and dusters, and envying girls with
• Beth’s burden
nice pianos, and being afraid of people.”
“I am a selfish pig!”
• Amy’s burden
Beth Finds
the Palace Beautiful
• “The very big house did prove a Palace Beautiful,
though it took some time for all to get in, and Beth
found it hard to pass the lions. Old Mr.Lawrence was
the biggest one. . . . The other lion was the fact that
they were poor and Laurie rich “ (Little Women
58)
• “Fear not the lions, for they are chained, and are placed there
for trial of faith where it is, and for discovery of those that have
none: keep in the midst of the path, and no hurt shall come unto
thee.” (The Pilgrim’s Progress, part I, stage 3)
• What courageous things does Beth do in this chapter?
Amy’s Valley of Humiliation
“I should not have chosen that way
of mending a fault . . . But I’m not
sure that it won’t do you more
good than a milder method. You
are getting to be altogether too
conceited and important, my dear,
and it is quite time you set about
correcting it” (Little Women 70).
What had happened?
Jo Meets Apollyon
The Destroyer; -- a name used (Rev. ix. 11) for the angel of the bottomless
pit, variant of the Hebrew Abaddon.
“’You don’t know; you
can’t guess how bad
it is! I get so savage,
I could hurt any one,
and enjoy it” (LW 79)
What had happened?
Christian Defeats Apollyon, Illustration in
The New Amplified Pilgrim’s Progress
Meg Goes to Vanity Fair
• Belle Moffat’s soiree
• How does Med dress?
• How does she behave?
Champagne, flirting, silly talk:
“I’m not Meg tonight; I’m ‘a doll,’ who
does all sorts of crazy things. Tomorrow I shall put away my ‘fuss and
feathers,’ and be desperately good
again” (LW 94)
Part I
and
Part II
Female-centered world (1
male pro-visionally
admitted) where “burdens”
are tackled and
“Progress” achieved.
Men are incorporated in a strictly non-patriarchal
arrangement with males exhibiting the nurturing
behavior conventionally
reserved for women in
“separate spheres” society.
A New Vision of the Family
“Don’t shut your husband out of the
nursery, but teach him how to help in it.
His place is there as well as yours, and
the children need him . . . That is the
secret of our home happiness. [Father]
does not let business wean him from
the little cares and duties that affect us
all. . . . Each do our part alone in many
things, but at home we work together,
always” (392)
Graphics Acknowledgements
• www.louisamayalcott.org
• William Blake’s illustration of Christian:
http://library.uncg.edu/depts/speccoll/exhibits/Blake/pilgrims_progress.ht
ml
• apollyon: www.orionsgate.org
• vanity fair: www.thebaptistpage.com
• Fruitlands: www.esoteric.msu.edu/Tours/Alcott.html
• Durand’s Kindred Spiris: www.artchive.com
• movie stills: www.erasofelegance.com/littlewomenphotos.html and
www.romanticmovies.about.com
• www.costumes.org/history
• Bunyan, Allegorist: www.wmcarey.edu/carey/portraits
• Violet silk dress:
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/barnard/theater/kirkland/3136/Crinoline%20
Gallery/pages/07.1865.1.htm
• Victorian schoolchildren: www.pembschool.org/uk