Louisa May Alcott: She Was Told To Write A Book For Girls. She Reluctantly Tried. The Rest is History.

Louisa May Alcott was 35 when she wrote the following journal entry - a prelude to the success (and fame) that was to come:

September 1867.

–Niles, partner of Roberts, asked me to write a girls' book. Said I'd try.

Louisa May Alcott (Nov. 29, 1832 - March 6, 1888)
Photograph dated around 1862,
when she was a Civil War nurse, at 30 years old.
source

My daughter and I just watched the 1994 film adaptation of Little Women for the umpteenth time, and it got me thinking about Louisa May Alcott and her own story...

Writing A Girls' Book
Mr. Niles later repeated his request, this time approaching her father...

May, 1868.

–Father saw Mr. Niles about a fairy book. Mr. N. wants a girls' story, and I begin "Little Women." Marmee, Anna, and May all approve my plan. So I plod away, though I don't enjoy this sort of thing. Never liked girls or knew many, except my sisters; but our queer plays and experiences may prove interesting, though I doubt it.

It only took her two months to write the first half, and Little Women (Part 1) was published in October, 1868.  It was an immediate success.

Like her protagonist Josephine "Jo" March, Louisa May Alcott was a bit of a tomboy, had a fiery temper, lived in poverty during the Civil War, and became a writer to earn money. But unlike Jo and the other March sisters, she never married.

Louisa's Journals and Letters about Little Women, Part II:  The "Wedding Marches"?

Oct. 30 1868.

-Mr. N. wants a second volume for spring. Pleasant notices and letters arrive, and much interest in my little women, who seem to find friends by their truth to life, as I hoped. 

A lot of young readers had their hearts set on Jo marrying Laurie. Read on...

November 1st.

–Began the second part of "Little Women." I can do a chapter a day, and in a month I mean to be done. A little success is so inspiring that I now find my "Marches" sober, nice people, and as I can launch into the future, my fancy has more play. Girls write to ask who the little women marry, as if that was the only end and aim of a woman's life. I won't marry Jo to Laurie to please any one.

Poor Laurie.
Reading Little Women as a young girl, I remember thinking, How could Jo have let Laurie go!?

I'm reminded of this every time I watch the film with Winona Ryder and Christian Bale.  Their chemistry is perfect, and the proposal scene is heart breaking!

If I'm honest with myself, I've not only never fully gotten over the fact that Laurie didn't end up with Jo, but that he ended up with her youngest sister, Amy.

Amy!  Who wore a clothespin on her nose every night. Who burned Jo's manuscript. Who broke Jo's heart by going off to Paris with Aunt March!

I think I was about eleven years old when I read Little Women for the first time. I just couldn't understand how stodgy Professor Bhaer - so old - was Jo's destiny, not Theodore "Laurie" Laurence, her charming "Teddy".

It seems that Louisa May Alcott created the character of Prof. Bhaer to appease her readers and her publisher.

But Jo's marriage to the Professor did make perfect plot sense with her plan to open a school for boys in the house left to her by Aunt March, something she may not have done if she had married Laurie. (Well you never know...I think they could have done it - after traveling all over Europe, of course!)

Because of the great success of Little Women, Louisa May Alcott quickly finished up Part II.  But what to title it?

I LOVE this archived letter that Louisa wrote to her publisher, Mr. Niles, regarding the title of the second half of her popular book...

Mr Niles,

     

     I can only think of the following titles. “Little Women Act Second”. “Leaving the Nest. Sequel to Little Women”.

     

     Either you like.  A jocose friend suggests “Wedding Marches” as there is so much pairing off, but I dont approve.

     

     Suggestions gratefully received.

yrs truly

L. M. A.

[source - Houghton Library Blog]

In 1869, the book was eventually published in America simply titled, Little Women Part Second, but in Britain it was given the endearing title, Good Wives.

Beginning in 1880, both parts have since been published as the single volume we know today, Little Women.

Read this interesting article "10 Things You May Not Know About Little Women" here, from MentalFloss; and more about Louisa May Alcott here, on Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute.

You can read the Journals and Letters of Louisa May Alcott,  here, on Project Gutenberg.

And I hope you've seen the 1994 film adaptation.  The music, casting, cinematography, costumes, and set design put you right in Louisa May Alcott's world and book.  The movie is as enjoyable as the novel!

MOST MEMORABLE LITERARY MOTHERS

Richer than I you can never be -- 

 I had a Mother who read to me.

-Strickland Gillilan (1869-1954)

My Top 10, in no particular order:

"Marmee" from Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)

Illustration by Jessie Wilcox Smith

"Money is a needful and precious thing--and when well used, a noble thing--but I never want you to think it is the first or only prize to strive for. I'd rather see you poor men's wives, if you were happy, beloved, contented, than queens on thrones, without self-respect and peace." 
-Marmee

Caroline Ingalls, "Ma", from the Little House books (Laura Ingalls Wilder)

Garth Williams, illustrator

Ma was trembling, and she began to laugh a little. “To think,” she said, “I’ve slapped a bear!”

Mrs. Darling, from Peter Pan (J.M. Barrie)

source

(Mrs. Darling was, after all an example to Wendy, who tried her best to be a Mother to the Lost Boys - telling them stories and making them take their medicine.)
Mrs. Darling first heard of Peter Pan when she was tidying up her children’s minds. It is the nightly custom of every good mother after her children are asleep to rummage in their minds and put things straight for next morning, repacking into their proper places the many articles that have wandered during the day. If you could keep awake (but of course you can’t) you would see your own mother doing this, and you would find it every interesting to watch her. It is quite like tidying up drawers. You would see her on her knees, I expect, lingering humorously over some of your contents, wondering where on earth you picked this thing up, making discoveries sweet and not so sweet, pressing this to her cheek as if it were as nice as a kitten, and hurriedly stowing that out of sight. When you wake in the morning, the naughtiness and evil passions with which you went to bed have been folded up small and placed at the bottom of your mind and on the top, beautifully aired, are spread out your prettier thoughts, ready for you to put on. 
-J.M. Barrie

The Mother Rabbit in The Runaway Bunny (Margaret Wise Brown)

Clement Hurd, illustrator

Once there was a little bunny who wanted to run away. 
So he said to his mother, "I am running away". 
"If you run away", said his mother, "I will run after you. For you are my little bunny".

The Missing Mother Bird from Are You My Mother? (P. D. Eastman)

"I must get something for my baby bird to eat!" she said.  "I'll be back."
The egg jumped and jumped...out came the baby bird! 
"Where is my mother?" he said...
"You are not my mother!  You are a SNORT!" 

(The baby bird, to our great relief, is finally reunited with his mother by end of the story!)

The Inuit Mother in Mama, Do You Love Me? (Barbara Joosee)

Illustrated by Barbara Lavallee

"Mama, do you love me?"  

"Yes, I do, Dear One."  

"How much?"

The Brave Mother in Heckedy Peg (Audrey Wood)

Illustration by Don Wood

The mother kissed her children good-bye and said, "Be careful, and remember -- don't let a stranger in and don't touch the fire."

(This story is about seven children named Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday; a witch who intrudes on the peace of their cottage; and a spell only the children's mother can break.)

Mrs.  Molly Weasley from the Harry Potter books (J. K. Rowling)

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Howler: (from Mrs. Weasley) "RONALD WEASLEY! HOW DARE YOU STEAL THAT CAR? I AM ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTED! YOU'RE FATHER'S NOW FACING AN INQUIRY AT WORK, AND IT'S ENTIRELY YOUR FAULT! IF YOU PUT ANOTHER "TOE" OUT OF LINE, WE'LL BRING YOU STRAIGHT HOME! And Ginny, dear, congratulations on making it into Gryffindor. Your Father and I are so proud." [From Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets]

And of course, we have to give honorable mention to Lily Potter - Harry's Mother - even though she has already died in the books...

“Your mother died to save you. If there is one thing Voldemort cannot understand, it is love. Love as powerful as your mother's for you leaves it's own mark. To have been loved so deeply, even though the person who loved us is gone, will give us some protection forever.”
-Dumbledore [From Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone]

Mrs. Murry from A Wrinkle In Time (Madeleine L'Engle)

"No, Meg. Don't hope it was a dream. 
I don't understand it any more than you do, but one thing I've learned is that you don't have to understand things for them to be."

"Mama" from Mama's Bank Account by Kathryn Forbes

Forbes was a radio scriptwriter before she began writing short stories. Mama's Bank Account, her most well-known work, was published in 1943 and revolved around the daily struggles and aspirations of a Norwegian family living in San Francisco in the 1910s.

Mama looked at me.  
"Is no account”, she said. “In all my life, I never been inside a bank.” 

And when I didn’t – couldn’t answer, Mama said earnestly: “Is not good for little ones to be afraid – to not feel secure.”

"HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!" and thanks to all my Facebook followers who posted their favorite literary Moms.

Here are a few more that I had to give "honorable mention" to:  Charlotte the Spider, from Charlotte's Web (E.B.White); Mrs. Rabbit - Peter Rabbit's mother (Beatrix Potter); Little Bear's Mother (Else Holmelund Minarik); Mama from All-of-a-Kind-of-Family (Sydney Taylor); Frances the Badger's Mother (Russell Hoban); Mrs. Moody from the Little Britches series (Ralph Moody); Max's mother from Where the Wild Things Are (Maurice Sendak); Critter's mother (Mercer Mayer); Betsy, Tacy, and Tib's moms (Maud Hart Lovelace); Mrs. Hamley from Wives and Daughters (Elizabeth Gaskell); Dowager Duchess of Denver - Lord Peter Wimsey's mother (Dorothy Sayers); Aunt Betsy Trotwood, who adopts David Copperfield (Charles Dickens); and of course Marilla Cuthbert, who adopts Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery).

One more adoptive "Mother" - Horton the Elephant from Horton Hatches the Egg (Maysie is probably one of the worst literary mothers!) and Horton Hears a Who (Dr. Seuss).

What about Mother Goose?  Go here.