Bibliofreakblog

Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women (DVD)

I had no idea just how much Little Women was based on Louisa May Alcott’s own life before watching this.  Actually, the things I knew about Louisa May Alcott included: her father was a transcendentalist & she grew up hanging out with Emerson and Thoreau; she was a tomboy who had sisters.  That’s about it.

So I learned a great deal in this little documentary, which was based on the book of the same title.  

I feel a little bit like I cheated, watching the movie and not reading the book, but it did give me a good run down of her life.

Here are a few of the things that I learned:

*There may be spoilers for those who have not read Little Women*

• Not only was Jo based largely on Louisa May Alcott, but the others were based on her sisters.
• Little Women was published in two parts.  After the first part, readers really wanted to see Jo and Teddy get married, but Alcott wanted her to stay single.  She compromised by created the Professor and having Amy marry Teddy.
• Alcott volunteered as a nurse during the Civil War, but not long into it she got really sick.  She had life-long health trouble that she blamed on the calomel they gave her for typhoid.
• Her health problems were probably due to Lupus, not the calomel.
• Her sister really did die of scarlet fever, just like Beth.
• She went to Europe, more or less by herself, when she was in her 30’s.  There she hung around with a young Polish guy, who was the inspiration for Teddy.  He wanted to marry her, but she thought he was too young for her.
• She wrote many stories under a pseudonym, that were meant for mass consumption, not literary value.

There’s probably more, but that’s what I remember offhand.