Little Women

Happy Halloween! Today’s topic isn’t about tricks or treats, nor is it about ghosts and goblins.  I know, you thought it would be about my eating all of the Halloween candy before today came.  Amazingly, I haven’t.  Instead, I want to share with you some thoughts on the latest book I’ve read.

I read vociferously as a child, and although my family wasn’t rich, they regularly took me to the library, bought me Scholastic Books from school, and enrolled me in various book clubs such as The Story of . . ., We Were There . . ., Best in Children’s Books, and so on.  I have vivid memories of it all.  I could walk into that old library and pick up a copy of Little House on the Prairie from the bottom shelf of the beautiful built-in dark wooden bookcase on the right just inside the children’s section.  I can feel the excitement of receiving the Scholastic Books flyer, reading the synopsis of each offering, and checking off those books I had most interest in.  And, I can still see myself ripping into the cardboard packaging of the new book that had arrived in that day’s mail and plopping down in my dad’s chair by the fireplace that had the best reading light. 

It was through one of the book clubs, the “Junior Deluxe Editions,” that I became familiar with Louisa May Alcott’s work--Jack and Jill, Little Men, Under the Lilacs, and Little Women.  Little Women, inspired by Alcott’s own family, fascinated me most, not only because of the story, but because one of the characters had “my name,” Beth.  That was a rare event.  At the time, it didn’t matter to me that the Beth character was the delicate, sickly child and died before the end of the novel, although later on I would accuse my mother of naming me that in hopes that I would die young too.  It was a hateful thing to say and far from the truth!  But I digress.

It was because of my feelings toward Little Women that I became very curious about Geraldine Brooks’ novel, March.  In Little Women, the girls’ father is absent for most of the story, and we follow the life of the rest of the family at their home for a year, from Christmas to Christmas. Brooks, in her book, spins the story of what Mr. March was doing during that time and draws upon the many works by and about Alcott’s father, Bronson, for her inspiration.

In this book of historical fiction, we find Mr. March, an idealist chaplain and vegetarian, in the Union camps during the first year of the Civil War.  It is a difficult life, and he is revolted to find that even the Union soldiers are capable of “acts of barbarism and racism.”  He wrestles with his faith, with the horror he sees and experiences, and finally with a most serious illness that reunites him with his wife.  Like all who go off to war, at the end, he struggles with reintegrating himself  back into his family and a life at home.  Unlike Little Women, March is an adult tale about idealism, temptation, and marriage.

All of you who count  Little Women  as one of your favorite childhood books, I urge you to read "the rest of the story," the story of the absent father in March.  It is a beautifully written novel, and you will not be disappointed.