Little Women: Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy

About:

Little Women follows the lives of of Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy March as they grow up. The March girls are raised in genteel poverty by their loving mother, Marmee, in a quiet Massachusetts town while their father serves as an army chaplain during the American Civil War.

Josephine “Jo” March is the brazen, driven, tom-boy character though which the reader lives. Through Jo, the March family befriend Theodore Lawrence “Laurie”, the lonely grandson of a rich old man next door. The first part of the story focuses more on the experiences of childhood in the 1800’s, making of unexpected and unusual friends, and the “coming of age” of the March girls. The first part ends with the engagement announcement of an 18-year-old Meg to John Brooke, Laurie’s tutor.

The second part of the book, originally published in 1869 as Good Wives, is an immediate sequel to Little Women. It starts with the preparation for Meg’s marriage. The second book focuses more on each of the girls growing somewhat separate in their adult lives, with Meg starting her own family; Beth suffering from frequent illness and scarlet fever; artistic Amy traveling and marrying someone unexpected; and Jo, grown in maturity through trial and trouble, marries, and sets up a school for boys with her husband.

This book is semi-autobiographical. The main character’s of Jo’s family (and their circumstances) reflect Alcott’s own life.

Author: Alcott, Louisa May
Date Published: 1868 (part 1), 1869 (part 2 – Good Wives), 1880 (parts 1 & 2 combined)
Publisher: Roberts Brothers
Illustrator: May Alcott (first edition), Merrill, Frank T
Public Domain: YES