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January 31, 2007
Little Women
One of my 'resolutions' was to read more books this year. I started well, but then I got to reading Little Women. I started with the title page, and was shocked to find that my good old (tear-stained) copy is an abridgement! Horrors!
Good thing, though, about being married to another English teacher: we have a lot of the same books. (That's also a bad thing. We sold lots of our college textbook duplicates, but some of them--some of our textbooks that we marked up even more during our stints teaching--have a great deal of character and value besides the text printed there. Sigh. So we have a lot of books to move when we move!) I dug around and found the Dude's copy of Little Women and read it. Being the first time I read it unabridged, I suppose it counts.
Here are some thoughts:
Alcott certainly has a perspective. She crosses the line into preachy quite often, though I haven't read many of her peers. Are all those other Transcendentalists preachy? How about novelists of all kinds from the late 1800s? Preachy or no? Someone comment and tell me.
She has no problem mixing Christianity with Transcendentalism. I, being a 21st century Reformed Presbyterian Christian, have a real problem with this! All her emphasis on self-reform and effort to make oneself the best he or she can be gets my goat! How many times have I been told (indoctrinated, even) that only Christ can reform me.
On the other hand, her heroines work very hard, and while I love being Reformed, I wonder if it's just me, or if others have also found that we put a little too much emphasis on relying on Christ alone without putting emphasis also on putting effort into our sanctification.
She's such a good novelist. The book is peppered throughout with foreshadowings of Beth's death, the Jo-Laurie-Amy love triangle, and all the sisters' eventual destiny in wifehood. So the big Beth-is-dying chapter is hard to read and poignant, but not really a surprise.
Overall, I still think the book is charming and witty. The plot is well-developed, the morals are interwoven instead of being tacked on at the end, and I love it even better for reading all that Alcott intended me to read.
| By The Newest Worker | 01:54 PM
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Comments
Its my opinion that relying on Christ needs to be emphasized so much because we rely on our strength way too easily.
It would be a shame to sit around and be like "Well, when Christ wants to move me, he'll move me.". As if we have no legs or other muscle He gave us to move around ourselves. Praise Him and Thank Him and realize He caused you to move, but move!
Posted by: Carrie at January 31, 2007 10:09 PM