This edition examines the novel’s central question: How does one grow up well? With Shealy as a guide, we appreciate anew the confusions and difficulties that beset the March sisters as they overcome their burdens and journey toward maturity and adulthood: beautiful, domestic-minded Meg, doomed and forever childlike Beth, selfish Amy, and irrepressible Jo. Malaprop?), and words likely to cause difficulty to modern readers (What is a velvet snood? A pickled lime?). The editor provides running commentary on biographical contexts (Did Alcott, like Jo, have a “mood pillow”?), social and historical contexts (When may a lady properly decline a gentleman’s invitation to dance?), literary allusions (Who is Mrs. In this richly annotated, illustrated edition, Daniel Shealy illuminates the novel’s deep engagement with issues such as social equality, reform movements, the Civil War, friendship, love, loss, and of course the passage into adulthood. Rowling, it is however much more than the “girls’ book” intended by Louisa May Alcott’s first publisher. Championed by Gertrude Stein, Simone de Beauvoir, Theodore Roosevelt, and J.
For many, it is a favorite book first encountered in childhood or adolescence. In this novel, as in real life, the truths about the dangers of tobacco will not emerge until 45 years later.ĭon Noble’s newest book is Alabama Noir, a collection of original stories by Winston Groom, Ace Atkins, Carolyn Haines, Brad Watson, and eleven other Alabama authors.Little Women has delighted and instructed readers for generations.
This is not a novel of alternative history like Philip Roth’s “The Plot Against America.” I think we know the answer to this dramatic question. Maddie learns this and the question becomes, will anyone blow the whistle, do the right thing, even if it wrecks the economy of the town and many of the people in it. In ads, doctors recommend it to reduce stress, help weight loss.Īnd the company Bright Leaf is just coming out with a new cigarette, MOMints, especially for women and most especially for pregnant women, even though, in this 1946 novel, management know that cigarettes probably contribute to lower birth weight, increase infant mortality. Tobacco, Americans are being told, is good for your health. Like everyone, she is inundated with tobacco advertising. Myers explores larger issues as Maddie learns a lot more than petty gossip. This is not just a competent novel exposing small-town peccadilloes. There is some commentary on the social strata, just what you might expect, and there is even a quick look at attitudes towards male homosexuality and lesbianism in this little, straitlaced town.Įverybody has some kind of secret in a culture where conformity is absolute. We are also told that “women tended to share more when they stood on a seamstress’ platform.” We learn about the women - some are friendly, sensible ladies some are snobs and harridans. We are told of a “scalloped peplum” and a “matching scalloped mini -cape.”
We learn a great deal about colors, fabrics and draping, fitted bodices and pleated skirts, hemlines, necklines, waistlines, plunging backs and slitted sides. The wives of middle management, “Second Tier,” have store-bought dresses to be altered, fitted, enhanced so they look to the untrained eye, perhaps, bespoke. Original and stunning new dresses have to be handmade for the very wealthy First Tier Tobacco Wives. The huge end-of-summer benefit “gala” is in a few weeks.
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