Louisa May Alcott

Born

in Germantown, Pennsylvania, The United States

November 29, 1832

Died

March 06, 1888

Website

http://www.louisamayalcott.org

Genre

Literature & Fiction, Historical Fiction, Mystery & Thrillers

Influences

Amos Bronson Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Johann ...more

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As A.M. Barnard:
Behind a Mask, or a Woman's Power (1866)
The Abbot's Ghost, or Maurice Treherne's Temptation (1867)
A Long Fatal Love Chase (1866 – first published 1995)
First published anonymously:
A Modern Mephistopheles (1877)

Louisa May Alcott was born in Germantown, Pennsylvania on November 29, 1832. She and her three sisters, Anna, Elizabeth and May were educated by their father, philosopher/ teacher, Bronson Alcott and raised on the practical Christianity of their mother, Abigail May.

Louisa spent her childhood in Boston and in Concord, Massachusetts, where her days were enlightened by visits to Ralph Waldo Emerson’s library, excursions into nature with Henry David Thoreau and theatricals in the barn at Hillside (now Hawthorne’s "Wayside As A.M. Barnard:
Behind a Mask, or a Woman's Power (1866)
The Abbot's Ghost, or Maurice Treherne's Temptation (1867)
A Long Fatal Love Chase (1866 – first published 1995)
First published anonymously:
A Modern Mephistopheles (1877)

Louisa May Alcott was born in Germantown, Pennsylvania on November 29, 1832. She and her three sisters, Anna, Elizabeth and May were educated by their father, philosopher/ teacher, Bronson Alcott and raised on the practical Christianity of their mother, Abigail May.

Louisa spent her childhood in Boston and in Concord, Massachusetts, where her days were enlightened by visits to Ralph Waldo Emerson’s library, excursions into nature with Henry David Thoreau and theatricals in the barn at Hillside (now Hawthorne’s "Wayside").

Like her character, Jo March in Little Women, young Louisa was a tomboy: "No boy could be my friend till I had beaten him in a race," she claimed, " and no girl if she refused to climb trees, leap fences...."

For Louisa, writing was an early passion. She had a rich imagination and often her stories became melodramas that she and her sisters would act out for friends. Louisa preferred to play the "lurid" parts in these plays, "the villains, ghosts, bandits, and disdainful queens."

At age 15, troubled by the poverty that plagued her family, she vowed: "I will do something by and by. Don’t care what, teach, sew, act, write, anything to help the family; and I’ll be rich and famous and happy before I die, see if I won’t!"

Confronting a society that offered little opportunity to women seeking employment, Louisa determined "...I will make a battering-ram of my head and make my way through this rough and tumble world." Whether as a teacher, seamstress, governess, or household servant, for many years Louisa did any work she could find.

Louisa’s career as an author began with poetry and short stories that appeared in popular magazines. In 1854, when she was 22, her first book Flower Fables was published. A milestone along her literary path was Hospital Sketches (1863) based on the letters she had written home from her post as a nurse in Washington, DC as a nurse during the Civil War.

When Louisa was 35 years old, her publisher Thomas Niles in Boston asked her to write "a book for girls." Little Women was written at Orchard House from May to July 1868. The novel is based on Louisa and her sisters’ coming of age and is set in Civil War New England. Jo March was the first American juvenile heroine to act from her own individuality; a living, breathing person rather than the idealized stereotype then prevalent in children’s fiction.

In all, Louisa published over 30 books and collections of stories. She died on March 6, 1888, only two days after her father, and is buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Concord. ...more

Combine Editions
Louisa May Alcott's Books

Average rating: 4.01 · 1,434,118 ratings · 23,665 reviews · 413 distinct works · Similar authors

	Little Women (Little Women, #1) 4.03 avg rating — 1,250,410 ratings — published 1868 — 1562 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Little Men (Little Women, #2) 3.84 avg rating — 39,220 ratings — published 1871 — 430 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Eight Cousins (Eight Cousins, #1) 4.02 avg rating — 28,087 ratings — published 1874 — 266 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Jo's Boys (Little Women, #3) 3.80 avg rating — 25,502 ratings — published 1886 — 288 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Rose in Bloom (Eight Cousins, #2) 4.03 avg rating — 17,628 ratings — published 1876 — 204 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Good Wives (Little Women, #1.5) 3.92 avg rating — 14,571 ratings — published 1868 — 197 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	An Old-Fashioned Girl 4.05 avg rating — 14,403 ratings — published 1869 — 266 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	A Long Fatal Love Chase 3.63 avg rating — 4,359 ratings — published 1995 — 28 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Inheritance 3.63 avg rating — 4,195 ratings — published 1849 — 18 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Jack and Jill 3.81 avg rating — 3,523 ratings — published 1880 — 140 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Louisa May Alcott…

Series by Louisa May Alcott

Little Women Series (8 books)
by Louisa May Alcott
4.02 avg rating — 1,334,206 ratings

Little Women (4 books)
by Louisa May Alcott
4.02 avg rating — 1,332,947 ratings

Descobrir os Clássicos (1 book)
by Louisa May Alcott
4.03 avg rating — 1,250,400 ratings

Eight Cousins (2 books)
by Louisa May Alcott
4.02 avg rating — 45,731 ratings

Aunt Jo's Scrap Bag (6 books)
by Louisa May Alcott, James Bernardin (Illustrator)
3.61 avg rating — 1,034 ratings

More series by Louisa May Alcott…

Quotes by Louisa May Alcott

“She is too fond of books, and it has turned her brain.”
― Louisa May Alcott, Work: A Story of Experience

tags: books

5261 likes

“I like good strong words that mean something…”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

tags: little-women, louisa-may-alcott, words

2524 likes

“I am not afraid of storms, for I am learning how to sail my ship.”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

tags: inspirational-ship-storms

2177 likes

See all Louisa May Alcott's quotes »

Polls

July 2015 Old School Classics Poll

Which book would you like to read for our July Old School Classics group read?

1868, Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, 449 pages

23 votes, 47.9%

1899, The Awakening by Kate Chopin, 195 pages

10 votes, 20.8%

1878, The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy, 448 pages

4 votes, 8.3%

1833, Eugénie Grandet by Honoré de Balzac, 200 pages

4 votes, 8.3%

1678, The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan, 324 pages

3 votes, 6.3%

1787, Faust: First Part by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 432 pages

1 vote, 2.1%

1797, The Italian by Ann Radcliffe, 423 pages

1 vote, 2.1%

1839, The Charterhouse of Parma by Stendhal, 532 pages

1 vote, 2.1%

1849, Shirley by Charlotte Brontë, 624 pages

1 vote, 2.1%

48 total votes

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