LITMIR.BIZ

The title of this second volume in the 'Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag' series is imposed upon a record of the author's journeyings in Europe, which might as appropriately have been called « Lunch Box,» or « Sherry Flask,» so far as the uninformed reader is concerned. In due time, however, he is apprised that the title «Shawl Straps» is supposed to indicate that the travelers – for there were three of them – abandoned their baggage train and made their campaign with personal equipage as meagre as that of Gen. Grant in his movement against Vicksburg – one clean shirt and a tooth-brush. In fact, the three lone females did, at a certain stage in their journey, desert their «Saratogas,» and for a season travelled in light order. That this season was a brief one, it is hardly necessary to say; a woman divorced from her trunken voyage, presents one of the most painful exhibitions of anguish that human nature ever affords. It is worthy of note that the chapters of the book which treat of this trunkless – we had almost said truncated – time, are far less spirited and jolly than their associates which deal with a period of habilimental opulence, and reflect faithfully the serene and self-satisfied condition of the author's mind.

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This story relates, in many of its most important features and incidents, to actual experiences of its author; and in «Christie» we find the views and ideas of Miss Alcott herself expressed in such a way as to make them most interesting and valuable.

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This is a gathering up into book form of stories previously published in magazines at a time, when the health of the author being such that she was forbidden the work of preparing new ones. There are eight in all, of which only 'The Baron's Gloves' has not before appeared in print. To most of the young folks they are new, and will be greeted with the welcome which is always accorded to anything of Miss Alcott's. The demand for children's stories is not likely to grow less in our day, and though it is needless to speak with approval of this author's work, we will yet say that we may accept the fact of this demand with more ready cheerfulness, when we consider that if any boy can read, in this book, 'My Red Cap', without getting a better understanding of what it is to be true and manly than he ever had before, or any girl read 'Psyche's Art', and not see, lying right in her path, the way for her to be a genuine woman, they are not fair samples of the boys and girls of the present reading public

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"Jimmy's Cruise In The Pinafore" is number five in the 'Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag series' and includes the following stories by famous authoress Louisa May Alcott: 'Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore', 'Two Little Travellers', 'A Jolly Fourth', 'Seven Black Cats', Rosa's Tale', 'Lunch', 'A Bright Idea', 'How they Camped Out', 'My Little School-Girl', 'What a Shovel Did', 'Clams' and many more.

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"A Modern Mephistopheles" was one of the best novels in that remarkable collection of American fiction known as the 'No Name' series. Miss Alcott's name has long been associated with it, because she never made any special effort to conceal the authorship. It is in many respects her most noteworthy effort, and by it her qualities as a writer may safely be judged. The novel is distinctly poetical in motive and the imaginative power displayed in the working out of the plot is to be classed with that of the creative artists of literature. Three souls—nay, four—are here unveiled to us, and while all are brought into bold relief, the true strength of the book undoubtedly lies in the portrayal of Gladys, who is a genuine woman of a fresh and original type. Helwyze is, of course, frankly impossible, and Canaris is only probable, while Olivia is a picturesque foil; but in Gladys there is no incredible or superfluous trait: she is thoroughly and deliciously feminine. The moral lesson is not to be ignored. Like the evil genius of Faust, Helwyze sought to work evil, but the forces that made for righteousness were against him and he was defeated in the very hour of his triumph. It is the recognition of the higher law controlling human deeds that gives «A Modern Mephistopheles» its hold upon popular esteem.

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'Silver Pitchers' is a collection of nine short stories by famous American authoress Louisa May Alcott. Most of the tales deal with young girls and their early love affairs, but do not lack the moralistic touch of the author. Included are 'Silver Pitchers', 'Anna's Whim', 'Transcendental Wild Oats', 'The Romance of a Summer Day', 'My Rococo Watch', 'By the River', 'Letty's Tramp', 'Scarlet Stockings' and 'Independence: A Centennial Love Story.'

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Louisa May Alcott ended Little Women (1868) with the words «So the curtain falls upon Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy. Whether it ever rises again, depends upon the reception given the first act of the domestic drama called Little Women.» It was an immediate commercial and critical success, and readers demanded to know more about the characters. Alcott quickly completed a second volume, Good Wives (1869), and later Little Men (1871)and Jo's Boys (1886). The novels follow the lives of the four March sisters—Meg, Beth, Jo and Amy, each with a very different character. It has been argued that within Little Women one finds the first vision of the «All-American girl» and that her multiple aspects are embodied in the differing March sisters. But whatever the reason, generations of readers have loved these novels since they were first published.

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Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag contains 66 children's short stories by Louisa May Alcott, divided in six volumes: Volume 1: My Boys Tessa's Surprises Buzz The Children's Joke Dandelion Madam Cluck and her Family A Curious Call Tilly's Christmas My Little Gentleman Back Windows Little Marie of Lehon My May-day among Curious Birds and Beasts Our Little Newsboy Patty's Patchwork Volume 2: Off Brittany France Switzerland Italy London Volume 3: Cupid and Chow-Chow Huckleberry Nelly's Hospital Grandma's Team Fairy Pinafores Mamma's Plot Kate's Choice The Moss People What Fanny heard A Marine Merry-making Volume 4: My Girls Lost in a London Fog The Boys' Joke, and who got the best of it Roses and Forget-me-nots Old Major What the Girls did Little Neighbors Marjorie's Three Gifts Patty's Place The Autobiography of an Omnibus Red Tulips A Happy Birthday Volume 5: Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore Two Little Travellers A Jolly Fourth Seven Black Cats Rosa's Tale Lunch A Bright Idea How they Camped Out My Little School-Girl What a Shovel Did Clams Kitty's Cattle Show What Becomes of the Pins Volume 6: An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving How it all Happened The Dolls' Journey from Minnesota to Maine Morning-Glories Shadow-Children Poppy's Pranks What the Swallows did Little Gulliver The Whale's Story A Strange Island Fancy's Friend

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Very few of even our best writers can compass a book for the young which shall be all that it ought to be, avoiding on the one hand extravagant sentimentality, and a standard so high as to be outside human nature altogether; on the other, vapid silliness which no grown girl can accept as fitting food for her mind at all, and which irritates, as all pretense and make-believe must. Some American books are, perhaps, the best of their kind for the present generation, leaving untouched our old favorites, which, however, have by this time acquired a certain musty and rococo air, and are not quite in harmony with the times. If we might single out one which seems to us perhaps the best of all, it would be 'An Old-Fashioned Girl.' In this American story there is, beside its intrinsic value as work of art, a certain homely practicality and quaintness that lends it a special charm. Their very diction is as amusing to us as its plot, and things which we should write as humorous caricature is set down in the most matter-of-fact sobriety. The characters of this little book are so lifelike, the story is so pleasant, the morality so sound, and the whole tone and treatment so brisk and healthful, that no one can read it without both pleasure and amusement, while its influence over the young would be, we should say, decidedly powerful as well as useful.

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Little Women is a semi-autobiographical account of Louisa May Alcott's childhood with her sisters in Concord, Massachusetts. The novel tells the story of four teenaged sisters and their mother, Marmee. The family lives in a new neighborhood in Massachusetts in genteel poverty. Having lost all his money, their father is acting as a pastor, miles from home, involved in the American Civil War. The women face their first Christmas without him. Meg and Jo March, the elder two, have to work in order to support the family: Meg teaches a nearby family of four children; Jo assists her aged great-aunt March, a wealthy widow living in a mansion, Plumfield. Beth, too timid for school, is content to stay at home and help with housework; Amy is still at school. Meg is beautiful and traditional, Jo is a tomboy who writes; Beth is a peacemaker and a pianist; Amy is an artist who longs for elegance and fine society. Jo is impulsive and quick to anger. One of her challenges is trying to control her anger, a challenge that her mother experiences. The term «little women» represented the period in a young woman's life where childhood and elder childhood were «overlapping» with young womanhood. Each of the March sister heroines had a harrowing experience that alerted her and the reader that «childhood innocence» was of the past, and that «the inescapable woman problem» was all that remained.

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