Louisa May Alcott Research Paper

Throughout her career, Louisa May Alcott wrote about the many things she experienced growing up; most relatable, Little Women, allows the reader to connect with the characters and relate to the ups and downs in life. Louisa May Alcott was born on November 29, 1832, in Germantown, Pennsylvania. She lived with her father, Bronson Alcott; her mother, Abby May Alcott; and her older sister, Anna Bronson, age 1. In 1834, the family moved to Boston, Massachusetts. A year later, on June 24, 1835, her sister Abigail May was born. Also in Boston, her father founded the Temple School to "practice his theories of education, which involved tapping into children's intuitive knowledge through free expression" (ABC-CLIO). Unfortunately, the school failed

She began to write for publication around 1848, which eventually became the family's support. While living in Concord, Elizabeth caught scarlet fever from an immigrant family. The family moved to Walpole, New Hampshire in 1855 in hopes that the move would help Elizabeth get better. Though they were out of the city, Elizabeth did not recover from the disease and died in December of 1858. In May of 1860, her older sister, Anna, married and moved out of the house in Walpole. With less people in the house and more room, Louisa had a room to write in, which also allowed her to concentrate on her work. Her name became known when she published Hospital Sketches (1863), which "recounted her experience as a volunteer nurse in a military hospital in Washington D.C. during the Civil War" (ABC-CLIO). While she served, she came down with typhoid fever. She was treated with mercury, which was the treatment at the time. This lead to mercury poisoning, an illness that weakened her physically for life. On March 6, 1888, Louisa May Alcott died at the age fifty-five. In her lifetime, Alcott wrote many novels, for children and adults, that are still read and enjoyed

This memoir revealed that Alcott really cared for her father and that her publishing books allowed her father to have food and a roof over his head. Alcott's next two novels, Eight Cousins (1875) and Rose in Bloom are about an orphan girl who goes to live with her six aunts and seven male cousins. Rose in Bloom tells the story of the same girl, older, who is trying to find her way in society. A Modern Mephistopheles (1877) is the story of a failed poet who makes a pact with the devil. Jack and Jill (1880) takes place in a town depicted from Alcott's home town, Concord. The story focuses on the adventures of three boys and three girls. "Three boys, Jack and Frank Minot, modeled after Alcott’s nephews John and Fred Pratt (the name Minot was one of their father’s family names) and Ed Devlin, transformed from Ellsworth Devens, whose death inspired Alcott to write the book" (The Other Juveniles). Alcott's last novel, Jo's Boys and How They Turned Out (1886), was very hard for her to write. Written fifteen years after Little Men, "the originals for Marmee, Amy, and Mr. Laurence were gone, so that writing about them simply renewed Alcott’s mourning for her mother, her sister, and Emerson" (The March Family Stories). All of Alcott's writings inspired others to keep pushing through life, even when things were rough. The Little Women series are stories that