Suck My Alcott
Six snarky chicks who dig Louisa May.
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"Thoreau also wore a neck-beard for many years, which he insisted many women found attractive.[20] However, Louisa May Alcott mentioned to Ralph Waldo Emerson that Thoreau’s facial hair “will most assuredly deflect amorous advances and preserve the man’s virtue in perpetuity.”[20]"
This building on MacDougal Street is the basis for Mrs. Kirke’s boarding house in Louisa May Alcott’s “Little Women.” I almost teared up when my friend Patty told me that! I love Literary New York City!
The actress who played adult Amy March (Samantha Mathis) and the Actor who played John Brook (Eric Stoltz) were both guest stars on Grey’s Anatomy at the same time for three consecutive episodes?: ”Wish You Were Here”, ”Sympathy for the Devil”, and ”Stairway to Heaven”.
WHOAH SAY WHAT!?!
This instead of my reading Standoff at Tiananmen.
But I was in Barnes and Nobel the other day, and this one book caught my eye — it was one of those “let’s go back in time to a fictional novel!” pieces — you know. The kind that’s been done and overdone with Romeo and Juliet (which usually completely misses the point of the play in the first place) — except this time with Little Women. Funny thing is, it specifically mentions that one of the main character’s objectives was to prevent Laurie and Amy’s marriage. To which my first thought was “Really?” and my second was “This couldn’t possibly actually happen, right? The girl learns some lesson about meddling or compatibility and then goes her merry way.”
Except not really. Because I, being the spoiler rat I am, decide to flip to the back to see (it’s not like I’d read the book anyway). Apparently this girl not only makes Jo go on the tour of Europe and hook up with Laurie and makes Amy seem like this huge bitch.
So here’s a list of problems I have with people who dislike Amy March:
Read the rest here! Trying not to clog your dashes.
YOW, this is partially directed at my ‘Amy sucks’ post. But I hate to be grouped with someone who has written shitty, Little Women fanfic. I was merely hyperbolizing (with acerbic, inappropriate humor) my hatred of what I perceive to be Amy’s homophobia/transphobia. With a blog called SuckMyAlcott, what else can you expect? I’m coming at this as a non-Christian, queer reader from the 21st century, so I have no patience for Amy’s feelings about Jo’s queer identity, nor with the rest of the family’s feelings about it.
Amy’s ambition does not automatically make her a feminist, nor does her femininity preclude her from being a feminist. What prevents her from being a feminist is that she is not accepting of the other, or those who do not conform to the gender binary (ahem, JO). She is threatened by Jo’s masculinity because it does not coincide with what sociey tells her should matter most to women (femininity, romance, marriage, social status, riches).
Oddly enough, Jo’s masculinity does not conflict with the March family’s Christian values of hard work and independence. I have yet to see these traits in Amy, though I am only about half way through the novel (I have read it before, but it has been a good decade since I’ve read it thoroughly).
Jo and Amy parallel one another. They are both the family fuck ups (which I think the novel treats pretty jovially—we are meant to laugh at and learn from their foibles). Their behavior is reported as ‘bad’ and ‘middling.’ Looking at Little Women as the Pilgrim’s-Progress-for-girls it was originally meant be, I see the key difference between them as this:
-Amy’s desires are societally acceptable and yet repudiated by the March’s Christian values
-Jo’s desires are NOT societally acceptable and yet mostly encouraged by the March’s Christian values
Still, they are pretty much equal in their ‘everyday’ faults. Jo has a bad temper and lack of patience. Amy is affected and rash, etc. They are at the opposite ends of the novel’s Christian reform spectrum. Amy must gain more Christian values and reject society’s false ones. Jo must also learn to be good and patient, and yet conform to society slightly more. In the novel, Amy is rewarded for her faults (their aunt takes feminine, conformist Amy to Europe over masculine, other Jo).
I don’t hate Amy. I find her incredibly relatable and oftentimes charming and funny. I also find it funny to come at it from Jo’s pissed off perspective. I’m angrier at the society that created Amy than Amy herself.
“Once upon a time a farmer planted a little seed. in his garden, and after a while it sprouted and became a vine and bore many squashes. One day in October, when they were ripe, he picked one and took it to market. A grocerman bought and put it in his shop. That same morning, a little girl in a brown hat and blue dress, with a round face and snub nose, went and bought it for her mother. She lugged it home, cut it up, and boiled it in the big pot, mashed some of it salt and butter, for dinner. And to the rest she added a pint of milk, two eggs, four spoons of sugar, nutmeg, and some crackers, put it in a deep dish, and baked it till it was brown and nice, and next day it was eaten by a family named March.” - The Pickwick Portfolio, Little Women
Chapter 29 of Little Women, in which Amy chides Jo for being ‘freakish’ and not straight enough. Bitch.
It’s like, don’t force Jo to call on neighbors with you, then give her shit for not flirting and talking about dresses. All the while Jo is complimenting Amy’s artistry, impressing everyone with her kindness and fun.
Amy, I wish Jo had let you drown.
” I have always known that I should be part of the March family.”
Bitches love citrus.
