Little Women

Summary

Little Women follows the four March sisters growing up in a New England town during and after the American Civil War, while their father serves as an army chaplain. Meg, the eldest, is pretty and longs for fine things; Jo, a tomboyish aspiring writer with a quick temper, is the heart of the book; Beth is shy, gentle and musical; and Amy, the youngest, is artistic and vain. Their wise and loving mother, Marmee, guides them through their faults, using The Pilgrim's Progress as a model for their moral journey. The family is genteelly poor, and the girls befriend their lonely rich neighbour Theodore 'Laurie' Laurence and his gruff grandfather, who gives Beth a piano. Episodes of first part include Jo's burning anger when Amy destroys her manuscript and Amy's near-drowning on the ice, Meg's humiliating visit to wealthy friends, the sisters' secret Pickwick Club and newspaper, and Jo's first published story. When a telegram brings news that Mr March is seriously ill in a Washington hospital, Marmee goes to nurse him, and Jo sells her long hair to pay for the journey. While she is away, Beth catches scarlet fever from a poor family's baby, who dies, and comes close to death before recovering. Mr March returns home at Christmas, and Meg becomes engaged to Laurie's tutor, John Brooke. The second part, originally published as Good Wives, follows the sisters three years later. Meg marries and learns the trials of housekeeping and motherhood with twins. Jo refuses Laurie's proposal of marriage, goes to New York as a governess, writes sensational stories for money, and meets Friedrich Bhaer, a poor, kindly German professor who criticises such writing. Beth, never fully recovered, slowly declines and dies, nursed by Jo. Amy travels to Europe with Aunt Carrol, where she encounters a drifting, heartbroken Laurie and challenges him to make something of himself; they fall in love and marry. Jo, lonely after Beth's death, begins to write from her own life, and Professor Bhaer comes to find her. They marry, and Jo turns Aunt March's house, Plumfield, into a school for boys. The book ends with the extended family gathered at an apple-picking on Marmee's birthday.

Top Lessons

• Growing up is a moral journey

  Each sister must overcome a particular fault: vanity, temper, shyness or selfishness. The novel presents character as something built by effort and love.

• Women's work and ambition

  Jo wants to be a writer and earn her own living, and the novel takes that ambition seriously while also steering her toward marriage. Readers continue to debate whether the ending fulfils or betrays her.

• Grief within a family

  Beth's long decline and death are handled with tenderness and realism. The book shows how families care for the dying and how grief can lead to creative renewal.

Verified Quotes

Medical Lens

Illness drives the book's central crises. Mr March's serious illness in a Washington army hospital (he is described as very ill, generally read as pneumonia) sends Marmee to nurse him. Beth contracts scarlet fever from the Hummel baby, who dies in her arms, and the chapters of her illness give a detailed picture of home nursing, quarantine of the younger sister Amy, the family doctor's visits and the crisis of the fever. Beth never fully recovers and her slow decline and death in Part Two (often read as a sequel of rheumatic heart disease, though the text is vague) is one of literature's most famous deathbeds. Alcott's own service as an army nurse and her near-fatal typhoid pneumonia, treated with calomel (a mercury compound she believed damaged her health for life), give biographical context. Meg's twins add a note on motherhood.

• Part One, Ch. 15

  A telegram reports Mr March seriously ill in Washington; Marmee leaves to nurse him and Jo sells her hair.

• Part One, Ch. 16–18

  Beth nurses the poor Hummel family's sick baby, who dies of scarlet fever; Beth catches it; Amy is sent away; Dr Bangs attends.

• Part One, Ch. 19–20

  The crisis of Beth's fever passes; Marmee returns.

• Part Two, Ch. 28

  Meg's twins and her struggle with new motherhood.

• Part Two, Ch. 36 and 40

  Beth's slow decline at the seaside and at home; her death nursed by Jo.

• Part Two, Ch. 42

  Jo's grief after Beth's death and her turn to writing from life.