This is the book review on the novel "Little Women" by Louisa May Alcott.

1. A BOOK REVIEW OF LITTLE WOMEN
BY
ALCOTT’S CHILDREN
CLASS: IX SECTION: A
SUBMITTED TO: SHASANK KU. PRADHAN.
A PROJECT FOR PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF
FA-1(ENGLISH).
D.A.V. PUBLIC SCHOOL, POKHARIPUT.

2. NAME ROLL NUMBER
1. Salony Das. 2
2. Subhrajeet Praharaj. 5
3. Omprakash Nanda. 14
4. Mimansha Subhadarshini. 28
5. Pratyusha Mohapatra. 32
6. Sindhu Soumya. 45

3. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
We the group members of Alcott’s Children
convey our deep thanks to our English
teacher Shasank sir for providing his helping
hand for bringing out this project successfully.
We would also like to thank our group
members for cooperation.

4. CONTENT
1. GENERAL INFORMATION
2. INTRODUCTION
3. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
4. THEME
5. SUMMARY
6. CHARACTERS
7. SETTING
8. CONFLICT AND RESOLUTION
9. OURVIEWS
10. RATING

5. GENERAL INFORMATION
1. TITLE: LittleWomen.
2. GENRE: Fiction, Romantic.
3. AUTHOR: Louisa May Alcott.
4. PUBLISHER: Robert Brothers.
5. YEAR OF EDITION: 1868(LittleWomen)
1869(Good Wives).
6. PRICE: 4.22 Euros
7. PAGE: 422

6. INTRODUCTION
The novel published in two parts.The first
part include 1-24 chapters named as Little
Women.The second part include 25-47
chapters and named as GoodWives. Little
Women is Semi Autobiographical where as
the GoodWives is not much realistic.The
second part was written very quickly on the
request of the fans to Louisa May Alcott.

7. Louisa May Alcott (November 29, 1832 – March
6, 1888) was an American novelist best known
as author of the novel Little Women and its
sequels Little Men and Jo's Boys. Raised by
her transcendentalist parents, Abigail May
and Amos Bronson Alcott in New England, she
grew up among many of the well-known
intellectuals of the day such as Ralph Waldo
Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Henry
David Thoreau.

8. Early in her career, she sometimes used the
pen name A. M. Barnard. With her pen name Louisa
wrote novels for young adults in juvenile hall.
Published in 1868, Little Women is set in the
Alcott family home, Orchard House, in Concord
Massachusetts and is loosely based on Alcott's
childhood experiences with her three sisters. The
novel was very well received and is still a popular
children's novel today. Alcott was an abolitionist
and a feminist. She died in Boston.

9. THEME
 WOMEN AND FEMINITY: LittleWomen
considers the place of women in society by
presenting the portraits of several very
different but equally praiseworthy women.
As we read the novel, we experience their
different interpretations of femininity, and
we see a range of different possibilities for
integrating women into society.

10. THEME
 LOVE: Love is everywhere in LittleWomen, a
novel about four marriageable sisters and
their various friends. Often it is romantic love,
either reciprocated or unrequited. But there
are many other kinds of love that sustain the
characters, and it's even suggested that they
could substitute for romantic love if
necessary.

11. THEME
 AMBITION: Most of the characters in Little
Women are ambitious – either they want to
get rich, or they want to be famous, or they
just want to see the world and have a good
time. As they mature, each must learn to
subordinate ambition to duty, or to shift his
or her ambitions in different directions.

12. SUMMARY
The novel begins with the Christmas party. In
a nuclear family of six members. Mr. March
and Mrs. March and their daughters- Meg, Jo,
Beth and Amy. Mr. March is serving as a
Chaplain in the Civil war. Mrs. March and her
daughters are living in the poverty.The novel
deals with the problems that the daughters
face to earn for their family.

13. SUMMARY
As the girls grow older, each faces her own
personal demons and moral challenges. Jo, our
beloved protagonist, must tame her tomboyish
ways and learn to be more ladylike while
pursuing her ambition to be a great writer. Meg,
the oldest, must put aside her love of wealth and
finery in order to follow her heart. Beth, the shy
one, must conquer her bashfulness, while Amy,
the youngest, has to sacrifice her aristocratic
pride.The girls are guided in their personal
growth by their mother, "Marmee," and by their
religious faith.

14. SUMMARY
The second part begins… Meg falls in love with John
Brooke. Meg and John marry and their house is
quickly populated by twins- Daisy and Demi. Laurie
reveals to Jo that he has fallen in love with her, but
she declares that she cannot care for him in the
same way. Jo goes to NewYork as the governess for
a family friend, Mrs. Kirke, experiencing the big city
and trying her hand as a professional writer.
Meanwhile, Amy travels through Europe with her
wealthy Aunt Carroll and cousin Flo, nurturing her
artistic talent. Separately, Laurie goes to Europe
accompanied by his grandfather. He pursues his
passion for music and tries to forget Jo.

15. SUMMARY
While in NewYork, Jo meets German
expatriate Professor Bhaer, whose intellect
and strong moral nature spark her interest.
Across the Atlantic, Laurie and Amy discover
that they lack the genius to be great artists,
but that they make an excellent romantic
pairing.When Beth, who has never been
strong, dies young as suffering from Scarlet
Fever.

16. SUMMARY
In the end, Jo and Bhaer marry.They start a
boarding school for the boys. Laurie and Amy
marry and live in the neighbourhood. Meg
and John had a good settlement.The story
ends with the Birthday Party of Mrs. March…
Therefore it was all a happy ending.

17. CHARACTERS
 Jo March:- When we first meet Jo March, she's a
tomboyish, hot-tempered, geeky fifteen-year-
old girl. She loves activity and can't bear to be
left on the sidelines; it drives her crazy that she
can't go and fight in the CivilWar alongside her
father, who has volunteered as a chaplain. Jo
also loves literature, both reading and writing it.
She composes plays for her sisters to perform
and writes stories that she eventually gets
published.

18. CHARACTERS
 Meg March:- Meg, short for Margaret, is the
oldest and (until Amy grows up) the prettiest
of the four March sisters. She's also the most
typical of the sisters – we think of her as
everything that you might expect a
nineteenth-century American girl from a
good family to be. Meg loves luxury, nice
things, dainty food, and good society.

19. CHARACTERS
 Beth March:- Beth is one of those children in
a novel who is so good and sweet and perfect
that you just know she's going to die.The only
thing that really surprises us is that she
survives her first bout of scarlet fever and
doesn't die until the second half of the novel.
Beth's only earthly love is music. She adores
playing the piano and singing, and the only
material thing that she wants is a nicer piano,
since her family's is old and out of tune.

20. CHARACTERS
 Amy March:- Amy is the March sister that most
readers love to hate. She's the youngest of the
family and she fits the stereotype of the spoiled
youngest child. Amy's vanity begins with her
appearance – she's a pretty child and turns into a
beautiful, stately woman, with lovely golden hair
and blue eyes.Amy's anxiety about her nose,
however, is just the beginning of her obsession
with all things upper-class. Amy's great ambition
is to be a gentlewoman.

21. CHARACTERS
 Other characters were Marmee (Mrs. March),
Father (Mr. March), Laurie, Professor Bhaer,
John Brooke, Daisy and Demi Brooke,Aunt
March, Mr. Laurence, Hannah,The Hummels,
The Moffats, Sallie Gardiner,TheVaughns,
Aunt Carrol, and Florence

22. SETTING
The setting of the story is not mentioned in
the novel. As it is a semi autobiographical
novel it seems that the story took place in
Cornord, New England.The first part of story
begins with a Christmas evening and ends
with other Christmas evening.The second
part comes after four years and continues till
six years.

23. CONFLICT AND RESOLUTION
The novel has many conflicts and many
solution but the main conflict here is about
the daughters managing their home. At that
time women were not given any importance.
But the way they manage is appreciable.

24. OUR VIEWS ON BOOK
The book is very nice and one feels enjoyable
to read. But the story would have better if
Beth would stay alive. And Laurie would have
married Jo.

25. RATING