Little Women

Written by the American writer named Louisa M. Alcott, "Little Women" presents the journey of some lovely young girls from childhood to maturity. The little star of the novel is represented by Little Josephine "Jo" March. She has a very boy-like behavior and is the second oldest of all the sisters. She has a strong personality and loves writing, thus resembling the authoress herself. She is too brave and bold, which often gets her into a lot of trouble.

The eldest sister is, however, Margaret "Meg" March. She is sixteen, very pretty and very conscious of that. She is the most responsible of them, and she is willing to help with the housework and to replace the mother figure whenever necessary. Because the March family passes through a period of poverty, she has to work as a governess for the King family. She has some bad experiences involving rich people which will help her grow in wisdom and realize money does not make anyone more worthy than the others, that true value has a rather spiritual nature. She falls in love with Mr. John Brooke, Laurie's tutor, whom she finally marries and with whom she has two twins: and John, Jr. "Demi" (short for Demi-John) and Margaret "Daisy" In Little Men, the authoress mentions Josephine, also called Josie, who is Meg’s third child.

Elizabeth "Beth" March is the second youngest sister aged 13 (when the novel begins). She is quiet, peaceful, kind, and has a great talent for the piano. She is also extremely fond of her dolls and her cats, which she happily takes care of. Obedient and almost too timid, she is even does her school studies at home because of her tremendously shy nature. She is described at the beginning of the book as seeming younger than she really is, with rosy cheeks and a childish round face. Although she is quite the opposite of Jo, the two seem to get along perfectly and are very close to each other. The most involved in charity works is Beth. In fact, she even catches scarlet fever from one of the Hummels’ children, Hummels being an extremely poor German family. Although she does survive this disease, her system is very much weakened and she even dies from the scarlet fever’s post-effects.

Aged twelve when the novel begins, Amy Curtis March is the youngest among the sisters. She has a great artistic talent. The writer describes her as a gorgeous young girl with blonde, curly hair and blue eyes, like a "snow maiden". Another characteristic is her flat nose, which was the consequence of an early-age accident, while she was playing with the naughty Jo. The poor child seems to be obsessed with this hardly noticeable physical flaw. Although she is very fond of her family, still she shows herself as being "cool, reserved and worldly", and this occasionally means trouble for her. Being the youngest of the sisters, she can be too spoiled, vain, and moody and resort to tantrums when she isn’t pleased with what she gets. Because of Jo’s tendency to tease everybody, Amy doesn’t get very close to her older sister. When she becomes the favorite companion to her Aunt March and manages to get along with that old lady far better than Jo ever could, she has the great joy of traveling the world with this aunt of theirs. Upon one of those travels to Europe she meets Laurie. A short time after the death of Beth, the two get married. And later on, they have a daughter whom they baptize Elizabeth (Beth).

Margaret "Marmee" March is the head of the household and mother of all these lovely little women. She is very busy with charitable activities and she is the one who wants to give the girls proper moral and religious education, to build up and improve the girls’ characters and personalities. She wants to offer a good example to all her daughters.

The father of the family bears the name of Robin March. Once rich, he has the same charitable heart of his wife’s. Yet this makes him lose his fortune, since he lends money to some friends who never pay him back.

This is but a mere presentation of characters from this very enjoyable book.