Alcott, Louisa May
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born on | 29 November 1832 at 00:30 (= 12:30 AM ) | ||||
Place | Germantown (Philadelphia County), Pennsylvania, 40n03, 75w11 | ||||
Timezone | LMT m75w11 (is local mean time) | ||||
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Biography
American novelist, short story writer and poet best known as the author of the novel Little Women (1868) and its sequels Little Men (1871) and Jo's Boys (1886). A nurse during the Civil War (1861-1865), she became one of America's most famous and beloved writers of children's stories.
Tired of "providing moral pap for the young," Alcott wrote A Modern Mephistopheles in 1877. Once secret, her novel is surprisingly erotic. This perception is reinforced by Alcott's own letters, published as The Selected Letters of Louisa May Alcott. A self-described "literary spinster," she wrote, "I was born with a boy's nature and have always fought my fight . . . with a boy's spirit."
Literature took the place of love, marriage and children. She called her first book in 1854 her "firstborn."
The dutiful daughter of a idealistic, influential but mostly impoverished Transcendentalist philosopher, Bronson Alcott, she turned out to be a hardheaded Yankee literary entrepreneur. She wrote to her sister Anna in 1854, "I am grubbing away as usual. I have $11, all of my own earnings - $5 for a story and $4 for a pile of sewing I did for the ladies."
Her beloved sister Elizabeth, the model for Beth in Little Women died on 14 March 1858 at 3 AM according to Louisa's journal.
Louisa was an assertive and self-contained woman, an early and ardent feminist who set out to win fortune and fame and was utterly unsurprised when she did so.
Alcott suffered from vertigo and other maladies for many years. About two years before her death she entered a homeopathic nursing home in Boston, complaining of insomnia and lack of appetite. Despite a permanent writer's cramp in her thumb, she was able to complete the final book in the March family saga, Jo's Boys (1886) and to write the last book of all, A Garland for Girls (1888). She went to see her dying father in Boston on 1 March 1888 and caught a chill. A day or so later she suffered a violent headache, and sinking rapidly, died on 6 March 1888 at 3:30 AM, the day of her father's funeral.
Relationships
- child->parent relationship with Alcott, Abigail (born 8 October 1800)
- child->parent relationship with Alcott, Amos Bronson (born 29 November 1799)
- sibling relationship with Alcott, Anna (born 16 March 1831)
- sibling relationship with Alcott, Elizabeth Sewall (born 24 June 1835)
- sibling relationship with Alcott, May (born 26 July 1840)
- (has as) teacher relationship with Emerson, Ralph Waldo (born 25 May 1803)
- (has as) teacher relationship with Fuller, Margaret (born 23 May 1810)
- (has as) teacher relationship with Hawthorne, Nathaniel (born 4 July 1804)
- (has as) teacher relationship with Thoreau, Henry David (born 12 July 1817)
Events
- Work : Published/ Exhibited/ Released 1854 (First published)
- Death of Sibling 14 March 1858 at 03:00 AM in Concord, MA (Sister Elizabeth)
chart Placidus Equal_H.
- Work : New Career 1861 (Nurse, four years)
Source Notes
Worthington "Miss Alcott of Concord", date recorded by her dad.
Sy Scholfield cites her father's letter to his father-in-law on her day of birth as quoted in "Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women" by Harriet Reisen (Picador, 2009), p. 7: "She was born at half-past 12 this morning on my birthday."
Categories
- Traits : Personality : Articulate
- Traits : Personality : Hard worker
- Diagnoses : Body Part Problems : Headaches, severe (Violent)
- Diagnoses : Body Part Problems : Ears (Vertigo)
- Diagnoses : Psychological : Eating Disorder (No appetite)
- Diagnoses : Psychological : Sleep disorders (Insomnia)
- Family : Childhood : Family close (Supportive)
- Family : Childhood : Family noted (Dad)
- Family : Childhood : Order of birth (Second of four girls)
- Family : Relationship : Married late/never (Never)
- Family : Parenting : Kids none
- Lifestyle : Financial : Gain - Financial success in field
- Lifestyle : Financial : Rags to riches
- Personal : Death : Unusual (Died same day as dad's funeral)
- Vocation : Medical : Nurse/ Nurse's Aids (Secondary)
- Vocation : Military : Military service (Nurse during the Civil War)
- Vocation : Politics : Activist/ feminist
- Vocation : Writers : Children's literature
- Vocation : Writers : Fiction
- Notable : Extraordinary Talents : For Creativity (Writing skills)
- Notable : Famous : Top 5% of Profession
- Notable : Book Collection : Profiles Of Women
- 1832 births
- Birthday 29 November
- Birthplace Germantown (Philadelphia County), PA (US)
- Sun 7 Sagittarius
- Moon 22 Aquarius
- Asc 18 Virgo
- 1888 deaths
- Traits : Personality : Articulate
- Traits : Personality : Hard worker
- Diagnoses : Body Part Problems : Headaches, severe
- Diagnoses : Body Part Problems : Ears
- Diagnoses : Psychological : Eating Disorder
- Diagnoses : Psychological : Sleep disorders
- Family : Childhood : Family close
- Family : Childhood : Family noted
- Family : Childhood : Order of birth
- Family : Relationship : Married late/never
- Family : Parenting : Kids none
- Lifestyle : Financial : Gain - Financial success in field
- Lifestyle : Financial : Rags to riches
- Personal : Death : Unusual
- Vocation : Medical : Nurse/ Nurse's Aids
- Vocation : Military : Military service
- Vocation : Politics : Activist/ feminist
- Vocation : Writers : Children's literature
- Vocation : Writers : Fiction
- Notable : Extraordinary Talents : For Creativity
- Notable : Famous : Top 5% of Profession
- Notable : Book Collection : Profiles Of Women