Louisa May Alcott Research Paper

Louisa May Alcott: Her Life Family and Influences Louisa May Alcott was an American author of the mid 1800’s with a strong personality and unique writing style. She was an active supporter of women’s rights and often wrote about powerful female characters. This essay is comprised of her family life and how they influenced her writing as well as some of the themes she often wrote about.

One of Alcott’s biggest influences was her personal life, which she used to write one of her more famous novels Little Women. Alcott was born in Germantown, Pennsylvania on November 29, 1832 to Amos Bronson and Abigail (Abba) May Alcott (Hamlin 85). She was their second daughter, the first having been Anna Alcott Pratt, and also had two younger siblings Elizabeth

Furthermore, the medicine she received as treatment had mercury in it and gave her mercury poisoning. While ill, she continued to write and later published a compilation of her letters to her family about the soldier’s hospital called Hospital Sketches (40). The success of Hospital Sketches encouraged Alcott to write a book after her own heart, Moods, which was widely rejected. Heartbroken, Alcott resorted to write more conventional works to please her public (Hamlin 88). After the failure of Moods, she, rather begrudgingly, wrote Little Women at the request of her publisher to write a “girl’s book” which to her surprise was a huge success. A book about her own life, Alcott easily wrote many more such as: An Old-Fashioned Girl, Little Men, Work, Eight Cousins, and Rose in Bloom (Kopacz 40). Alcott’s characters were based off of her and her siblings and like the character Beth Alcott’s younger sister, Lizzie, died at a young age. Alcott’s youngest sister died as well, though much later, not long after giving birth to her daughter Louisa (Lulu) May Neiriker. By her sister’s request Alcott then raised her niece as her own (Ditchfield 96). Unfortunately, Alcott never fully recovered from her typhoid fever and mercury poisoning. She died March 6, 1888 at the age of fifty-five, two days after the death of her father (Kopacz