repulsive, but all were fed and clothed, nursed and caressed with an affection which never failed. p.41
Amy is interested in arts and always acts like a very proper young lady. ‘Little Raphael,’ as her sisters called her, had a decided talent for
drawing, and was never so happy as when copying flowers, designing fairies, or illustrating stories with queer specimens of art. Her teachers
complained that instead of doing her sums she covered her slate with animals, the blank pages of her atlas were used to copy maps on, and
caricatures of the most ludicrous description came fluttering out of all her books at unlucky moments. She got through her lessons as well as
she could, and managed to escape reprimands by being a model of deportment. She was a great favorite with her mates, being good-
tempered and possessing the happy art of pleasing without effort. Her little airs and graces were much admired, so were her accomplishments,
for besides her drawing, she could play twelve tunes, crochet, and read French without mispronouncing more than two-thirds of the words. She
had a plaintive way of saying, ‘When Papa was rich we did so-and-so,’ which was very touching, and her long words were considered ‘perfectly
elegant’ by the girls. p.42-43
Those are the differences among the March sister. Now, I would like to show us how the women against the patriarchal culture because women are not weak and don’t want to be
called as the second inferior in society because women can earn money and run the house by her own money and absolutely women can make her own decision with the self determination
with no consideration by others and do it in responsibility.
4.1 Women struggled against patriarchal culture
The convention of the nineteenth century dictated that women stay in the home, marry, have children and find happiness in so doing. In Little Women appears the self
determination of women through the characters. From the quotation below, it can be seen women are not weak and here women try to break the patriarchal culture.
Margareth “Marmee” March or Mrs. March is the head of household while her husband is away at war. She engages in charitable works and attempts to guide her girls’
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moral and to shape their characters, usually through experiment. As a mother and being a father for a while of four daughters she still has time to help and join herself to Soldiers’ Aid
Societies. ….and her mother was called to devote her skill and energy to Soldiers’
Aid Societies….p.41 ‘As I sat cutting out blue flannel jackets today at the rooms, I felt very
anxious about Father, and thought how lonely and helpless we should be , if anything happened to him. It was not a wise thing to do, but I kept on
worrying till an old man came in with an order for some clothes. He sat down near me, and I began to talk to him, for he looked poor and tired
and anxious. ‘‘Have you sons in the army?’ I asked, for the note he brought was not to me. ‘Yes, ma’am. I had four, but two were killed, one
is a prisoner, and I’m going to the other, who is very sick in a Washington hospital.’ he answered quietly.
‘‘You have done a great deal for your country, sir, ‘ I said feeling respect now, instead of pity.
‘‘Not a mite more than I ought, ma’am. I’d go myself, if I was any use. As I ain’t, I give my boys, and give ‘em free.’ ‘He spoke so cheerfully,
looked so sincere, and seemed so glad to give his all, that I was ashamed of myself. I’d given one man and thought it too much, while he gave
four without grudging them. I had all my girls to comfort me at home, and his last son was waiting, miles away, to say good-by to him perhaps
I felt so rich, so happy thinking of my blessings, that I made him a nice bundle, gave him some money, and thanked him heartily for the lesson
he had taught me.’ p.46
In raising her daughters without her husband next to her, Mrs. March who always been called Marmee by the March family often gives advices to them and make them feel
free to talk and say anything and never have any secret to be hidden from her. The quotation above is one of the moral lessons from her. Marmee wants her daughters be free to talk about
everything with her and she is very close to all of them. ‘Tell another story, Mother, one with a moral to it, like this. I like to
think about them afterward, if they are real and not too preachy,’ said Jo, after a minute’s silence. Mrs. March smiled and began at once, for she
had told stories to this little audience for many years, and knew how to please them. ‘Once upon a time, there were four girls, who had enough
to eat and drink and wear, a good many comforts and pleasures, kind friends and parents who loved them dearly, and yet they were not
contented.’ Here the listeners stole sly looks at one another, and began
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to sew diligently. ‘These girls were anxious to be good and made many excellent resolutions, but they did not keep them very well, and were
constantly saying, ‘If only we had this, ‘ or ‘If we could only do that, ‘ quite forgetting how much they already had, and how many things they
actually could do. So they asked an old woman what spell they could use to make them happy, and she said, ‘When you feel discontented, think
over your blessings, and be grateful.’’ Here Jo looked up quickly, as if about to speak, but changed her mind, seeing that the story was not done
yet. ‘Being sensible girls, they decided to try her advice, and soon were surprised to see how well off they were. One discovered that money
couldn’t keep shame and sorrow out of rich people’s houses, another that, though she was poor, she was a great deal happier, with her youth,
health, and good spirits, than a certain fretful, feeble old lady who couldn’t enjoy her comforts, a third that, disagreeable as it was to help
get dinner, it was harder still to go begging for it and the fourth, that even carnelian rings were not so valuable as good behavior. So they
agreed to stop complaining, to enjoy the blessings already possessed, and try to deserve them, lest they should be taken away entirely, instead of
increased, and I believe they were never disappointed or sorry that they took the old woman’s advice.’ ‘Now, Marmee, that is very cunning of
you to turn our own stories against us, and give us a sermon instead of a romance’ cried Meg. ‘I like that kind of sermon. It’s the sort Father
used to tell us,’ said Beth thoughtfully, putting the needles straight on Jo’s cushion. ‘I don’t complain near as much as the others do, and I shall
be more careful than ever now, for I’ve had warning from Susies’s downfall,’ said Amy morally. ‘We needed that lesson, and we won’t
forget it. If we do so, you just say to us, as old Chloe did in UNCLE TOM, ‘Tink ob yer marcies, chillen ‘Tink ob yer marcies’’ added Jo,
who could not, for the life of her, help getting morsel of fun out of the little sermon, though she took it to heart as much as any of them. p.46-
48
Josephine “Jo” March consistently struggles with the boundaries 19
th
century society placed on females, including not being able to fight in war, not being able to attend college.
The society at that time believes that a man is able to join the war not a woman. But the fact Jo wants to help in the war as the nurse to help the victim or even she can fight with her
father. For the education, a man is more proper to get the high level education than a woman. Because in this case people believe that man will be the one to earn money in a family and
woman just stay at home and waiting for her husband. Jo wants to show that a woman has a good think that education must be equal for woman and man or maybe better.
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…And it’s worse than ever now, for I’m dyin to go and fight with Papa. And I can only stay home and knit, like a poky old woman’ p.8
‘Don’t I wish I could go as a drummer, a vivan—what’s its name? Or a nurse, so I could be near him and help him,’ exclaimed Jo, with a groan.
p.13
‘I suppose you are going to college soon? I see you pegging away at your books, no, I mean studying hard.’ And Jo blushed at the dreadful
‘pegging’ which had escaped her.Laurie smiled but didn’t seem shocked, and answered with a shrug. ‘Not for a year or two. I won’t go before
seventeen, anyway.’ ‘Aren’t you but fifteen?’ asked Jo, looking at the tall lad, whom she had imagined seventeen already. ‘Sixteen, next
month.’ ‘How I wish I was going to college You don’t look as if you liked it.p.33
As Jo ever said before that she wants to be the man while Mr. March gone to the battle, Jo also wants to be independent woman, as she said below.
‘I don’t like favors, they oppress and make me feel like a slave. I’d rather do everything for myself, and be perfectly independent.’ p.283
Jo always wants to be a boy, not by the physically appearance but being a woman with no difference between man and woman. She thinks that woman can do what man can do
and man has one thing he can not do as giving birth to a child. Jo wants woman speak when woman have to speak something that is true. As seen below Jo wants girls show when they
disapprove men.
‘But I think girls ought to show when they disapprove of young men, and how can they do it except by their manners? Preaching does not do
any good, as I know to my sorrow, since I’ve had Teddie to manage. But there are many little ways in which I can influence him without a word,
and I say we ought to do it to others if we can…. ‘I can’t argue about it I only know that it’s the way of the world, and
people who set themselves against it only get laughed at for their pains. I don’t like reformers, and I hope you never try to be one.’ p.281
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Because too independent, Jo has been left by Aunt March and choose Amy to France. Jo feel it is not fair Amy can go to France and learn to paint while Jo just wait and find her
own way to be a great writer. But the fact she really wants to go to France with Aunt March because she has being a companion for her aunt longer than her sister Amy.
‘I’m afraid it’s impossible, Jo. Aunt says Amy, decidedly, and it is not for us to dictate when she offers such a favor.’ ‘It’s always so. Amy has
all the fun and I have all the work. It isn’t fair, oh, it isn’t fair’ cried Jo passionately.
‘I’m afraid it’s partly your own fault, dear. When Aunt spoke to me the other day, she regretted your blunt manners and too independent spirit,
and here she writes, as if quoting something you had said—‘I planned at first to ask Jo, but as ‘favors burden her’, and she ‘hates French’,
I think I won’t venture to invite her. Amy is more docile, will make a good companion for Flo, and receive gratefully any help the trip may
give her.’ p.292-293
As a new mother, Meg loved it very much. She loved to do the house keeping and loved being a wife for her husband. Meg still runs her role to be a good mother fir her little
family. Meg has the great jobs to be a good mother for her children and be a good wife for her husband.
‘Yes, Mother, I’m sure of that,’ said Meg, listening respectfully to the little lecture, for the best of women will hold forth upon the all absorbing
subject of house keeping. ‘Do you know I like this room most of all in my baby house,’ added Meg, a minute after, as they went upstairs and
she looked into her well-stored linen closet. p.231
Jo is a fighter for March family. …. But, you see, Jo wasn’t a heroine, she was only struggling human
girl like hundreds of others, and she just acted out her nature, being sad, cross, listless, or energetic, as the mood suggested. It’s highly virtuous to
say we’ll be good, but we can’t do it all at once, and it takes a long pull, a strong
pull, and a pull all together before some of us even get our feet set in the right way. Jo had got so far, she was learning to do her duty, and to feel
unhappy if she did not, but to do it cheerfully, ah, that was another thing She had often said she wanted to do something splendid, no matter how
hard, and now she had her wish, for what could be more beautiful that to
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devote her life to Father and Mother, trying to make home as happy to them as they had to her?
And if difficulties were necessary to increase the splendor of the effort, what could be harder for a restless, ambitious girl than to give up her
own hopes, plans, and desires, and cheerfully live for others? p.411
Money come to the people who still waiting for it because God still has plan for everyone who wants to wait. After the death of the rich Aunt March, she gives Plumfield, a
big house to be run by Jo. Being not so greedy, Jo simply change the use of the house being a school for little lady, a good, happy and homelike school. Finally she decides that she would
like to open a boys home with her and the Professor as teachers. The home would provide a place for both rich and poor boys so that each could learn and grow up in a giving
environment. In the nineteenth-century, running a big house and change it into a school like is still unbelievable because woman at that time are supposed to be a good mother for her
own children not to run any school like that. The second year began rather soberly, for their prospects did not
brighten, and Aunt March died suddenly. But when their first sorrow was over—for they loved the old lady in spite of her sharp tongue—they
found they had cause for rejoicing, for she had left Plumfield to Jo, which made all sorts of joyful things possible. ‘Boys. I want to open a
school for little lads—a good, happy, homelike school, with me to take care of them and Fritz to teach them.’ ‘That’s a truly Joian plan for you
Isn’t that just like her?’ cried Laurie, appealing to the family, who looked as much surprised as he.
‘I like it,’ said Mrs. March decidedly. ‘So do I,’ added her husband, who welcomed the thought of a chance for trying the Socratic method of
education on modern youth. ‘It will be an immense care for Jo,’ said Meg, stroking the head or her
one all-absorbing son. ‘Jo can do it, and be happy in it. It’s a splendid idea.
Tell us all about it,’ cried Mr. Laurence, who had been longing to lend the lovers a hand, but knew that they would refuse his
help. ‘I knew you’d stand by me, sir. Amy does too—I see it in her eyes,
though she prudently waits to turn it over in her mind before she speaks. Now, my dear people,’ continued Jo earnestly, ‘just understand that this
isn’t a new idea of mine, but a long cherished plan. Before my Fritz came, I used to think how, when I’d made my fortune, and no one
needed me at home, I’d hire a big house, and pick up some poor, forlorn little lads who hadn’t any mothers, and take care of them, and make life
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jolly for them before it was too late. I see so many going to ruin for want of help at the right minute, I love so to
do anything for them, I seem to feel their wants, and sympathize with their troubles, and oh, I should so like to be a mother to them’ p.454-
456
4.2 Women can work
