Section 4
Good afternoon. Today I'd like to continue our discussion of the lives of prominent American writers by talking about Louis Alcott, one of the best-known 19'" century writers.
Alcott has known for her moralistic girls novels. But she was a much more serious individual than those novels might lead one to belief.
She was born in 1832, the daughter of Bronson Alcott, who was one of the founders of the Transcendentalist Movement.
Bronson Alcott was a philosopher but not a provider. And the family lived close to poverty.
From the early age, Louis was determined to find a way to improve her family's economic situation.
As a teenager, she worked to support her family by taking on a variety of low-paying jobs including teacher, seamstress and household servant.
Alcott also started writing when she was young.
She wrote her first novel when she was just seventeen years old, although it wasn't published until many years after her death.
It was called "the inheritance".
In 1861, the Civil War broke out. Alcott worked as a volunteer sewing uniforms and bandages for soldiers.
The following year, she enlisted as an army nurse. She spent the war years in Washington.
Nursing wounded soldiers at a military hospital.
While working at the hospital she wrote many letters to her family at home and Massachusetts.
After the war, she turned the letters into a book, which was published under the title "Hospital Sketches".
She also wrote numerous romantic stories which she sold to magazines.
Around the same time, she was offered the opportunity to travel to Europe as the companion to an invalid.
When she returned home from Europe in 1866, she found her family's still in financial difficulty and in need of money.
So she went back to writing. Her great (big) break came in 1868, with the publication of her first novel for girls "little woman".
The novel achieved instant success and the public wanted more.
From then on, Alcott supported herself and her family by writing novels for girls.
It's wasn't the writing that she dreamed of doing, but it turned into a good income.
Alcott took care of her family for the rest of her life.
In 1878, her youngest sister May got married.
A year later, May died after giving birth to a daughter.
Louis Alcott raised her sister's orphan child.
In 1882, Bronson Alcott suffered stroke.
Soon after that, Louis Alcott set up a house for him, her niece, her sister Anna and Anna's 2 sons in Boston.
Her mother was no longer living by this time.
Alcott was still writing novels for girls including 2 sequels to "Little Woman", " little Man" and "Joe's Boys", the latter was published in 1886.
Louis Alcott has suffered poor health ever since she contracted typhoid fever while working as a war nurse.
She died in March in 1888, at the age of 55. She was buried in Concord, Massachusetts.