Pre 1920s Fiction

Below is an extract from a fiction novel called ‘Little Women’ written by Louisa May Alcott in 1832 - 1888

Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents, grumbled Jo, lying on the rug.

It's so dreadful to be poor! sighed Meg, looking down at her old dress.

I don't think it's fair for some girls to have plenty of pretty things, and other girls nothing at all, added little Amy, with an injured sniff.

We've got Father and Mother, and each other, said Beth contentedly from her corner.

The four young faces on which the firelight shone brightened at the cheerful words, but darkened again as Jo said sadly, We haven't got Father, and shall not have him for a long time. She didn't say perhaps never, but each silently added it, thinking of Father far away, where the fighting was.

Nobody spoke for a minute; then Meg said in an altered tone, You know the reason Mother proposed not having any presents this Christmas was because it is going to be a hard winter for everyone; and she thinks we ought not to spend money for pleasure, when our men are suffering so in the army. We can't do much, but we can make our little sacrifices, and ought to do it gladly. But I am afraid I don't And Meg shook her head, as she thought regretfully of all the pretty things she wanted.

I would say that the most interesting thing about this text is the way that women (the two main characters Meg, Amy, Beth and Jo) seem to be portrayed. They are portrayed to be speaking in a very typical way that girls of their era would have been expected to speak. The whole text is very stereotypical. Their speech is spoken in Standard English, and their language forces them to sound very prim, proper and polite. ‘It’s so dreadful to be poor!’. Dreadful sounds very dramatic, and further makes stereotypes the girls almost into the clichéd ‘women in distress’. The way they are described as speaking the sort of things they say are also interesting and significant – ‘Sighed Meg’, ‘Grumbled Jo’, ‘Said Beth contentedly’. These are all stereotypically the sorts of ways in which women might speak – generally either very softly or whilst moaning. Back in this era, women would have been portrayed in the way that they would have been expected to act, which looking back now is extremely prejudice and sexist.