Talk:Louisa May Alcott

New image

i replaced Image:louisa_may_alcott_stamp.JPG with a new image. If someone would like to place the stamp image somewhere else in the article, please do. Kingturtle 00:01 22 May 2003 (UTC)

Boston link

The Boston link could do with updating to point to the appropriate Boston article, but I'm not sure which it is. --John 23:29, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

mercury poisoning

Alcott wrote through the rest of her life, finally succumbing to the aftereffects of mercury poisoning contracted during her Civil War service

This could benefit from some explanation -- what was she doing during the war to contract mercury poisoning? Something to do with the treatment of syphilis perhaps? Flapdragon 7 July 2005 16:23 (UTC)

Alcott actually contracted Typhoid fever while serving as a nurse in the civil war. She had continuing ill health for the rest of her life. Jgood898 17:00, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

This needs a citation. The article is sadly lacking in detail - and some of it may not be at all accurate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Levalley (talk • contribs) 05:31, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Dangerous for little minds?

The article says: 'and were later referred to as "dangerous for little minds" in Alcott's own novel Little Women'

I have found no such a reference in the book (searching in the electronic text by "dangerous" or "minds").May be the sentence comes from another book?--Bradomín 12:58, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

This topic is the centerpiece of chapter 34. I replaced the misquote. Jtdunlop (talk) 17:56, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Clean up!

This page needs to be cleaned up-- I don't have time now, but I'll check later if need be. Diimmortales 22:18, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

You're a lot like me - 2 or more years will go by before you find the time. I don't know what your time constraints are, but someone should assign some graduate student somewhere to rewrite this - surely there are still people studying literature who need a go at practicing their craft in writing an encyclopedia article? If not, Wikipedia is doomed. You and I can't edit everything ourselves, Diimortales. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Levalley (talk • contribs) 05:32, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Bibliography and dates

I've cleaned up the bibliography - put it in chronological order, bracketed the dates, separated those she published under another name - I double checked everything on the web and yes before I'd realised it, I'd changed some of the dates. As far as I can find from my research, for some books there is no definitive date as it seems to skip between years depending on which reference source you use. So by all means change them back but I'm not sure what the point is. I also removed the direct links to the text of the books as these are covered in the external links section - where most of the books can be found online.

I've also added a general clean up tag to highlight the page to other editors Madmedea 20:05, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Hey i think this article is really factual about Louisa May Alcott's life. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.189.252.203 (talk) 23:14, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Should this page be protected?

There is so much vandalism on this page. Can it be protected so that only registered editors can edit it? — scribblingwoman 15:57, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

I just requested semi-protection. Maybe we'll have a break from the silliness! — scribblingwoman 19:37, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Civil War Volunteer work

I know that L.M.A. Volunteered in the civil war, but this article states nothing about what she did! (I was looking for that for an assignment.) Could someone please find out and pop in a section, possibly titled "War Times" or similar.

Much Appreciated,
Vikedal 15:41, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Really needs work

Louisa May Alcott was (and is) a major American novelist and deserves better than this article. Thanks are certainly due to the people who did some cleanup on the facutal side, but a far more comprehensive biography and critical assessment of her work are needed. Grammar, syntax, and style need a complete overhaul. Alcott was a consummate writer whose command of the language puts this article to shame. No film version has ever done justice to Alcott's work; let's see if we can do better in print.

Litlady 22:42, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Louisa-may-alcott-200x292.jpg

Image:Louisa-may-alcott-200x292.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 18:32, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Imageekdo.jpg

Image:Imageekdo.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 19:02, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Joji.jpg

Image:Joji.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 19:26, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Nationality: New England...?

Why does it say that New England is one of her nationalities? I don't recall New England ever being a nation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.78.10.47 (talk) 20:20, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Married?

was she ever married — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.130.193.254 (talk) 19:52, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

No. She had at least one serious sutor, but she dedicated her life to the support of her aging father. She very possibly might have married if she'd lived after his death. Saxophobia (talk) 13:04, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I need to source this, but there was an interview of hers in which she answers why she was never married- she says she has never fallen in love with any men, but has had fallen in love with a great many girls. So, I think that just about says it./ —Preceding unsigned comment added by Clodya (talk • contribs) 05:28, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

RE: << I think that just about says it. >> Mmmm-hmmmm. Deal with it, world.Codenamemary (talk) 17:31, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Nope, you don't understand the period, or what expressions of that type meant. Reading through her letters should help explain, and why she never married the man who was her great love. Now if you want to talk about people like Anna Elizabeth Dickinson, who knows? 12.201.7.201 (talk) 23:04, 16 September 2017 (UTC)

Lupus

The Wikipedia article on lupus says Alcott had the disease - it should be mentioned here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.97.18.101 (talk) 20:28, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Then the wikipedia article on lupus might need correcting. Alcott was never diagnosed with lupus during her lifetime. Doctors today speculate that she might have had the disease, but short of exhuming her body in order to do tests that would confirm that diagnosis, all they can do is make an educated guess based on her symptoms. So if a mention of lupus is included in this article, it should state it's a speculative diagnosis and not a confirmed one. LoneStarWriter82 (talk) 20:31, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

If it's wrong or unconfirmed it shouldn't be in either article. There is however no one who will notice and change it, is my bet. I hope to be proved wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Levalley (talk • contribs) 05:37, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

There's an article in a medical journal arguing that Alcott's health symptoms aren't consistent with acute mercury poisoning, and that lupus is the most likely suspect. True, doctor's will never know for sure, but I'd trust modern medicine's analysis over 19th century speculation. More recent biographies of Alcott have adopted lupus as her likely cause of death. I've updated the article to reflect this.--Bkwillwm (talk) 23:40, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Critical discussion still needed

At least a few quotes from critics -- there is not much hint of the nature of her works or appeal here.Geneven (talk) 22:39, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Alright, I'll bite ...

How in the merry hell does someone dead for a century and a quarter have an "official website?" "Official" according to whom? louisamayalcott.org might serve in the external links section, but not otherwise.  RGTraynor  07:34, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

List of sources I plan on using to improve this article

• The selected letters of Louisa May Alcott By Louisa May Alcott, Daniel Shealy
• Louisa May Alcott: the contemporary reviews By Beverly Lyon Clark
• Louisa May Alcott: Her Life, Letters, and Journals By Ednah Cheney
• Louisa May Alcott By Susan Cheever
• Alternative Alcott By Louisa May Alcott, Elaine Showalter
• Louisa May Alcott: a biography : with an introduction to the new edition By Madeleine B. Stern
• The Limits of Sympathy: Louisa May Alcott and the Sentimental Novel Glenn Hendler Published by: Oxford University Press
• Louisa May Alcott: Success and the sorrow of self‐denial Eugenia Kaledin
• The Louisa May Alcott encyclopedia By Gregory Eiselein, Anne K. Phillips
• American Bloomsbury: Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller ... By Susan Cheever
• May Alcott: a modern biography By Martha Saxton

Katierenee88 (talk) 21:40, 5 March 2012 (UTC)katierenee88

Be sure that you do not use primary sources, such as letters and diaries when writing this article. Wadewitz (talk) 18:56, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Outline of possible edits to this page for my class assignment.

I. Intro

A. In the introductory paragraph before it talks about the work Louisa May Alcott is known for, I want to put some information. I would also like to add a few other things towards the end.

1. Where she grew up.

2. If she went on to do anything else

3. When and where she passed away.

II. “Childhood and Early Work” section

A. I would edit things, like her father’s birthday she is born on, and maybe even the quote from him to a friend about his daughter’s birth. It’s a nice touch, but seems out of place. Even so, the quote should come after the location of her birth.

B. I would edit and change around things to put them more eloquently, maybe putting paragraph changes in.

C. There is also some copyediting to be done.

D. I would add more about her and her father’s relationship, which seemed to be close, but not healthy.

E. I would condense the places they moved into one paragraph, not multiple

F. I would add information about her sisters and how they ended up, seeing as they were integral to her most famous story.

G. I would move the short paragraph “as an adult” to the next section because it doesn’t fit.

III. “Literary Success and Later Life” section

A. I would talk a bit more about how hard/not hard it was for her to be published.

B. Where it talks of her advocacy of women’s suffrage, this is where I would move the paragraph from the previous section about her abolitionism and feminism.

IV. I am debating on adding a new section called “Legacy”

A. Reasons being:

1. Her books are very famous and studied in schools and beloved by many.

2. I want to see how they have impacted us today slightly, for I have found articles on such things.

B. I would also discuss here how her work was received then and now.

V. I am also debating on adding a section called “Adaptions”

A. Little Women had been made into 3 movies over the years (1933, 1949, and 1994) along with multiple TV series (one called “Good Wives)

B. Jo’s Boys has also been a TV series.

The sources I will officially be using (as of now) are:

• Louisa May Alcott: A Personal Biography by Susan Cheever
• Alternative Alcott By Louisa May Alcott by Elaine Showalter
• Louisa May Alcott: The Contemporary Reviews by Beverly Lyon Clark
• Louisa May Alcott: Success and the sorrow of self‐denial by Eugenia Kaledin
• The Louisa May Alcott Encyclopedia by Gregory Eiselein, Anne K. Phillips

If any other sources occur to me, I will add them to this list. Katierenee88

This is an excellent list of changes! I like your idea of an "Adaptations" section - many readers will come to the article looking for that information. I look forward to reading your improvements! Wadewitz (talk) 18:06, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Feedback I agree that you're on the right track here and I think it is definitely wise to sort out purely biographical data from other parts of this article--that is, it's a good idea to have some chronological description of her life (where she was born, schools she attended, when and how she died) and then also have a separate discussion of her legacy and themes in her work. I would like to initially caution you that sections about adaptations are completely fine (and a good idea!), but you want to be careful about creating a long list of every single adaptation of her work, as there are likely to be many. There are guidelines about trivial information and simply put, it makes for a better article to focus on biographical content and literary themes than long lists of adaptations made after the fact. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 03:46, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Peer Review

You have a really solid start to your page. There is a lot of depth in this article and about Alcotts life. At first glance at the article I think that the two sections there are could be made into their own. I like your idea about the more eloquent look that paragraph breaks would give the article. There is a lot of good information so I think you should be hesitant at what you delete and decide to keep for use. Great start and should be a great article Dmbfan85 (talk) 20:45, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree with User:Dmbfan85 that paragraph breaks would improve the visual of the article and the readability of it. I was looking for more in the lead though. I'm not exactly sure what I would add, but I felt like I wanted more. The second list of resources looks like a good start. I definetly feel like there needs to be more sections or at least a better breakdown of the sections already in place. Crazykaystar (talk) 21:52, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

These are good suggestions! Nice work so far! Wadewitz (talk) 13:58, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Comments by User:Ssilvers

Hi. I took a look at the article, made some copy edits and fixed some of the reference formatting. I indicated some places that need a reference. I also moved all of the 1850s and 1860s information together chronologically and eliminated some repetition. Finally, I left a few hidden comments for you in the text. To see them, hit the edit tab, and you will see them in CAPS. After you address the hidden comments, just delete them. Here are a few random thoughts:

• Punctuation always goes *before* the <ref> tag.
• In discussing the content of novels and other works, we usually use present tense. For example: The novel *is* set in New England. However, in discussing the history of the work, we use past tense: The novel *was* well-received.
• You don’t need to describe someone as "noted", because everyone who is blue-linked should be a famous person. If you want to explain in what way they are noted, you can give the specifics: "She won the Pulitzer Prize in 2004 for her novel X".
• The WP:LEAD section should be an overview of the article, containing a brief summary of the highlights. The first sentence or two of the Lead usually state what the person is most famous for. You don't need to repeat, in the Lead, most of the details that are given below, but rather select the most important facts. I took a crack at it, but as the article expands, the Lead will need to be adjusted. I usually recommend that people worry about the Lead later, towards the end of their editing process, after they have expanded the article.

In general, the writing is good, and it looks like you are really picking up Wikipedia. Make sure that every reference or cite includes all of the following information, to the extent that it is available: author name (last name first), title of the article, the name of the publication, the name of the publisher, the date of publication (or just the year if it's a book), the url or page number, and the access date if it is an online source. See WP:CITE. Feel free to ask me on my talk page if you have questions about any of this. Happy editing! -- Ssilvers (talk) 02:22, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

By the way, I notice that an anonymous editor recently removed this information from the article without any explanation. I do not feel strongly either way about it. If someone feels that the information really should be in the article, feel free to re-insert it, giving an explanation on this page as to why you think the info is useful (and referencing the talk page in your edit summary). Then, if anyone minds, they can discuss it here. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:23, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Categorization

Alcott is in Category:19th-century American novelists. There is no reason to put her in any parents of that category when she is in that caegory.John Pack Lambert (talk) 16:49, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

WeRelate

A record for this person has been created in the WeRelate genealogical website. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 01:12, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to one external link on Louisa May Alcott. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add {{cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add {{nobots|deny=InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/20120303204115/http://www.vu.union.edu/~mcguirem/lastwords.html to http://www.vu.union.edu/~mcguirem/lastwords.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Y An editor has reviewed this edit and fixed any errors that were found.

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers. —^{cyberbot II}_{Talk to my owner:Online} 02:58, 27 August 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Louisa May Alcott. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080407143910/http://ww3.startribune.com/blogs/oldnews/archives/175 to http://ww3.startribune.com/blogs/oldnews/archives/175

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 18 January 2022).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 03:31, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Why the move?

@AprilShowersBringMayFlowers: - why move the article? --John (User:Jwy/talk) 15:04, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 17 August 2020 and 10 December 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Silberhornmf.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 00:17, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Mgs1234.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 02:53, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Alcott's gender

This historian found evidence that Louis Alcott was actually a trans man: https://twitter.com/peytonology/status/1516612189687324673 . Therefore, the article should be updated to talk about this - as well as including Alcott's actual name and pronouns. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.0.35.8 (talk) 01:45, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

That person is not a historian but a novelist, and Twitter is not a reliable source. Schazjmd (talk) 14:59, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

I concur this is a pretty significant bit of research from Peyton. While Twitter isn't a reliable source, he does hint at sources which I'm sure he expands upon more explicitly elsewhere. ZoeB (talk) 16:44, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

Yes. I think these sources should be investigated, with Alcott's page amended if his sources are reliable. I'd do it but it's late where I am and I need to sleep. 92.0.35.8 (talk) 21:42, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

(As in, I'd investigate the sources myself were it not late here) 92.0.35.8 (talk) 21:43, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

She was not trans. It is misogynistic as hell to act like gender non conforming women were men. She was not like James Barry or Billy Tipton who actually lived as men, she lived as a woman. 47.147.26.14 (talk) 00:36, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

The tweeter said that Alcott called herself a man and was referred to as such by her family - which is different from being gender-non-conforming. 92.0.35.8 (talk) 01:55, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

Maybe it had to do with the extremely misogynistic times she was living in. Also how do we even know to trust that person. All /i know is that I am tired of hearing that these trailblazing women were really men. 47.147.26.14 (talk) 15:01, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

Also, I was looking into bios on Alcott and every single one refers to her as a woman. If this wiki is updated with calling her a man, I will completely lose respect for wikipedia. It is completely ahistorical to label her a mann. Sure, if they are like Alan Hart or James Barry gender them as men. But even if Alcott had gender dysphoria--which you can't prove, she lived her life as a woman. 47.147.26.14 (talk) 15:11, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

If these speculations are ever published in a reliable source, at best it would be a mention in the article. Unless it becomes widely accepted scholarship, it would not change how Wikipedia refers to her in the article. Schazjmd (talk) 15:27, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

I would like to say that even though we now know the Peyton was lying, your two previous comments above this are transphobic and deeply upset me (as a trans woman). I'm not upset at you, but saying that "even if Alcott had gender dysphoria, she lived her life as a woman" is transphobic. As your statement boils down to 'even if they were trans, they lived in the closet all their life and therefore their actual gender shouldn't be acknowledged' (Alcott wasn't trans, but this goes for any figure). And it was transphobic to say "which you can't prove" - because you said this before we had finished discussing whether she was or wasn't trans - rather than considering the historical evidence knowing that either could be true. Additionally, you said "if they are like Alan Hart or James Barry" - but if they hadn't come out of the closet when they were alive, it wouldn't be fair for you to have a different attitude if historians retroactively found evidence of them being trans. I am not trying to start a flame war. I only want to tell you my feelings on this, and hope u will take on board my criticism in the future :) 92.0.35.8 (talk) 00:51, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Everyone sit down. Peyton's a liar.

Peyton's a liar, a damned liar, and a long-held liar at that. This isn't the first bullshit he's made up and it won't be the last. See here.

For anyone who's gonna jump in with "it's transphobic to not assume someone could be trans back then" – I am trans, and we have examples of trans people from back then. Alcott isn't one of them.

The statement that "lou alcott simply did not live his life as a woman" simply isn't true. We have examples of people we could probably call trans from centuries ago, such as James Barry, but Lou Alcott, whatever her relationship with gender was, really doesn't fall into this category. We can acknowledge that Alcott had, for the time, an unusual relationship with her gender and sexuality, but the leap that Alcott was a trans man is just that. A leap.

For anyone to call Peyton a historian is ridiculous; he isn't. The fact no-one on this thread has thought "hey, I wonder what Peyton beachdeath's track record is on reliability" depresses me. Peyton's thread is WP:SYNTHESIS on steroids, and it's nonsense to add this synthesis to the article, as it steamrollers over the existing truth of Alcott's relationship with gender and sexuality.

Peyton's being doing this shit for years, and this is the latest in a long string of bullshit.--Ineffablebookkeeper (talk) ({{ping}} me!) 20:17, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

I think you might be able to get your point across with less vitriol.--Bbb23 (talk) 20:24, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

@Bbb23: I'm sorry; I'm tired and stressed, and I don't like seeing stuff like this pop up, cus more often than not, it sticks around for years, with various editors turning up just to add it in over and over again, despite editor warnings. It's like looking into a future filled with tedious edit-warring over stuff that isn't even true.--Ineffablebookkeeper (talk) ({{ping}} me!) 22:04, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

...So any thoughts on this now that Peyton's published an extensively fact-checked guest essay in the New York Times in which the sitting president of the Louisa May Alcott Society agrees that Alcott "never fit a binary sex-gender model?" Or does Tumblr user marzipanandminutiae hold more weight here? 174.91.176.3 (talk) 19:21, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Why do you think an opinion essay is "extensively fact-checked"? Schazjmd (talk) 19:31, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Because the New York Times extensively fact-checks guest essays. This isn't the Huffington Post. Peyton Thomas cites and interviews Pulitzer Prize-winning Alcott scholars in the piece. So, again: why are we deferring to an anonymous Tumblr blog and the above editor who clearly has a years-old grudge against the author of the piece? 174.91.176.3 (talk) 13:31, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

"Why are we deferring to an anonymous tumblr blog." Peyton is a twitterist and tumblr person, not a historian. He took the quotes from LMA & real scholars (including the LMA society) totally out of context. The NY fact-checkers do not do particular in-depth scanning of purported facts. These same fact checkers let through horrible opinions on trans people. I highly suggest you pick up scholarship on LMA instead of parroting a racist rich white boy chasing clout. Kleopatra I Syra (talk) 08:32, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Also to note - a Pultizer Prize does not make a writer correct. Stacy Schiff won a Pulitzer Award for a book on Vera and she is widely condemned by essentially every scholar of every topic she writes on. John Matteson, the writer cited (who Peyton also misquoted) is well-known for being a fairly nasty person and dismissive of primary source material (including Louisa's papers where she says she wanted to marry) when it does not fit his narrative, especially when being an apologist for Louisa's selfish and mentally abusive father.

Dismissing an "anonymous tumblr blog" because they do not have Peyton's wealth and connections is pretty petty and...super elitist.

I highly suggest keeping your chronically online beef to yourself. Wikipedia is for scholarly consensus, not for public grifting. Kleopatra I Syra (talk) 07:30, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, again, the president of the Louisa May Alcott Society AND her Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer concurring in the New York Times that Alcott "did not fit a binary sex-gender model," in a fact-checked article supported by extensive archival evidence, is far closer to "scholarly consensus" than your bizarre Tumblr grudge or your opinions about Matteson's "nastiness." It's not elitist; it's a fact! Eyes off the pot, kettle!

Plus, "Peyton's wealth?" "Rich white boy?" 174.92.48.180 (talk) 02:52, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

Oh, and the NYT article didn't take quotes from "real scholars" out of context - Peyton conducted original interviews for the piece. Maybe read the piece before you complain about it? 174.92.48.180 (talk) 02:55, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

I actually think you are full of it and have no interest in real research or the truth here. I am a trained historian. Matteson is known for making xenophobic and fatphobic comments. You and I both know what Peyton is known for. I highly suggest you look at what Matteson and the other scholars, including the president of the LMA Society actually clarified in other articles. None of Peyton Beachdeath's archival resesearch was original or scholarly. It is time for you to grow up. Kleopatra I Syra (talk) 22:39, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

For future editors, here are receipts on Peyton being an abuser, violent racist, and liar. https://www.tumblr.com/1892/189991136363/another-beachdeath-callout?source=share Kleopatra I Syra (talk) 22:47, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

A Tumblr callout is not a scholarly source. 174.92.48.180 (talk) 21:35, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

To even point out one omission from the article, Peyton purposely misquotes/misuses this quote from LMA.

The actual quote: "I have often thought that I may have been a horse before I was Louisa Alcott. As a long-limbed child, I had all a horse's delight in racing through the fields and tossing my head to sniff the morning air. Now, I am more than half-persuaded that I am a man’s soul put by some freak of nature into a woman’s body … because I have fallen in love with so many pretty girls and never once the least bit with any man."

(For context, this is from an interview with her friend and fellow writer Louise Chandler Moulton for a larger biographical work entitled "Our Famous Women: An Authorized Record of the Lives and Deeds of Distinguished American Women of Our Times." A free copy is available to read here on Harvard Library's website.)

In the first half of the quote, Alcott sets up the type of metaphor she uses in the second, which is why it's so important contextually when you want to interpret the second half. Now, in the first half, it's obvious that Alcott is not saying that she literally identifies as a horse. Rather, that in girlhood, she partook in activities that were attributed to horses ("racing through the fields" and "tossing my head to sniff the morning air"). In the second half, she uses the same device. She's not saying that she identifies as a man, she's saying that she partakes in activities attributed to men ("fall[ing] in love with...pretty girls")."

https://www.reddit.com/r/SapphoAndHerFriend/comments/wo84gw/louisa_may_alcott_author_of_pretty_women_could/

I agree that she did not live in the "binary" (I myself am non-binary, they/them, lesbian) and LMA often refers to herself as a woman in her letters and diaries which are omitted by Peyton, who is attempting to force LMA into the sexual binary. As pointed out by Gregory Eiselein in the very NYT article, LMA's relation with gender was very in line with transcendentalist thinking. In her letters and diaries, LMA dismissively and sarcastically refers to men as “lords of creation.”!

Additionally, I find it bizarre and lesbophobic of Peyton to dismiss LMA's own words about her possible attraction to women. According to Eiselein, the LMA Society president, in one of his scholarly papers (Sentimental Discourse and the Bisexual Erotics of Work), LMA demonstrated her BISEXUALITY in "Work". Peyton seems to imply LMA was a heterosexual woman or gay trans man. Because women and women being attracted to women is gross, right?

From Niina, the host of the Little Women Podcast and a historian, makes this interesting observation:

"I think it was in the biography “Louisa May Alcott the writer behind Little Women” by Harriet Reisen, Reisen wrote that Alcott, often wanted to lead the interviews away from the topics she was asked about, for example if she was asked why she wasn’t married or why she didn’t have a family. She would joke around and sometimes say unflattering things about herself. Susan Bailey has also pointed out the same thing about Louisa. She seemed to have been quite embarrased sometimes by the fact that she wasn’t married and even sad about it, but she was too proud to talk about that in interviews.

Of course when we read Louisa’s diaries, we know that she did fall in love at least twice perhaps three times, my guessings are Henry David Thoreau and Laddie Wisniewski, and of course Emmerson. One of my friends pointed this out to me, if you read any Alcott book and you spot Henry David Thoreau there, you know that it wasn’t such a mere crush.

There is also the quote in her journals, that Louisa wrote after Niles had asked her to write a book for girls and she wrote that, she doesn’t know any girls and doesn’t like girls, she liked only boys and and her sisters. So it’s pretty much in contradiction :D

When people asked her about her relationship with Laddie, she always praised him, but in her letters between her sister, they are often quite critical about him. So what it comes to “ interviews” of LMA, in the back of my head I always wonder if she is telling the truth. Being bi myself, I think she might have been bi and confused about it, but people shouldn’t take her always so literally, without knowing the context."

Littllewomenpodcast.tumblr.com/post/725347225347178496/what-are-your-thoughts-on-this-louisa-quote-from

It is also likely that Bhaer is based on Henry David Thoreau, the man that LMA loved. LMA wrote in her diaries and letters of her desire to marry and have children. https://littlewomenpodcast.tumblr.com/post/675885956783603712/what-do-you-make-of-the-of-repeated-quote-than-lam

A few other notes: "A. "Lou" was her family nickname, not a Preferred Gender-Neutral Name(TM) the way we might think of it today, and it was a common diminunative of Louisa.

B. She also referred to herself as a woman and exclusively used she/her pronouns, so I will be respecting her right to self-determination just as I would a living person's.

C. According to one of my friends who is an Alcott scholar, her niece and nephews did not refer to her as their father or Papa. She compared herself to a father figure in the sense of financially supporting them, in a few letters, but they called her Aunt (her niece Lulu specifically called her "Aunt Wee," from her own earliest fumbling attempts to pronounce "Louisa").

[LMA also refers to herself as "grandma" in her letters and diaries.]

Would she be a trans man given today's range of more socially accepted options? Maybe. I'm not discounting the possibility and I think the fact that some of her experiences resonate so strongly with trans men should be acknowledged. But in her own context- at a time when some AFAB people did transition, like Charley Parkhurst or Albert Cashier -she ultimately understood herself as a woman. Something I think we should respect instead of acting like she was too stupid or ignorant to interpret her own experience of gender."

Finally, the quote from Matteson is from his book and is taken out of context by Peyton in the NYT article.

Now, here is a bibliography of everything I have read, and I suggest you pick it up yourself (and anyone interested in contributing to this article or learning more on Alcott):

Primary Sources:

The Journals Of Louisa May Alcott By Louisa May Alcott, Joel Myerson

The Selected Letters by Madeleine B. Stern, Louisa May Alcott, Daniel Shealy, Joel Myerson

Little Women Abroad: The Alcott Sisters' Letters from Europe, 1870-1871 by May Alcott Nieriker, Louisa May Alcott, Daniel Shealy

Alcott in Her Own Time: A Biographical Chronicle of Her LIfe, Drawn from Recollections, Interviews, and Memoirs by Family, Friends, and Associates by Daniel Shealy

Lis Adams' new and wonderful Little Women Letters to Laurie: The Alcott Family Correspondence with Alfred Whitman, 1858 - 1891

Secondary Sources:

Little Women: An Annotated Edition by Louisa May Alcott, as annotated by Daniel Shealy

Louisa May Alcott: Critical Insights by Gregory Eiselein and Anne K. Phillips

Louisa May Alcott by Harriet Reisen

The Louisa May Alcott Encyclopedia By Gregory Eiselein and Anne K. Phillips

American Bloomsbury: Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Henry David Thoreau: Their Lives, Their Loves, Their Workb By Susan Cheever

May Alcott a Memoir by Caroline Ticknor

Little Women at 150 by Daniel Shealy

Meg, Jo, Beth, Amy: The Story of Little Women and Why It Still Matters by Anne Boyd Rioux

Little Women: Critical Insights by Anne K. Phillips, Gregory Eiselein

Christine Doyle

Louisa May Alcott and Charlotte Bronte: Transatlantic TranslationsLouisa May Alcott and Charlotte Bronte: Transatlantic Translations

Scholarly Articles (Commentary Courtesy of Niina):

"Christine Doyle’s “German literature and culture in Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women” is a must-read for every Jo and Friedrich fan on the planet, and one of those essays that very thoroughly explained that Friedrich was definitely not an afterthought. It goes very much in depth to LMA’s germanophilia and her obsession with German literature. Doyle manages to trace both Laurie’s and Friedrich’s character arcs from these stories. It is also a wonderful read for those who wish to understand Laurie’s character better and his origins.

The Alcott’s through thirty years, Letter to Alf Whitman by Elizabeth Bancroft, This essay includes letters between Louisa and one of the real-life Laurie’s Alf Whitman. It also gives a nice glimpse into the lives of the Alcott sisters, and how they pretty much adopted this young boy into their lives (Alf was quite a lot younger than Louisa, but his and May’s age difference was only two years). Great read esp. for pro-Laurie and Amy fans.

“Louisa May Alcott’s New American religion” by Gregory Eiselein. This is a very interesting read about Louisa’s religious views and how her worldview was affected by Christianity through transcendentalism and her fascination for Buddhism and other religions in the east.

The cosmopolitan project by Louisa May Alcott by Laura Dassow Walls. This is another awesome read for Jo and Fritz fans. It goes in-depth into the transnational project of the transcendentalists and their views about “the brotherhood between all nations” and Walls describes how Alcott creates this cosmopolitan atmosphere in her novels, within the mixed-race and mix-cultural marriages, which appear very often in her books.

Wedding Marches By Daniel Shealy. This was one of the first Alcott studies that I ever read and later found out that Shealy is one of the world’s top Alcott scholars. He also made several studies on how Louisa and her publisher Thomas Niles created the “Louisa May Alcott the spinster writer” brand, and how this brand became a burden for Louisa. He has a very realistic take on the marriages of Little Women, it includes very interesting parts from Louisa’s writings that handle her (surprisingly pretty conservative) views related to marriage and love. This was also one of the things that led me to believe @joandfriedrich theory on Louisa (and Jo) being demisexual.

Jo Marries Goethe By Meghan Armknecht. If you have listened to my Goethe episodes this is the main source for that. Armknecht shows how Friedrich and Goethe are very much alike and how Louisa May Alcott, indeed married Jo to her favourite writer..and I love it."

https://littlewomenpodcast.tumblr.com/post/706822727867187200/do-you-have-any-suggestions-for-some-of-the-best

Also:

Sentimental Discourse and the Bisexual Erotics of Work by Gregory Eiselein

The Newness of Little Women by Gregory Eiselein and Anna K. Phillips (and this whole series for the Women's Studies Journal)

“Who are your heroes? Thomas Carlyle and Louisa May Alcott" by Clayton Carlyle Tarr

“Fun Forever”?Toys, Games, and Play in Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women by Anne K. Phillips

Biography of Louisa May Alcott: Delineating Fiction from Memoir in Little Women by Anne K. Phillips

Women's Control of Passion: Louisa May Alcott's Revision of Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre and Societal Restrictions of Passion in the Ninteenth-Century By Erica Eileen Cicero-erkkila

Once you have read ALL of this, please come back here to talk. Kleopatra I Syra (talk) 00:27, 29 August 2023 (UTC)[reply] Kleopatra I Syra (talk) 00:28, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

Now to get back to the point of wiki - not as a place of petty squabling but improving the articles, I will soon be adding many of these SCHOLARLY sources in the further reading section! Kleopatra I Syra (talk) 02:57, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

Gregory Eiselein, the scholar you cite here, says in his interview with Peyton in the New York Times piece that Alcott "did not fit a binary sex-gender model." 174.92.48.180 (talk) 21:36, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

did you not read anything I wrote? Including about Gregory, including his quote in the NYT article, who is a wonderful scholar and who I specifically wrote that I agree with, particularly his analysis of transcendentalism and gender (which he has written of in his scholarship)?

If you want to keep this asinine back and forth going in which you clearly have disregardrd everything I proved, I suggest you take it to my page so we can find a way to communicate outside wiki. This page is specifically for addressing the wiki editing process.

Also as far as Peyton's recorded behavior, well of course it is not scholarly lol You don't need "scholarly" analysis for his own racism and his abusiveness of his ex. (Nor is his is NYT Opinion article scholarly at all, as I clearly demonstrated). I specifcally gave you tonnes of scholarly material that I have read, have advised you to, and you have chosen to ignore. You clearly are not here to help wiki in any sort of way. You actually just simply seem to not care about LMA at all, which is really quite pathetic.

Kleopatra I Syra (talk) 22:32, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

From the NYT's website:

Fact-checking: Before we publish your article, it must be fact-checked. If an essay is accepted for publication, the guest writer will be asked to submit an annotated copy of the essay, listing the relevant sources for each factual assertion.

• We focus our checking on verifiable facts. For example, the number of Americans without health insurance, the median household income or the date a law was enacted.
• We also investigate broader factual assertions (“No one named to the court in the postwar period was as conservative as Justice Scalia or as liberal as Justice Brennan,” “Laos is one of the world’s most corrupt nations”) that may need to be qualified, explained or stated with greater precision or nuance.
• We look at the factual evidence cited to verify that the methodology is sound and that the data is presented with precision and balance.
• We prefer primary sources (an N.I.H. research paper) to secondary ones (a news article about the paper’s findings).
• If we determine that a particular fact cannot be verified, we will not publish it.

174.91.176.3 (talk) 13:34, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

That's a helpful link, thank you. Schazjmd (talk) 15:38, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

These same fact checkers let through horrible opinions on trans people.(For example, transphobic, highly biased opinion piece article which has been now been cited in anti-trans legal briefs.

It's important for us all to keep this in mind. SalomeofJudea (Maria) (talk) 23:13, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

@Ineffablebookkeeper: Er, how do you know that James Barry isn't also trans? HighwayTyper (talk) 23:56, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

@HighwayTyper: no, I meant Barry likely was trans. Not much cisgender about asking someone to bury you in your clothes and never examine your body.--Ineffablebookkeeper (talk) ({{ping}} me!) 09:50, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

HighwayTyper, your "gender neutral" edit was unnecessary. Alcott's gender is not in question simply because somebody posted on Twitter. Schazjmd (talk) 00:14, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

My bad. My impression was that this kind of edit would fall within the range of minor-ness. HighwayTyper (talk) 00:17, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

@HighwayTyper: we do neutralise mentions of gender in some articles, like Public Universal Friend, but that's only after an agreement to avoid all use of pronouns. No point neutralising anything if there's no evidence for it being necessary.--Ineffablebookkeeper (talk) ({{ping}} me!) 09:52, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program assignment

This article is the subject of an educational assignment at Indiana University-Purdue University-Indianapolis supported by the Wikipedia Ambassador Program during the 2011 Q3 term. Further details are available on the course page.

Above message substituted from {{WAP assignment}} on 15:06, 7 January 2023 (UTC)

Alcott's death

At the end of the introduction, I added "citation needed" for the cause of her death. The American Transcendentalism Web, which doesn't let me paste its URL here, states that she died from the long-term effects of mercury poisoning. Of course, she could have died from a stroke brought about by mercury poisoning. I don't know what she died from. Perhaps someone with a reliable biography can edit this and cite a source. I also changed "passed" to "died." We say "passed" in order to be gentle to the bereaved. On Wikipedia, I think that we should be straightforward and not use euphemisms. Maurice Magnus (talk) 02:13, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

'stroke' has a citation in the body of the article - and in most articles the lead need not have citations as it is a summary of the content. That doesn't mean a discussion of the validity of the citation might not be in order - but not as an objection of the lead (which might be changed after the article changes with any clarifications from this discussion). I'm completely with you on the euphemism aspect and left what you had in that respect. --John (User:Jwy/talk) 06:14, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

Broken link, and I do not know how to fix it.

The link is in the Selected Works tab under "in popular culture", it is to the 2005 musical adaptation, which does have a wikipedia page at https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Women_(musical) the link is broken and I do not know how to fix it. 2603:9009:BF0:A750:5569:8877:7611:DECC (talk) 05:47, 19 January 2024 (UTC)