Trix Wilkins's Blog: Much ado about Little Women, page 5
August 26, 2017
10 things you may not know about Little Women’s Laurie
By Trix Wilkins
Photos courtesy of Columbia Pictures (1994)
We know he was half-Italian, exceedingly wealthy, and loved Jo desperately. Here are ten things you might not have known about Little Women’s Theodore Laurence.
[image error]
He was a good writer – maybe even better than Jo!
Laurie is accepted to join the March sisters in producing their newspaper The Pickwick Portfolio, and we’re told Jo regarded his contributions as “worthy of Bacon, Milton, and Shakespeare; and remodelled her own works with good effect, she thought.”
He loved books just as much as Jo
He might not have loved study and preferred playing truant with the Marches next door to “digging,” but he loved reading! When Jo goes to visit him when he’s sick, she’s delighted to find that “he loved books as much as she.”
He wasn’t into being fashionable
Some of my favorite scenes in Little Women are proof of this! When Laurie gently tells Jo how they will manage to dance despite her burnt dress; when he tells Meg not-so-gently that he doesn’t like “fuss and feathers;” when he tells Jo, “Why mind the fashion? Wear a big hat and be comfortable!”
[image error]
He wanted to settle in Germany
The March sisters and Laurie sit in the sunshine talking of their castles in the air. Laurie tells them all that in his favorite one he lives in Germany and becomes such a famous musician all the world comes to hear him (and that he doesn’t run his grandfather’s ships).
He had a flair for diplomacy
Laurie attempts to compliment Jo by telling her “I like the medicine your mother sent very much” (which goes over Jo’s head until Meg enlightens her); he eats everything less than delectable at Jo’s disastrous dinner party; the way he doesn’t brush over her feelings in asking to dance in the hallway.
He tended to be lazy (but fought it)
Who doesn’t prefer reading books, playing the piano, and rowing with friends as opposed to learning to run one’s grandfather’s ships one doesn’t have any heart for? Despite his natural inclinations, Laurie works to live up to Mrs March’s expectation that he is only wanting for “a motive.”
He played chess
I haven’t often re-read this scene, being in the chapter regarding Amy and the limes. It’s now become a favorite. Jo and Laurie are playing chess and Laurie gives Beth a compliment about her playing and composing music. Is it nerdy to play chess? Yes, but that’s why I like it.
He and Jo shared a streak to defy authority and convention
He doesn’t want to be a wealthy merchant as per the family tradition; he wants to run off with Jo in a ship to India even if she’s dressed like a boy; he notoriously plays pranks on people; he invites Jo to run off to Washington to visit her father despite its not being entirely proper.
His grandfather hadn’t liked his mother
Little Women ends and the reason for this dislike remains a mystery (other than a hint that Mr Laurence didn’t like to hear Laurie play and so we can merely infer that his mother’s being a musician had something to do with it), even though Laurie promises Jo “I’ll tell you someday.”
He was exceedingly shy until he met Jo
At the time of their first meeting, Laurie doesn’t have many friends. Jo tells him he ought to make an effort to know people (which I think rather ironic given Jo’s proclivity to avoid society, and reminiscent of Elizabeth’s speech to Darcy about practicing social interactions!).
P.S. A quick reminder for those keen to read The Courtship of Jo March
August 22, 2017
Favorite quotes from Little Women
Photography and calligraphy by Trix Wilkins
Some favorite quotes from Louisa May Alcott’s beloved classic…
For love of reading
[image error]
One of my favorite quotes from Little Women by Jo March during that enlightening week of the March sisters’ experiment of all play and no work. Personally, I think if one must spend a leisurely week doing “nothing” this would be an ideal way of doing so
Mothers & daughters: Little Women quotes #6
Photography and calligraphy by Trix Wilkins
From Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women by Marmee and about Marmee
Love and respect
[image error]
Wishes for daughters
[image error]
[image error]
[image error]
The worth of time
[image error]
That which can never be taken
[image error]
My thanks to Louisa May Alcott for writing these lovely words of wisdom for the home! (And my husband for making this little shelf :))
[image error]
August 19, 2017
Writing the Pickwick Portfolio: Little Women quotes #5
Photography and calligraphy by Trix Wilkins
Makes one want to start one’s own newspaper…Here are some quotes from within and about the March sisters’ (+Laurie/Sam Weller) Pickwick Portfolio from Little Women…
[image error]
[image error]
I love just how much Laurie contributed to the development of Jo’s writing. When Laurie joins the ‘staff’ of the Pickwick Portfolio, Jo comes to admire his writing so much that she styles her own pieces after his. It seems to foreshadow that he would continue to be instrumental somehow in her writing for years to come, if not possessing something of a literary-related career himself…
August 18, 2017
August 17, 2017
Don’t like fuss: Little Women quotes #3
By Trix Wilkins
Remember that line from Jerry Maguire, “You had me at hello”?
Well, this is the Little Women equivalent for me. The moment Laurie saw Meg dolled up in the latest dress and flirting by the latest fashions – and when she asked what he thought of it all (expecting the sort of admiration she’d received from other men), he looked at her disapprovingly and curtly replied, “I don’t like fuss and feathers.”
[image error]
That was the moment Theodore Laurence shot to the top of my teenage literary hero list.
It was also the moment I became convinced that he and Jo would love each other (as if Jo’s modelling her writing after Laurie’s works of “Shakespeare, Milton, Bacon, etc” for the Pickwick Portfolio didn’t signal the inevitability!).
He was going to adore her exactly for who she was; she was going to respect him for the man of integrity he would grow up to be.
I’m not sure if any other line in literature has had the same impact on my ideas of romance as that line.
[image error]
In six words I got the idea that there existed men in the world who weren’t drawn by such things – and that was the moment my resolve began to form that if ever I did marry, it would be to one who shared similar sentiments, “I don’t like fuss and feathers.”
(What a joy it is to be able to say this is true of my husband…! Now you know a bit more of the impetus behind The Courtship of Jo March 
August 15, 2017
Worth having: Little Women quotes #2
Photographs and calligraphy by Trix Wilkins
Love this quote from Little Women’s Marmee to her daughters! Meg returns from “Vanity Fair” admitting how much she liked being admired. Marmee affirms her feelings as natural and follows her sympathy with some sage advice.
[image error]
[image error]
[image error]
The photos are mine, but the beautiful background painting is Joy Scherger’s tribute to William Henry Margetson’s The sea hath its pearls (the one mentioned in Jo March’s legacy: musing over The Little Women Letters).
What are your favorite pieces of advice from literary mothers?
August 14, 2017
Shining hours of reading: Little Women quotes #1
[image error]
One of my favorite quotes from Little Women by Jo March during that enlightening week of the March sisters’ experiment of all play and no work. Personally, I think if one must spend a leisurely week doing “nothing” this would be an ideal way of doing so
August 10, 2017
Anniversary of a Little Women variation
By Trix Wilkins
It’s been 8 months since the initial release of The Courtship of Jo March and how glad I am to write that an anniversary edition is now available! Many thanks to Kainos Print for the amazing job they’ve done
August 6, 2017
The Laurences of Little Women
By Trix Wilkins
A couple of scenes I’ve been speculating might have occurred prior to the opening of Little Women. Laurie’s parents first meet, and his father resists those ships to India. Yes this is fan fiction. Yes this is pure speculation. But goodness it was fun…
[image error]
Background design courtesy of Canva
A meeting of worlds: the first encounter between Laurie’s parents
I’ve always envisaged there having been a status distinction between Laurie’s parents – his father being the wealthy sole heir to the Laurence merchant fleet, his mother being a talented pianist and daughter of a minister (there’s a hint of this assumption in The Courtship of Jo March). This is a conversation that might have taken place during their first encounter at church – after Laurie’s father Jonathan accidentally stumbles into a room of people praying then crosses paths with Eleanor, his later wife and Laurie’s mother.
“You seem rather disturbed, sir,” said she, with a side glance at him. “Surely you have seen people pray before.”
“Of course,” he said, huffily. Grace by his mother at dinner surely counted as prayer. “I just have never seen so many. It seems rather an extravagant use of time.”
He was certain she would now coldly leave him in peace to his own troubled thoughts; to his surprise, she smiled. “Tell me, sir. How often do you feed your horse?”
“Daily, of course,” he said. “But I do not personally do it. It is part of the privilege of being a gentleman.”
“And how often do you sharpen your pencils? I know you use those personally, and are particular about them.”
“What do you know of my pencils?” he exclaimed.
“It is a matter of public knowledge, your sketches,” replied she, laughing. “Fantastical designs, entirely impractical, if you believe some; daring, innovative, genius, if you listen to others. In any event, they are said to be so numerous that you keep the entire pencil industry in business.”
He remained silent, unsure whether to feel rather offended at his private passion being spoken of everywhere, or flattered that she would have paid attention to such reports.
“You could no more sketch without sharpened pencils, than my father could speak of God without prayer,” she went on. “You might try, but you would be frustrated, feel your efforts wasted, the outcome inevitably unsatisfactory. Think of every person in that room as a sharpened pencil. They are the absolutely essential first step to the endeavor. Being so essential, do you now see why I find your earlier remark somewhat…amusing?”
“I see that this is a subject of paramount importance to you,” he replied diplomatically. “As to why, perhaps you might pray that I will see the answer to that, too.”
It’s a bit like Star Wars: James and Jonathan Laurence talk about those ships
Laurie didn’t want to run the ships to India, and I’m imagining his father didn’t either. At this point Jonathan is neither a husband nor father, though he does love Eleanor. His elder brother Theodore was lost to illness, after whom Jonathan later names Laurie. With only one surviving son, James Laurence lays heavy pressure on Jonathan to take the rein of the family business.
“I am not Theodore,” said Jonathan.
“Of course not. Theodore knew his duty,” replied his father, rashly, angrily.
Jonathan bristled. “I know my duty, and it is not first and foremost to you, father.”
“And who else could command your loyalty?” demanded he. “You have no wife of whom to speak, unless you have joined yourself to that-”
“Careful, sir,” cut in Jonathan. “I love her more than anything in this world. You would do well to remember that. But it is not she of whom I speak. Your conscience is blunted, father. You have pursued wealth at the expense of your soul. I cannot follow where you lead. I will commit myself to these ships on the condition you will be open to suggestions to change and to improvement, for there is plenty of room for it.”
His father’s face was red with restrained indignation and anger.
“I will not run these ships against my conscience. I will not displease God in order to please you.”
Much ado about Little Women
- Trix Wilkins's profile
- 44 followers
