I'm SO curious how May felt about this book! It paid for her art studies, so she can't really complain... but also it basically tells the whole world that May is doomed to fail as an artist! HOW did she feel about. WHAT did she say to her art friends in Europe. DID they have lengthy discussions about the toxic Alcott family dynamics.
Beth loves her piano and is clearly quite talented but has no professional ambitions at all, zero, zilch. Going out of the house and playing in front of strangers? NO THANK YOU. As you say, this is still the era of home music production, Pa playing his fiddle in Little House etc., and also an era before people were pushed so hard to turn their hobbies into a side hustle... Why shouldn't Beth just enjoy her music on her own terms?
If she did have professional ambitions, presumably the family would support them, as they support Jo's writing and Amy's art - but no one pushes her in that direction when she doesn't go that way on her own.
I think that article is a bit hard on Louisa, honestly - not to mention hard on literary Beth: "It's weirdly hard to dislike Beth," Machado says, like she's been earnestly trying and is annoyed she can't manage it. We all have characters we dislike from time to time, but I don't think trying to dislike a character is a firm foundation for literary criticism.
Also, let's be real, if it was possible to kill a child sheerly through piling words and emotional projections onto her head, none of Bronson Alcott's daughters would have reached adulthood. It was complications of scarlet fever that killed Lizzie/Beth, not the fact that her family thought she was a darling.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2022-02-16 02:37 am (UTC)Beth loves her piano and is clearly quite talented but has no professional ambitions at all, zero, zilch. Going out of the house and playing in front of strangers? NO THANK YOU. As you say, this is still the era of home music production, Pa playing his fiddle in Little House etc., and also an era before people were pushed so hard to turn their hobbies into a side hustle... Why shouldn't Beth just enjoy her music on her own terms?
If she did have professional ambitions, presumably the family would support them, as they support Jo's writing and Amy's art - but no one pushes her in that direction when she doesn't go that way on her own.
I think that article is a bit hard on Louisa, honestly - not to mention hard on literary Beth: "It's weirdly hard to dislike Beth," Machado says, like she's been earnestly trying and is annoyed she can't manage it. We all have characters we dislike from time to time, but I don't think trying to dislike a character is a firm foundation for literary criticism.
Also, let's be real, if it was possible to kill a child sheerly through piling words and emotional projections onto her head, none of Bronson Alcott's daughters would have reached adulthood. It was complications of scarlet fever that killed Lizzie/Beth, not the fact that her family thought she was a darling.