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A review by carriedoodledoo
An Old-Fashioned Girl by Louisa May Alcott
3.0
I read this one a few times in high school, as it was part of my local library's collection and I believed then in reading everything an author I liked had to write. (My views have since been modified!).
Sweet, and shows Alcott's worldview perhaps even more clearly than "Little Women" does: an embrace of truth and simplicity over pomp and circumstance. The occasional break in the fourth wall is charming.
What I found interesting was that while Polly and her morals and manners would be still called "old-fashioned" today, I still see remnants of the fashionable Shaws' behavior in contemporary society. Sure, on the surface they may have become as antiquated and quaint as the book they appear in, but I still see children being presented as adults before their time; party culture in colleges; impractical and immodest fashions; a desperate and sad pressure to keep up with your peers at the expense of your own character.
Maybe Polly wasn't "old fashioned", just better educated by loving parents.
Sweet, and shows Alcott's worldview perhaps even more clearly than "Little Women" does: an embrace of truth and simplicity over pomp and circumstance. The occasional break in the fourth wall is charming.
What I found interesting was that while Polly and her morals and manners would be still called "old-fashioned" today, I still see remnants of the fashionable Shaws' behavior in contemporary society. Sure, on the surface they may have become as antiquated and quaint as the book they appear in, but I still see children being presented as adults before their time; party culture in colleges; impractical and immodest fashions; a desperate and sad pressure to keep up with your peers at the expense of your own character.
Maybe Polly wasn't "old fashioned", just better educated by loving parents.