In Alcott’s Little Women,
the concept of marriage is brought up numerous times by an abundance of
characters, and therefore seems to be a central theme of the novel. Mrs. March demonstrates her respect for
marriage early on in the novel when she states, “I want my daughters to be
beautiful, accomplished, and good; to be admired, loved, and respected, to have
a happy youth, to be well and wisely married…To be loved and chosen by a good
man is the best and sweetest thing which can happen to a woman” (Alcott 97). This viewpoint seems to have been the popular
opinion in the 19th century, as unmarried women were often referred
to as “spinsters” and openly pitied by others because they, “missed the
sweetest part of life” (Alcott 441).
What I found most interesting was
not this common, positive view of marriage, but Jo’s profoundly negative
view. When speaking with Laurie before
Meg’s wedding she makes it clear that she has no intentions of ever getting
married stating, “I’m not one of the agreeable sort. Nobody will want me, and it’s a mercy, for
there should always be one old maid in a family (Alcott 246). Then again further down the page she
continues with her animosity by saying, “I don’t like that sort of thing; I’m
too busy to be worried with nonsense, and I think it’s dreadful to break up
families so.” (Alcott 246).
She even goes to the extreme by
comparing marriage to a disease, knowing firsthand how serious a disease can be
from watching her own sister, Beth, battle scarlet fever. When speaking about Meg falling in love with
Mr. Brooke she states, “She feels it in the air—love I mean—and she’s going
very fast. She’s got most of the
symptoms, is twittery and cross, don’t eat, lies awake, and mopes in corners”
(Alcott 207). From Jo’s perspective, the
two characters are both living out common 19th century “tragedies”: Meg
falling into the traditional role as a young wife and Beth falling ill to a
fatal disease.
While this connection between
marriage and illness might seem like a stretch at first, further research into
Alcott’s personal life seems to support it.
First, Alcott herself never married.
Second, it is said that Alcott never intended to write the second half
of the book, known as Good Wives.
Finally, in the introduction there is a quote from a letter Alcott wrote
to a friend affirming that, “Jo should have remained a literary spinster, but
so many enthusiastic young ladies wrote to me clamorously demanding that she
should marry Laurie or somebody, that
I didn’t dare refuse and out of perversity went and made a funny match for her”
(Showalter, xix).
Even when Mr. Bhaer returned to the story in the appropriately titled chapter "Surprises" and speculation arose that he would ask Jo to marry him, I remained fairly confident that Jo would remain unmarried. I assumed that she would follow the same path as Alcott, who as you mentioned, never married. Jo certainly embraces her society's feminine roles much more in the second act of Little Women, but I still expected Alcott to steer her away from marriage despite fans clamoring for it . That being said, I think that the “funny match” Mr. Bhaer is actually a great partner for Jo. He is middle-aged, lacks money, and in the words of Jo, “hadn’t a really handsome feature on his face” (Alcott 316). This combination of characteristics make Mr. Bhaer a comically unsuitable husband for many of the women in this novel, like the wealthy and materialistic Sallie Gardiner and Annie Moffat, and even Amy and Meg. For Jo, however, he is ideal because she values a loving, gentle personality over appearance and finances, and she is essentially and equal to him in their marriage rather than the traditionally submissive wife. Jo does not need a husband to thrive. Mr. Bhaer is not a disease—he makes Jo stronger and supports her unorthodox dreams. He is a funny match, but a great one too.
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