Ahira's Hangar

Last night here in Chicago, the PBS series American Masters had a two feature on Louissa May Alcott. It was AWESOME, and really good, too. During her life she was a famously successful author selling over 100,000 copies of her books for her publishers, for her day she was compared to JK Rowling. Additionally, this particular special pointed out that during a period around the American Civil War, she made a substantial amount of money writing 'neo-gothic' thrillers under a variety of pen-names and this was generally known until recently. It seems, that at the time such authorship was regarded as too vulgar, base and tawdry for a lady who counted as her family friends the like of Emerson, Thoreau and Hawthorne to be engaged in.

It might have been considered too vulgar, but I am sure that she and her family greatly appreciated any extra money the gothics brought in.

When I was a girl, I always liked her lesser known works such as Eight Cousins and An Old Fashioned Girl to her much better known Little Women. I have not read any of her stuff in decades...

I only ever read the two really famous ones, but they were fairly regular reads in my childhood. Great books.

--A

Little Women was my favorite book 'til I read Jane Eyre. My first copy of Little Women was, unbeknownst to me, an abridged version, ending with Meg's marriage to John. I was seriously torqued when I discovered, years later, that there was more...

The two women who discovered the Olcott authorship of these thrillers, said during the documentary that they may never discover all these types of texts she wrote. Yes, during this part of her family's life the income from this writing was a substantial part of their income; for your information, this documentary continuously emphasized the poverty of the Olcott family which was very substantial.