A talk about the book, "Marmee & Louisa: the Untold Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Mother" will last about 45 minutes, followed by Q & A, then, book signing and refreshments. Author Eve LaPlante, who is Abigail May (Marmee) Alcott's great-niece and Louisa May Alcott's cousin, re-creates their shared story from diaries, letters and personal papers, some recently discovered in a family attic and many others that were long thought to have been destroyed.
Louisa May Alcott was one of the most successful and bestselling authors of her day, earning more than any of her male contemporaries. Her classic Little Women has been a mainstay in American literature since its release nearly 150 years ago, as Jo March and her calm, beloved “Marmee” have shaped and inspired generations of young women. Biographers have consistently attributed Louisa’s uncommon success to her father, Bronson Alcott, assuming that this outspoken idealist was the source of his daughter’s progressive thinking and remarkable independence.
But in this riveting dual biography, award-winning biographer Eve LaPlante explodes these myths, drawing from a trove of surprising new documents to show that it was Louisa’s actual “Marmee,” Abigail May Alcott, who formed the intellectual and emotional center of her world. Abigail, whose difficult life both inspired and served as a warning to her devoted daughters, pushed Louisa to excel at writing and to chase her unconventional dreams in a male-dominated world.
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Ms. LaPlante will also be speaking about another of her books, "My Heart is Boundless: Writings of Abigail May Alcott."
A New Englander with degrees from Princeton and Harvard, LaPlante has published articles, essays, and five nonfiction books. She is a cousin of Louisa May Alcott and a great-niece of Abigail May Alcott and resides in New England with her husband and four children.
