Eve LaPlante is a great niece and a first cousin of Abigail and Louisa May Alcott. She is the author of Seized, American Jezebel, and Salem Witch Judge, which won the 2008 Massachusetts Book Award for Nonfiction. She is also the editor of My Heart Is Boundless the first collection of Abigail May Alcott’s private papers. She lives with her family in New England.
“[An] involving mother-daughter portrait…and a fresh perspective on
Louisa….Louisa’s unconventional father, Bronson, has received far
more attention than his long-suffering, feminist wife...Her own
dreams cruelly thwarted, Abigail brilliantly nurtured Louisa’s
literary genius. Although bitter ironies mark each woman’s story,
vividly set within the social upheavals of the Civil War era, their
profound love, intellect, and courage shine.”
*Booklist, starred review*
“In this meticulously researched look at Louisa May Alcott and her
mother, LaPlante shatters myths about the supposed passive Marmee,
replacing them with a portrait of a woman who fought for a woman's
right to education, professional and maternal satisfaction, and
power.”
*People Magazine*
A November 2012 Indie Next Great Read (American Booksellers
Association)
“Engrossing... LaPlante, a descendant of the Alcotts, pursued this
untold story after discovering forgotten journals and letters in an
attic trunk. In her skilled hands these documents yield Abigail
unabridged: a thinker, writer, activist, wife and mother who held
fast to her convictions in the face of terrible suffering...[T]his
is a biography of Louisa, too, and LaPlante makes a compelling case
that it was Abigail, not Bronson, who encouraged Louisa not only to
channel her considerable energy through writing, but also to pursue
publication and to weather the censorship that female writers
faced...In bringing to life the woman who made Louisa May Alcott’s
work possible, LaPlante shows us that there’s even more to admire
in the real Abigail than in the fictional Marmee."
*The Washington Post*
“This revealing biography... will forever change how we view the
characters and their relationships in Louisa’s novels... Through
LaPlante’s book we see how Louisa drew heavily from Abigail's life
experiences in her own writings.... Alcott fans who revel in
LaPlante’s biography can read to the very last page and then turn
to a bonus... companion volume, MY HEART IS BOUNDLESS, writings of
Abigail May Alcott.”
*USA Today*
“A revelatory dual biography... LaPlante makes a convincing case
that Abigail’s doggedly pragmatic responses to the intertwined and
ongoing catastrophes of Bronson’s inconsistent emotional
involvement and the family finances left an indelible impression on
Louisa, who vowed from an early age to take care of her mother...
[D]emonstrates that Abigail’s daughters were her dreams made
manifest.”
*The Seattle Times*
“A romance... The eye-opener of Eve LaPlante’s marvelous new dual
biography...is that Abigail was every inch the social philosopher
that Bronson was when it came to issues of abolition and women's
rights.... Marmee & Louisa charts Abigail’s relatively
unacknowledged influence as a progressive thinker on her famous
daughter Louisa.... When Louisa began to write Little Women... she
drew material from her mother's approximately 20 volumes of
diaries. Until Abigail's death...she was her daughter's closest
confidant and biggest booster.”
*NPR "Fresh Air"*
“Until recently, most scholarship has glossed over Abigail’s
influence on Louisa’s writing, focusing instead on the role of
Louisa’s father, who was often absent. Drawing on newly discovered
letters and diary entries, this fascinating dual biography corrects
the record by revealing the enormously close bond that was shared
by mother and daughter,...showing that Abigail was Louisa’s most
important intellectual mentor.”
*BUST (five stars)*
“Convincingly argue[d]... Of interest to anyone who enjoys
mother/daughter stories, American history, or literary studies… In
the winter season, when many of us will cue our DVD players to the
opening scene of LITTLE WOMEN, Marmee & Louisa is well worth a
read.”
*Bookpage*
“[Marmee & Louisa] shows just how much iconic children’s author
Louisa May Alcott (1832–1888) “was her mother’s daughter”…
previously undiscovered family papers and untapped pages from
Abigail’s dairies … provide new evidence exposing her undeniable
influence on her daughter … Fresh material gives flesh to the
formerly invisible Abigail, revealing how she and her famous
daughter mirrored one another … Thoroughly researched and
moving.”
*Kirkus*
“LaPlante sheds light on Abigail May Alcott… [who] is shown to have
been a remarkable intellect and a progressive who played a primary
role in Louisa’s life. LaPlante pays meticulous attention to
primary sources, delving into the surviving diaries of mother and
daughter. This heavily researched double biography serves as a kind
of twin to John Matteson’s Eden’s Outcasts. Nineteenth-century New
England literature buffs and Alcott aficionados will appreciate
this well-wrought study.”
*Library Journal*
“‘Let the world know you are alive!’ Abigail Alcott counseled her
daughter, who amply did, having inherited her mother’s spirit and
frustrations, diaries and work ethic. Along the way Louisa May
Alcott immortalized the woman in whose debt she understood herself
to be and who ultimately died in her arms; Eve LaPlante beautifully
resurrects her here. A most original love story, taut and
tender.”
*Stacy Schiff, Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times bestselling
author of Cleopatra: A Life*
“Eve LaPlante’s Marmee & Louisa is a heartwarming and thoroughly
researched story of family interdependence very much in the style
of Louisa’s own unforgettable Little Women. No other biographer has
examined so thoughtfully and with such compassion the
mother-daughter relationship that supported both women through
decades of adversity and brought a great American novel into
being.”
*Megan Marshall, author of The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who
Ignited American Romanticism andMargaret Fuller: A New American
Life*
“This is an important book about an important relationship. Writing
engagingly and with precision, Eve LaPlante sheds new light on the
Alcott story, a story that is in some ways the story of
America.”
*Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times bestselling
author of Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power*
“‘Reason and religion are emancipating woman from that intellectual
thralldom that has so long held her captive.’ That was the dearest
hope of Louisa May Alcott's mother Abigail, who was a writer
herself and juggled work and family in ways that will be strikingly
familiar to many contemporary readers. Marmee & Louisa is the
engrossing story of a vibrant, talented woman whose life and
influence on her famous daughter has, until now, been erased.”
*Anne-Marie Slaughter, Bert G. Kerstetter '66 University Professor
of Politics and International Affairs, Princeton University*
“It’s hard to imagine that anything new could be said about the
life of Louisa May Alcott, one of America’s most beloved authors.
Yet as a great-niece of Abigail May Alcott, Louisa’s mother, Eve
LaPlante isn’t just any biographer. Her new book, MARMEE & LOUISA,
is…an intimate portrait of mother and daughter, showing how their
lives were profoundly intertwined in ways that some biographers
have underplayed or ignored altogether... LaPlante chronicles the
intense attachment between Abigail and Louisa…. [A] fascinating
story of two visionary women…”
*The Boston Globe*
“Compelling... LaPlante admirably seeks to paint a fuller picture
of Abigail and her role in Louisa's life....[and] allows her
protagonists to speak for themselves.”
*Publishers Weekly*
A trailblazer and mainstay of American literature, Louisa May Alcott has always been framed by historians as her father's daughter, molded in his image. LaPlante (Salem Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall) reveals that while Bronson Alcott certainly influenced Louisa, he was absent, distant, and critical for much of her childhood. Instead, Louisa's long-suffering mother encouraged her to be a fiercely independent woman, far ahead of her time. In this story of the early stages of American feminism, Abigail May Alcott is revealed to have led a thankless, invisible life in the shadow of her strange and overbearing husband, though she perseveres and finds meaning in her family and charity. Abigail's fierce love and sacrifice for her children is something to be celebrated. Karen White vocalizes LaPlante's assiduous research into letters, diaries, and current events to reveal the nuanced and loving relationship between mother and daughter. Verdict Recommended for public and academic libraries. ["This heavily researched double biography serves as a kind of twin to John Matteson's Eden's Outcasts: The Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Father. Nineteenth-century New England literature buffs and Alcott aficionados will appreciate this well-wrought study," read the review of the Free Pr: S. & S. hc, LJ 9/15/12.-Ed.]-Terry Ann Lawler, Phoenix P.L. (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
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