Little women

To stage

Should I be ashamed to be still so childish despite my age which is certainly becoming too mature?

Too bad – I’m too old to change – I love this expression, I used it as soon as I was a reasonable age to say it & thus : eliminate from my path all the annoying people who explained to me that I had to change this and then change that in my life and especially that I had to decide to be mature and responsible. Then, the four daughters of Mr March.

Mind you, I’m talking about the book, not the adaptations – what do you think? I’m a girl who comes from a world without electricity, no television no no, just books and oil lamps to enchant my childhood world.

Of course, my favorite daughter was Jo. A girl “for” my heart – completely resourceful, not very “feminine”, not too sweet, not at all patient, not so nice, quite wild, a girl made for incredible adventures…

and then at the end, she marries an old man and becomes a teacher – I was disgusted with this ending – but so much! My beautiful Jo, to settle down like that? impossible.
I had to become a teacher myself, having completely forgotten about Jo, to realize that this job is anything but relaxing – and doesn’t take very well to girls who are so nice and sweet – it’s a job done for girls like Jo – but as a child, I didn’t know that at all.

As for the other sisters, they represented for me – as a girl – all the other types of girls, that I liked more or less – Meg: too perfect, Beth: too self-effacing, Amy: pouah!

And to see all four of them, with their mom, doing as well as they could, doing “against all odds: good heart”, it gave me so much courage.

I do know that the book is a little “old” – a little too old America! eh!!! – but the characters presented still exist, because they were extremely well thought out and well written.
And it has the immense advantage, in my opinion, of presenting several types of female characters, at a time when idiots are trying to represent women in only one possible way – to save women, let’s eliminate all women who are not female enough – ah ! what a bad joke.

I’m actually not that far removed from the times – there’s a very recent Netflix adaptation of this novel.

So why on a stage rather than in film?
Precisely because the story is a bit old – so, adapted faithfully the direction is forced to make a film in period costumes and this propels this beautiful story to the time of the dinosaurs.
Whereas on a stage, as the adaptation will be more radical and largely less faithful, it is so possible to give modernity to the timeless Little women described by Mrs. Louisa May Alcott.

Besides, since this is – among other things – the great freedom of the scene compared to series and films that can and almost must remain faithful to the context of the stories – how can we not make the most of it?
Theatre is made of old things refurbished, and this has been going on for as long as theatre has existed.

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