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• W1979738060 abstract "Reviewed by: Twain, Alcott, and the Birth of the Adolescent Reform Novel Andrew Klekner Kantar (bio) Trites, Roberta Seelinger . Twain, Alcott, and the Birth of the Adolescent Reform Novel. Iowa City: U of Iowa P, 2007. What do Mark Twain and Louisa May Alcott have in common? Other than being nineteenth-century contemporaries who lived, at one time, less than a hundred miles from one another and who penned what are arguably two of the best-loved classics in adolescent literature, and indeed American literature, one might well surmise that there would be little common ground upon which to base a critical study. And one would be sorely mistaken. For in Twain, Alcott, and the Birth of the Adolescent Reform Novel Roberta Seelinger Trites makes a cogent argument for the literary, professional, and personal similarities shared by these two literary giants who used adolescent characters as a vehicle for addressing social reform, marking the historical genesis of the adolescent reform novel. She then takes the argument a step further, analyzing the effects of that similarity on American adolescent literature as a genre (xii). Having written a master's thesis on Alcott and her dissertation on Twain, Trites, an accomplished scholar and author, is uniquely qualified to tackle this project. The rationale for her study is based on the premise that contemporary literary scholarship, while subliminally recognizing the Twain-Alcott connection, has not yet grappled with those connections. Citing the commonly defined genre categorization of adventure stories (Twain) and domestic stories (Alcott), Trites notes the limitations of such groupings, leading to a gender-based division that fails to take into account how similarly intertwined both novels—and both novelists—were in the cultural milieu from which they emerged (xii). Traditionalists will particularly appreciate the humanistic approach that is employed here, a pleasing amalgam of biographical and historical criticism and history of ideas. It is this methodology that enables the author to explore not just the works but the authors behind the works, as well as the social and economic contexts that motivated them, culminating with their far-reaching influence on adolescent literature. The opening chapter presents a biographical foundation, establishing the parallels between Twain and Alcott (despite an apparent distaste for each other). Both were best-selling authors of adolescent novels (even before the twentieth-century concept of adolescence was applied); both lost siblings and were repeatedly uprooted, moving from place to place; both were drawn into writing for profit due to family financial woes (to be sure, Bronson, Louisa's philosopher father, was perpetually unemployed); and both authors were psychologically complex figures whose rich imagination was enhanced by the very duality of their nature. Indeed, Trites points out that their biographers have made an industry of pointing [End Page 119] out the psychological pain endured by these two writers and brought on by pressures from fame and family (7). Trites speculates (and rightfully so, I think) that Twain's and Alcott's psychological suffering may have in fact informed their imaginative representation of the inner struggles and emotional conflict that are so much a part of adolescence. Together, they shared common values, including a conviction that the innocence of youth could be used to effect social change (29). By the chapter's end, Twain and Alcott emerge as intriguingly similar, complex individuals. Both were independent thinkers and self-reliant (in the Emersonian sense), profoundly affected by the Civil War (each serving only about a month), and acutely aware of their filial obligations (emotional and financial). Their psychological turmoil combined with a literary brilliance that created the memorable characters of Huckleberry Finn and Jo March, whom Trites later calls metaphors of the need for reform (35). Next, Trites compares both authors' most notable classics The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Little Women in her chapter, The Metaphor of the Adolescent Reformer. After initially acknowledging the long-standing boy book/girl book labels assigned to these titles, the chapter goes on to cite numerous similarities in character and theme, and the parallels prove striking. Huck and Jo are depicted as an extension of Twain's and Alcott's social conscience and sense of humanitarian reform. In fact, the novels' social issues of..." @default.
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• W1979738060 date "2008-01-01" @default.
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• W1979738060 title "Twain, Alcott, and the Birth of the Adolescent Reform Novel (review)" @default.
• W1979738060 doi "https://doi.org/10.1353/uni.2008.0010" @default.
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