Louisa May Alcott My Contraband Summary

It’s interesting to see the ways different authors depict how a character matures. In Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mocking Bird we can easily see how she chose to do it. The novel is set in Alabama in the 1930’s, while black vs. white racism was a big issue and problem for many. Atticus is the father of Scout and Jem, young children who witness the discrimination first hand when their father, a white man, defends a black man in court. Lee does a great job developing the characters; especially the narrator, Jean Louise Finch (Scout). Scout’s thoughts, conversations, and actions, illustrate that she’s emotionally maturing from the innocent child that she was.

The book "To Kill a Mockingbird" is a story of life in an Alabama town in the 30's. The narrator, Jean Louise Finch, or Scout, is writing of a time when she was young, and the book is in part the record of a childhood, believed to be Harper Lee’s, the author of the book..

It is greatly reflected how the Author Wes Moore was heavily influenced by his family to be the best he could be. The book quotes on page 3, “Your [author Wes]

" ‘I want something to do…' ‘Write a book,' Qouth the author of my being. ‘Don't know enough, sir. First live, then write.' ‘Try teaching again,' suggested my mother. ‘No thank you, ma'am, ten years of that is enough.' ‘Take a husband like my Darby, and fulfill your mission,' said sister Joan. ‘Can't afford expensive luxuries, Mrs. Coobiddy.' ‘Go nurse the soldiers,' said my young brother, Tom. ‘I will!' (Harper 14)." This is a dialog of Louisa May Alcott with her relatives. Miss Alcott, like many other African American women, helped serve in the Civil War. During the Civil War, Miss Alcott held a variety of jobs. Mainly working as a writer, she held positions as a nurse, teacher, and volunteered in

Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird shows us how one small, peaceful, southern town during the Great Depression can be engulfed in hatred, racism, and prejudice unseen by the outside world. In this seemingly quiet town in the middle of Alabama, people are forced to live by racist ideals that their families have carried on for generations. Although the citizens of Maycomb believe they are right and just, their prejudices overtake their human conscious when the time comes for them ‘to do the right thing.’ They truly believe that they are a kind community of Christians who live by the words of the Bible. While Maycomb includes all folks who think the same way as they do, they ban those who think differently or are from an ‘inferior’ race. Therefore, Boo Radley, Dolphus Raymond, and Mayella Ewell stand outside the structure of respectable Maycomb society, in some cases as the result of their own doing and in some, as the result of being forced out by others.

" ‘I want something to do…' ‘Write a book,' Qouth the author of my being. ‘Don't know enough, sir. First live, then write.' ‘Try teaching again,' suggested my mother. ‘No thank you, ma'am, ten years of that is enough.' ‘Take a husband like my Darby, and fulfill your mission,' said sister Joan. ‘Can't afford expensive luxuries, Mrs. Coobiddy.' ‘Go nurse the soldiers,' said my young brother, Tom. ‘I will!' (Harper 14)." This is a dialog of Louisa May Alcott with her relatives. Miss Alcott, like many other African American women, helped serve in the Civil War. During the Civil War, Miss Alcott held a variety of jobs. Mainly working as a writer, she held positions as a nurse, teacher, and volunteered in

At a young age she experienced her mother’s death but she didn’t let that take away from her focus on writing. Her most famous book was titled Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which Abraham Lincoln believed to be the start of the Civil war. Later in life she had married and had a son. Although she found it very hard to raise a son and still keep up on her daily writing she somehow managed. She managed to raise her son with the help of a friend and keep up on her

Harriet Jacobs, in her narrative, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, was born into slavery in the south. While her youth contained “six years of happy childhood,” a few tragedies and mistresses later, Jacobs spent many years in pain under the possession of her cruel five-year-old mistress, Emily Flint, and Emily’s father, Dr. Flint. Once able to obtain freedom, Jacobs spent most of her life working for the Anti-Slavery office in New York, in hope that one day she could make a difference in the world. “She sought to win the respect and admiration of her readers for the courage with which she forestalled abuse and for the independence with which she chose a lover rather than having one forced on her” (Jacobs 921). Linda Brett, the pseudonym that Jacobs uses to narrate her life story, endures the harsh behavior women slaves were treated with in the south during the nineteenth century. The dominant theme of the corruptive power and psychological abuse of slavery, along with symbolism of good and evil, is demonstrated throughout her narrative to create a story that exposes the terrible captivity woman slaves suffered. The reality of slavery in the past, versus slavery today is used to reveal how the world has changed and grown in the idea of racism and neglect.

Louisa May Alcott is an American Novelist best known as the author of the novel “Little Women”. Louisa was born in November 1982, grew up in Germantown- Washington D.C and was known to be an abolitionist, feminist and also a naturalist. Being a naturalist meant that she believed that nothing existed beyond the natural earth i.e. no such thing as spirituality or the supernatural. Her family suffered from financial difficulties and so Alcott had to work to support her family in an early age. She penned the story “My Contraband” (1869) which was formerly known as “The Brothers” (1863). Contraband was a black slave who escaped to or was brought within union lines (Alcott 759). In “My Contraband”, Louisa

Most people view conflict as a bad thing, but authors love to use it to benefit their writing. Conflict is common in writing as it is essential to plot and often many other aspects. In Louisa May Alcott's novel, Little Women, the main characters experience types of conflict. In this book, conflict is used to develop the characters and show their growth. The four main characters, sisters Amy, Beth, Jo, and Meg, experience Person vs. Self, Person vs. Person, and Person vs. Society conflict which leads them to who they've become at the end of the novel.

The introductory line of Harriet Jacob’s preface to Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, “Reader, be assured this narrative is no fiction”, is short yet serving (Jacobs 224). Although brief in its nature, this statement manages to encompass two major aspects that characterize African-American literature: audience and truth. In all writing, understanding the target audience and how to arrange an argument or essay to appeal to that specific crowd is paramount. However, it is especially important for African-American authors, who typically need to expose injustices or call for social change in their works. In particular, two African-American authors who understood their audience and how to manipulate that understanding were Charles W. Chesnutt and Marcus Garvey. Although they were born only twenty-nine years apart, Chesnutt and Garvey technically wrote for different time periods. While Chesnutt’s work is associated with “Literature of the Reconstruction”, Garvey was grouped with authors and activists from the Harlem Renaissance (Gates and Smith 580 ). The separation of their literary epochs drove Chesnutt and Garvey to write for contradistinctive audiences that demanded unique written techniques and rhetorical strategies, but that both asked for utmost honesty.

Anna Alcott was the model for Meg March. Both these characters shared common life events. They both married a man called “John” and both gave birth to twins. They were both the eldest in the family. Louisa’s little sister, May, was the model for Amy. They were both graceful and poised at a young age and very materialistic. The youngest of the Alcott girls, Elizabeth was the model for Beth in the novel. Not only did they share the same namesake as the youngest March character Beth; they both shared a childhood death due to scarlet fever. They both died at a very young age. Evidently, Alcott was the model for Jo. They were both tempestuous and of wild nature. They were both females living in the Victorian Era who defied the norms of their times. At the age of fifteen, she wrote in her diary, “I will do something by and by. Don’t care what, teach, sew, act, write anything to help the family and I’ll be rich and famous and happy before I die, see if I won’t” (Laire 10). Women of that time did not normally focus on getting jobs; they left it to their male counterparts to bring home the income. Alcott and her sister both took on teaching jobs, though her dream was to become an actress. By the age of twenty, she knew her real talent was to write. To please the readers, she quickly understood the reading market and started experimenting with different writing styles. This gave her

During the slavery period a number of African slaves wrote stories, and poems about their daily hardships that they had to withhold by being a slave and everything else that happen throughout their life’s. Not many Black writers had the resources or support from their owners to publish what they wrote or anyone to care about what they wrote, lucky slaves did reach success when they published their work. Knowing where they came from or where they grew up from is important, the type of work that each individual accomplished when they published their work to the public. The massive impact that Phillis Wheatley, Frederick Douglas, Sojourner Truth, Harriet Jacobs, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Abraham Lincoln had in the black community and how they helped change the way they were being treated completely.

Courage is the quality of mind that enables one to face danger with confidence, resolution, and gain a firm control of oneself. Many of the characters in To Kill a Mockingbird showed courage in their own way. Courage can come in many different forms: physical, mental, emotional and moral. Courage is not the only main theme displayed in To Kill a Mockingbird; prejudice and education are also very important themes exhibited throughout the progression of the novel. Through the eyes of Scout Finch, a bright, sensitive and intelligent little girl, these themes of the novel are explored in great depth.

What is life about? Just living, or maybe giving or something else. At this point the question goes differently just as all of us are different. All of us see life differently and as well the goals are different. Though there is something in common we all have. We all want to be happy in this world. Some people believe that love gives happiness, another wealth...All with different concept. They spend most of their time and energy to get it. But it does not give a guaranty of satisfaction. Meanwhile it could give you basic comforts of life.