초록 열기/닫기 버튼
On the surface, Louisa May Alcott reinforces strict morals for women in the Victorian period. However, Alcott wrote well-known sentimental stories such as Little Women (1879) and Jo’s Boys (1886) to earn money for her impoverished family. Thus, she did not value them much herself, calling them “moral pap” or baby food. Although her sentimental stories garnered popular and critical attention, her gothic thrillers have not been fully studied. Her body of gothic stories has been overlooked primarily because a number of the tales were unknown. This study of Alcott’s gothic works attempts to remedy that gap. It also focuses upon the gothic theory embraced by the author and on the transatlantic connections that appear in the stories. In the paper, I will specifically demonstrate how Alcott’s Flower Fables (1854) incorporates her concern about the sphere of American influence within the seemingly scriptural and mythical images, and further, how this motif is developed in her other gothic stories.
