Works



Louisa was 21 in 1854, when her first book was published, but she was only 16 when she first told the fairy tales in Flower Fables to young Ellen Emerson. Alcott’s last book, A Garland for Girls, was published in 1888, the year of her death. Like Flower Fables, A Garland for Girls was a collection of fairy tales; these Louisa told to “Lulu”, the child bequeathed to her by May Alcott, her youngest sister. During her 55 years, Louisa produced hundreds of works – plays, stories, novels, poems, journals, and letters. By her bedside, at her death, was an unfinished story. Below is a partial list of Louisa May Alcott’s works.

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Flower Fables (1854)
Original fairy tales and poems first told to Ellen Emerson when Louisa was 16.

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Hospital Sketches (1863)
An account of Louisa’s stint as a Civil War army nurse.

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Moods (1864)
Emerson and Thoreau are the models for the male characters in Louisa’s story of a woman in love with her husband’s best friend.

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A Long Fatal Love Chase (1996)
A young woman is pursued relentlessly by her ex-lover in this romantic cliffhanger published more than a century after it was written.

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Pauline’s Passion and Punishment (as “A Lady from Massachusetts”)
A prize-winning “sensation” story that earned Louisa $100 and entrée into the well-paid national magazine market.

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Work: A Story of Experience (1873)
This autobiographical novel about Alcott’s early working life amounts to a tour of occupations permitted to women at the time.

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A Modern Mephistopheles (1877)
A novel based on the Faust story, in “the lurid style,” published anonymously after Alcott’s public image as “The Children’s Friend” became a commodity too valuable to be risked.

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Little Women (1868)
The first of three “March family” novels based on the Alcotts, set during the Civil War; Jo March is a portrait of teenage Louisa.

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Little Men (1871)
In this sequel to Little Women, Jo March runs a school for boys based on Bronson Alcott’s unconventional Temple School.

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Jo’s Boys (1886)
In the last of the March trilogy, a mature Jo March, a famous writer like her creator, is a mentor to students at a coeducational college.

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An Old-Fashioned Girl (1870)
This fine young adult novel about a poor country cousin and a rich city girl has major characters and storylines based on Alcott’s mother and grandfather.

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Aunt Jo’s Scrap Bag (six volumes, (1871-1879)
An assortment of stories, including “Eli’s Education,” about Bronson Alcott’s childhood self-education, episodes from Alcott’s travels in Europe, and character sketches of young people of her acquaintance.

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Transcendental Wild Oats (1873)
Louisa’s hilarious satire of Fruitlands, her father’s ill-fated commune.

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Eight Cousins (1876)
Orphan Rose Campbell goes to live with her aunts and seven rough-and-tumble male cousins. Parents protested the heroine’s unconventional home-school education, which includes the study of anatomy, and forbids the wearing of corsets.

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Rose in Bloom (1876)
In this sequel to Eight Cousins, Rose Campbell and her cohorts come of age. As Alcott’s mouthpiece, she speaks out in favor of women’s suffrage and recommends the work of Henry David Thoreau.

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Behind a Mask, or a Woman’s Power (as A.M. Barnard)
One of Alcott’s best thrillers.

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The Inheritance
Alcott’s first novel, written at seventeen, heavily influenced by Jane Eyre.

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Diana and Persis, or An Untitled Romance
An unfinished novella with characters based on Louisa and her sister May, about woman’s conflict between the life of an artist and marriage.

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A Garland For Girls (1888)
Fairy tales told to Lulu Niereker, daughter of May Alcott.

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The Poetry of Louisa May Alcott
Louisa’s poems, in every mood, from age 7 until her death.