Little Women Podcast: Social Life In Victorian Times (3)

It's so funny because when I lived in the UK,

The royal family in England,

They get lots of media coverage and I don't think all of that is true.

Like most of it is just gossip.

But then a lot of people tell me that all the royal family in England,

They are popular because they are so marketable.

Like we have democracy here in Finland.

We never had a king or royal family,

But there's a royal family in Norway,

In Denmark and in Sweden.

We get way more news from the English royal family because in all these other countries,

The people tend to be a bit more modest or they keep into their privacy a lot more.

Not so much in Sweden,

But in these other countries.

But it's definitely a way to market a country.

Yeah,

Yeah.

No,

Because I think back in the day,

The royal family and their sort of problems,

They were kind of the talk of the town,

Right?

Even if they tried to control their image a bit,

Everyone's just kind of in either rumor or some other form would hear like,

Oh,

The king's not happy with his wife because of whatever,

Whatever.

People always had that sense of things.

Now,

I totally understand a lot of other royal families now not wanting to put up with that because why would you?

I think in a sense,

The current royal family,

Even if they on their face keep up,

Do also keep up a bit of a modest,

Tasteful facade.

Partially,

They do profit a bit from having some people know a bit about stories about them.

Yeah,

That is a very interesting.

I don't know as much about the Swedish and Norwegian and Dutch royal families and how they comported themselves during events like,

Say,

World War II,

But I know that the royal family,

I mean,

The British royal family was absolutely crucial in keeping up morale during that time.

My cat is now very chatty.

I sometimes like follow news on other royal families.

I remember when the princess of Sweden got married and she married a non-royal person,

There was a big backslash that there were people who complained about that she didn't marry another aristocrat.

That was really silly because this was in the beginning of 2000 and why would people complain about this kind of thing?

But there are really people who want to stick on to that aristocracy.

Yeah,

I know.

It's almost like keeping the legitimacy.

It's like somehow,

I don't know if people think their country derives legitimacy from aristocracy or what.

I think people have always,

Even if they complain about it,

Always have some sort of sense of,

A sense of all of royalty.

And of course,

You know,

People should just marry whoever they want.

And it is,

At the end of the day,

Nobody's business.

I think a lot of people now still have that very similar reverence of the myths around people being of a certain family and of a certain blood.

Since the Middle Ages,

There's this idea that power came from God,

So that the royals were selected by God to rule the country.

We don't really agree these days,

But I think that's where the worship started.

And I think still we unconsciously or consciously have that kind of worship,

Or a lot of people do in any case.

Yeah,

I know.

That's very thought-provoking.

Shall we move on?

Yeah.

Just the conversation.

Yeah,

No,

It really was.

I feel like we talked at least half an hour about that one passage.

Super interesting.

Yeah.

Okay,

So,

Remory.

Brown paper parcel.

Okay.

So it's no use trying to argue with you,

Began Amy.

Not the least,

My dear,

Cut in Joe.

So let us look amiable and drop a card here,

As the kings are evidently out,

For which I am deeply grateful.

The family carcase having done its duty,

The girls walked on,

And Joe uttered another thanksgiving on reaching the fifth house and being told that the young ladies were engaged.

Now let us go home and never mind Aunt Marge today.

We can run down there any time,

And it's really a pay to trail through the dust in our best bibs and tuckers when we are tired and cross.

Seek for yourself,

If you please.

Aunt Marge likes to have us pay her the compliment of coming in style and making a formal call.

It's a little thing to do,

But it gives her pleasure,

And I don't believe it will hurt your thanks half so much as letting dirty dogs and clumping boys spoil them.

Scoop down,

And let me take the crumbs off your planet.

What a good girl you are,

Amy,

Said Joe,

With a repentant glance from her own damaged costume to that of her sister,

Which was fresh and spotless still.

I wish it was as easy for me to do little things to please people as it is for you.

I think of them,

But it takes too much time to do them,

So I wait for a chance to confer a big favor and let the small ones slip.

But they tell best in the end,

I guess.

Amy smiled and was mollified at once,

Saying with a maternal air,

Women should learn to be agreeable,

Particularly poor ones,

For they have no other way over paying the kindnesses they receive.

If you'd remember that and practice it,

You'd be better liked than I am,

Because there is more of you.

I'm a crotchety old thing,

And always shall be,

But I'm willing to own that you are right,

Only it's easier for me to risk my life for a person than to be pleasant to them,

But I don't feel like it.

It's a great misfortune to have such strong likes and dislikes,

Isn't it?

It's a greater not to do not to be able to hide them.

I don't mind saying that I don't approve of Tudor any more than you do,

But I'm not called upon to tell himself,

Neither are you,

And there is no use in making yourself disagreeable because he is.

But I think girls ought to show when they disagree with young men,

And how can they do it except by their manners?

Preaching don't do any good,

As I know to my sorrow,

As I've had Teddy to manage,

But there are many little ways in which I can influence him without a word,

And I say we ought to do it to others if we can.

Teddy is a remarkable boy,

And can't be taken as a sample of other boys,

Said Amy,

In a tone of smile and conviction,

Which would have convulsed the remarkable boy if he had heard it.

If we were bells,

Or women of wealth and position,

We might do something,

Perhaps,

But for us to frown at one set of gentlemen because we don't approve of them,

And smile upon another set because we do,

Wouldn't have a particle of effect,

And we should only be considered odd and puritanical.

So we are turcountinous things and people which we detest merely because we are not bells and millionaires,

Are we?

That's a nice sort of morality.

I can't argue about it.

I only know that it's the way of the world,

And people who set themselves against it only get laughed at for their pain.

I don't like reformers,

And I hope you will never try to be one.

I do like them,

And I shall be one if I can,

Or,

In spite of laughing,

The world would never get on without them.

We can't agree about that,

For you belong to the old set,

And I to the new.

You will get on,

Are the best,

But I shall have the liveliest time of it.

I should rather enjoy the brick baths I think.

Well,

Compose yourself now,

And don't worry on't with your new ideas.

I'll try not to,

But I'm always possessed to burst out with some particularly blunt speech or revolutionary sentiment before her.

It's my do,

And I can't help it.

Yeah,

That's a bit of foreshadowing about favors,

Right?

For a big favor.

Because she talks a lot about them later in the subsequent pages,

But then it seems like she's like,

Oh,

Well,

Why do the little things?

Well,

I could just do one big thing,

But of course that's not really how the world works.

I feel like this entire chapter should be called,

We Live in a Society.

That does that mean,

Right?

Of course,

Amy has a quite cautious understanding of it.

We had a discussion earlier,

It's broadcast,

How Jo kind of possesses or represents this sort of,

Not like the other girls,

Attitude.

Her way is the only way.

And then we had Amy,

Who is,

No,

There are all these other ways of being.

And she kind of questions her behavior.

I think going back to class,

I think she's very conscious of how class changes perceptions of people,

And especially women.

And I think we've seen through this entire chapter,

She's so class conscious.

And she is always like,

Well,

We need to give ourselves space because we do not have money to compensate for any bad behavior or any other ways that we might be perceived.

And I think this is a very interesting conversation from between the two of them.

I think shows off their different ideas so well.

Jo doesn't really care that much about the class differences,

Even though she recognizes them.

Yeah.

But it's like,

Makes you wonder if Jo,

And she has maybe some criticism to the other classes,

But then she doesn't really see how she could remove the class differences.

And I think maybe Amy has this,

An agenda that if she gets higher in Society,

She has an ability to make differences,

Especially for other women,

For these poor women like herself.

Once upon a time,

They would have been really in a position to do whatever they wanted,

Right?

I think the family wasn't always right.

And also,

Jo has a bit of a nostalgia for how she acted as a girl,

As a younger girl,

Anyway,

Being able to do what she wanted and not have it be of consequence.

Same with Amy,

Who is very grown up,

Is trying to take the family forward within the confines of what Society currently is.

So yeah,

I think it's an interesting way of looking at that.

Yeah.

And she's quite realistic.

Because to me,

The way Jo behaves here,

She says that she's going to go forward.

I don't think that her way works that well if she refuses to conform to a certain level.

Yeah,

No,

Because we've seen it not work out for her.

She does not see the world this way or act this way when she's a grown up.

What is it?

She's not like this around the professor.

No.

She's not ornery like this around him.

But yeah,

No,

I think,

You know,

She just kind of wants to stay in her childhood state,

In a sense.

And it's interesting when I spoke to people about this chapter,

There are a lot of people who say that,

Oh,

Amy is sort of the villain here,

Which I don't see.

I'm like,

Where that comes from?

I have no idea.

You're just calling it like it is.

In this society,

During this time period,

You can't go on just to be mean to people,

Refuse to speak to other adults,

Be offended when somebody gives you compliments.

Even now you can't do that.

No,

You can't.

People don't want to hang out with you.

It's like when I was in art school,

One of my university teachers said that if you want to be in good terms and get lots of clients,

All you have to do is be polite and do your work.

That's how you get clients.

That illustration.

And she,

Of course,

Costs herself a lot because of it.

I mean,

We all still have to interact because if we value people around us and not just ourselves,

We also have to learn how to be nice to people,

Actively with people around us.

From my perspective now,

Having worked and now in academia,

It really pays so much to basically go through the Amy way of life and being like,

Oh,

Well,

I'm going to be nice and listen to your stories,

Even if it's not that great.

I don't respect you that much.

I still need you in this kind of social situation.

I do understand where Jo is and her head space because sometimes she's just like,

Oh,

Why can't I just be who I am all the time and just be super authentic?

And I kind of understand her frustration,

But sometimes it's not even because her reasons for liking certain people aren't even that justified.

If she really didn't like some of these people for ideological reasons,

Then I understand why she's acting this way.

But she's not just being like,

Oh,

Like these people,

Like,

I just can't,

I just can't handle them.

All these people,

I don't really like him a lot,

You know.

Her reason for like Mr.

Tudor,

She's like,

Oh,

He's just kind of mean.

He's just kind of an unpleasant person.

Oh,

Like,

And they're not super justifiable reasons for being impolite.

I don't think we are supposed to get along with every people we meet.

Her dislike for him,

It doesn't really have any kind of real reasons.

Well,

If he,

If he,

Be that he's dark or something.

If he was some sort of child abuser,

Then maybe it would be super justified.

But we don't see him being an unpleasant individual.

He's barely even a character.

We just see Amy and Jo talking about him.

We have no idea about him.

I don't approve of Tudor any more than you do,

But I'm not called upon to tell him so neither are you.

So Amy is just like,

Well,

You know,

Just,

Just let it,

Yeah,

Let it go.

It's not,

It's not your job to tell him.

Really that's smart to say something if this guy is an aristocrat.

Yeah,

No,

No.

I mean,

It seems like he is generally not a very nice guy.

They're in agreement about this.

And it's quite something that even Amy is saying something about it.

But of course,

Like she says,

It's not their job to really tell him or inform him that it doesn't really even matter how they feel about him.

If you give something like constructive criticism about their art,

That's okay.

But to say something about their character,

That's not so easy.

I mean,

It probably is quite something for Amy to say something about someone's personality.

I think it does take a lot for her to make a statement like that.

But yeah,

So I find that bit interesting because,

Because clearly they do agree on something.

Not that they don't understand certain people,

The people they're seeing in very different ways.

Amy totally understands where Joe is coming from.

But this is also because of their position in the society.

They can just go and work these things to these other families because they're part of that community.

There's a lot hanging on the success of these social calls.

But of course,

We see that Joe is quite popular with the kids,

And maybe not with the adults,

But with the kids.

And Amy is quite successful with the adults.

And so,

You know,

I wouldn't say that's a complete failure on Jared's part.

And it's not like she can't socialize.

She's at least allowed to be a bit authentic.

But I think Amy has a better understanding of the stake.

As we said before,

Very conscientious of how status and class status influences these interactions in a way that Joe doesn't think about as much.

I think Joe is a lot like Lori in this sense,

Because they both have almost like these blurry lines,

What is proper and what isn't.

In the first part,

When Lori,

He kind of calls out Meg at the ball.

And then there's this rumor that,

Oh,

Meg and Lori are an item.

And then he does that trick with the catfishing.

Like,

He doesn't understand that it can damage Meg's reputation.

Yeah,

Yeah.

And Joe doesn't really understand that her behavior can damage her entire family's reputation.

And that's what Amy is really worried about.

They found Aunt Carol with the old lady,

Both observed in some very interesting subject,

But they dropped it as the Carols came in,

With a conscious look which portrayed that they had been talking about their nieces.

Joe was not in a good humor,

And the perverse fit returned,

But Amy,

Who had graciously done her duty,

Kept her temper,

And pleased everybody,

Was in a most energetic frame of mind.

His amiable spirit was felt at once,

And both the aunts likeyered her affectionately.

Looking at the afterwards set,

Empathically,

That child improves every day.

Are you going to help about the fair,

Dear?

Asked Mrs.

Carol,

As Amy sat down beside her with the confiding air elderly people like so well in the young.

Yes,

Aunt,

Mrs.

Chester asked me if I would.

Can I afford to tend a table,

As I have nothing but my kind to give?

I am not,

Looking Joe decidedly.

I hate to be patronized,

And the Chesters think it's a great favor to allow us to help with their highly connected fair.

I wonder you consent it.

Amy,

They only want you to work.

I am willing to work.

It's for the freedmen as well,

As the Chesters,

And I think it very kind of them to let me share the labor and the fun.

Patronage don't trouble me when it is well meant.

Quite right and proper,

I like your grateful spirit,

My dear.

It's a pleasure to help people who appreciate our efforts.

Some don't,

And that is trying.

Observed Aunt Marge,

Looking over her spectacles at Joe,

Who sat apart rocking herself with a somewhat morose expression.

If Joe had only known what a great happiness was really being,

In the balance of poor one of them,

She would have churned dove-like in a minute,

But unfortunately we don't have wing-doves in our breaths,

And cannot see what goes in the minds of our friends.

Better for us that we cannot as general think,

But now and then it would be such a comfort.

Such a thing of kind temper.

By your next speech,

Joe deprived herself of several years of pleasure,

And received a timely lesson in the art of holding her tongue.

I don't like favors.

They oppress and make me feel like a slave.

I've learned to do everything for myself and be perfectly independent.

Ahem!

Hoch coughed Aunt Carol,

Softly,

With a look at Aunt Marge.

I thought you so,

Said Aunt Marge,

With a decided nod to Aunt Carol.

Mercifully,

Unconscious of what she had done,

Joe sat with her nose in the air,

And a revolutionary aspect,

Which was anything but inviting.

Did you speak French,

Dear?

Asked Mrs.

Carol,

Lying her hand on Amy's.

Very well,

Thanks to Aunt Marge,

Who lets Esther talk to me as often as I like,

Replied Amy,

With a grateful look,

Which caused the old lady to smile affably.

How are you about languages?

Asked Mrs.

Carol of Joe.

None your word.

I'm very stupid about studying anything.

Can't bear French.

It's such a slippery,

Silly sort of language,

Was the brusque reply.

Another look passed between the ladies,

And Aunt Marge said to Amy,

You are quite strong and well now,

Dear,

I believe.

Eyes don't trouble you any more,

Do they?

Not at all,

Thank you,

Ma'am.

I am very well,

And mean to do great things next winter,

So that I may be ready for Rome whenever that joyful time arrives.

Good girl.

You deserve to go,

And I'm sure you will some day,

Said Aunt Marge,

With an approving pat on the head as Amy picked up her ball for her.

Cross patch,

Throw the latch,

Sit by the fire and spin,

Scruff Polly,

Pending down from his perch,

On the back of her chair,

To peep into Joe's face with such a conical air of impertinent inquiry that was impossible to help laughing.

Most observing bird,

Said the old lady.

Come and take a walk,

My dear,

Cried Polly,

Hoping toward the china closet,

With a look suggestive of love's sugar.

Thank you.

I will come.

Amy and Joe brought the visit to an end,

Feeling more strongly than ever that cause did have a bad effect upon her constitution.

She shook her hands,

And in a gentler manner,

But Amy kissed both the aunts,

And the girls departed,

Leaving them behind with the impression of shadow and sunshine,

Which impression caused Aunt Marge to say as they vanished.

You'd better do it,

Mary.

I'll supply the money.

And Aunt Carl to reply beside me.

I certainly will,

If her father and mother consent.

Was the end of the tractor cause.

Yeah,

Yeah,

And so this is kind of the payoff of all the different dynamics that we've been observing the whole time.

My first observation is there's an interesting reference to the aftermath of the Civil War,

Because we have freedmen,

Because the fairies were freed slaves,

Formerly enslaved individuals,

Which is an interesting allusion to the surrounding history at the time.

And so I think with that particular context,

I find it sort of insensitive,

What Joe does,

Because like,

You know,

It's like,

Oh,

There's a fair.

Essentially,

It's a charity fair.

And she's like,

Oh,

I don't want to do it.

It's a favor for people who just want to work.

It's going to make me outwork.

And then she's like,

All these favors.

It makes me feel like a slave.

And it's just like,

That's a very privileged statement,

Which it's an experience that she knows nothing of.

Those are my initial observations.

But I think also,

Of course,

We have that callback to her speech about favors that we had before,

Where she's like,

Why do small favors when you can just do a big one?

I should really read this fair chapter again,

Because I don't really remember it.

Well,

Yeah,

Joe is like,

She says that she's willing to work,

But then working for charity.

Maybe she sees it if it's held by these families who are more aristocratic.

Maybe she sees that it's not authentic,

Perhaps.

These people are just kind of doing it for show,

And so connecting and not out of genuine sentiment.

Yeah.

Yeah,

No,

That's completely possible,

Because I know this is a sort of cause that her mom would have been,

You know,

Would have been eager to contribute to.

Yeah,

Maybe it is.

Like,

Maybe it's just that he's just like,

Oh,

Look at this rich family trying to make me work for free.

That as well.

In the first part,

When she doesn't want to go,

Like,

Setting off a squall.

I mean,

I know these are pretty different things,

But it's also a refusal to participate on these societal events where you have to be social.

Yeah,

So,

I mean,

She's never really taken well to these sorts of things,

Especially when,

Yeah,

She has a little bit of a contempt for these more affluent families.

These sorts of things force her into situations where she doesn't really know what to say or how to interact and can't be her authentic self.

So it's probably frustrating for her.

She probably doesn't really know how to interact in those situations.

If Jill would have gone to Europe with the ants,

Do you think she would have given up at some point and returned home?

I mean,

I feel like,

Well,

She would have certainly had a very different experience from Amy.

I mean,

I think artistically for her,

Maybe she would have had a good time.

But I feel like having to hang out with this person that she doesn't seem to,

It's not like she even enjoys ant marches.

She doesn't like them.

It's not like they even get on that well.

So for me now,

I'm just like,

Why would she want to go?

I mean,

Even if it's a great opportunity,

She has to hang out with ant march all the time.

It's very possible she would have given up because I don't know that she and ant march would have had a very pleasant time together.

There isn't any scene in the book where it said that Jill generally liked to hang out with the ant.

Only Amy in the entire family seemed to like the ant.

Yeah,

Even with just living with her for a bit,

She got a lot out of that whole experience.

You know,

Got to empathize with her a lot in a way that Joe did not.

So this time,

Like,

Well,

Joe denied herself of a really,

Really amazing travel opportunity that probably was rare back in the day.

But she would still have to hang out with a person that she didn't like that much.

She probably had a much better time in New York.

Tell you,

Jill,

Joe's description was to be ant march's companion.

Because there had been lots of time for writing,

His aunt is always like,

Stop that.

Do something else.

Well,

Like,

You should marry somebody for it.

Oh,

My God.

Yes.

No,

She would.

She would.

She would totally want Joe to marry somebody and would be trying to connect her up with different people.

And Joe would not be having any of it.

Yeah,

March knows this about Amy.

Amy wants to marry well.

So I don't think it would have been a very pleasant trip for Joe.

And then she would have to wear these dresses.

At this,

She would have to speak French.

And she says here that she doesn't like to speak French.

They're actually going to France.

So I don't know how that is going to work out.

She's basically giving the aunts every possible reason why they should not pick her as their grandma in the end.

Like,

When people say that Amy stole Joe's trip to Europe,

I think that's entirely based on the movies,

Because there's none of that in this chapter.

No,

Joe totally does it to herself.

But this is essentially an interview of Amy and Joe.

This is like.

This is like a job interview.

It is a job.

They don't know about it.

They don't know it,

But it is.

Yeah,

No.

And she is.

Joe is very clearly not the right candidate here.

Like,

You could like,

How can you go to Europe and be and be like,

Oh,

I hate this language?

I think it's so stupid.

I don't I don't like speaking.

And I was like,

You will literally be living there.

French,

Mr.

Bear.

Oh,

Yeah.

I mean,

We did have a French Mr.

Bear or Professor Bear.

I don't know.

Maybe she would have had a better time in Germany if they ever went there.

Yes,

I hope.

Like,

I can imagine Joe going to Frankfurt looking for this house or something like that.

Like,

I think she would have enjoyed France without the apps.

Yeah,

I think so.

I think if Joe were allowed to do a European trip,

But her own way and the people she liked,

Then I think it would be a better experience for her.

But like she she hates just,

You know,

Being under the kind of constraints that the apps would have very would have definitely put on her.

And she wouldn't have the freedom that she really wanted.

And so I don't think I mean,

For this particular the requirements for this particular trip,

I mean,

Absolutely not.

She was not the right person.

You know,

Nobody's stealing anything from anybody.

It was Aunt March making this decision.

There's one part that I want to read to you.

And it was like a critique about Aunt March in Greta Gerwig's room.

I see if I can find it.

I want to talk about it with you,

Because in the novel,

In the first part of Little Woman,

It said that Joe really liked Uncle March.

And I think Joe also pitied Aunt March a little bit because she had lost her child.

Oh,

Yeah,

I remember.

I remember that.

No,

It seems to be a bit of it's a very passing reference.

But yeah.

So this was written by Carly Henderson.

Aunt March's character is similarly sacrificed to Gerwig's particular ideal of femininity.

Interestingly enough,

Aunt March in this film becomes the aspirational model.

In contrast to the book,

In Gerwig's film Aunt March is the sister of Mr.

March.

This means she's not only unmarried and rich,

She also has never been married,

Which for Gerwig means she has freedom and means.

Next sidestep,

The question of how an unmarried sister inherits and keeps the family wealth.

And note that the real problem here is that Gerwig's Aunt March represents the only path to freedom for the March girls.

Money.

Are we really prepared to declare that freedom simply is access to capital?

None of the girls' artistic endeavors mean anything unless they indeed capitalize on them.

Here it seems to me particularly clear that Gerwig unknowingly submits Albert's work to the architecture of late-stage capitalism.

Additionally,

Streep's Aunt March is a one-dimensional character,

Surprisingly enough for Streep.

In the novel and in the 2017 BBC adaptation by Helen Thomas,

Aunt March is a tragic figure,

A widow whose only child died in her youth and one who says stupid things,

But later realizes it and has the humility to apologize.

She therefore is a character of debt.

That is,

In the novel,

She too grows and matures,

Whereas Streep's Aunt March has no arc.

Streep's Aunt March is the woman-to-be,

Nothing to learn and to debate,

Or no one.

Yeah,

No,

That's,

It's really interesting because I think it never made sense to me that in 2019 Aunt March was the sister of their dad,

But somehow she's rich,

But he is not.

Unless he lost a ridiculous amount of money.

That whole situation doesn't really make much sense.

So what is the objective again?

That basically Aunt March is sort of this ideal where she just is rich so she doesn't have to marry?

So is that the point?

That is supposed to be like aspiration for Jo,

That she,

She shouldn't marry and have babies,

She should be free spinster like Aunt March.

Aha.

Or something like that.

And it's so weird because mine,

Who was a big fan of the 2019 film,

And then they,

Like,

Jo's and Fredrick's relationship in that movie,

They said that,

Oh,

To her,

That scene when Aunt March was like,

You need to marry well,

And then Jo is like,

No,

I want to paddle my own canoe.

This person said that,

Oh,

To her,

It meant that,

Jo,

You want to be lonely and sad like Aunt March.

But then Greta Gerwig says that for her Aunt March is this aspirational character who Jo admires for being a spinster and rich.

So there's this sort of pick your own narrative and capitalize on these people who hate the ending of Little Women.

And then this person who said this said that they,

They read some of her interviews and now they are like,

They can't even comprehend.

How would somebody do that?

Put aside the fact that lots of adaptations don't really treat Aunt March with a whole lot of nuance.

She's not always a nuanced character.

If anything,

I think 2017 probably did her best.

I agree.

I am not a fan because Aunt March is the character that Jo is trying to be.

Then they should have had been in,

On a lot better terms with each other.

Then why is she imposing this idea on Amy?

And why does she attach to Amy so well?

Jo is the one trying to aspire to be her.

That doesn't make sense.

And it has such a big contrast because if Jo is supposed to admire Aunt March,

Why Aunt March is constantly saying that the girl should get married if she is a happy spinster like Gerwig says.

Yeah.

And if she wanted,

And if she was telling the girls to be rich spinsters,

Then it would be so easy for her to kind of pass some of her wealth to the girls and so that they could be rich spinsters.

Then why doesn't she contribute to that?

A lot of people would have asked these questions.

That was very jarring for me in 2019 when I was watching it in cinema where it's just like,

Oh,

Well,

You're not married.

Oh,

Well,

That's because I'm rich.

And then I was like,

Hang on.

I'm pretty sure Aunt March married into wealth.

I'm pretty certain that was what happened.

But of course,

That's like one of the many changes,

Smaller changes that Gerwig made,

Which kind of don't make sense for the different character arcs and is inconsistent with Aunt March in general.

I don't talk a lot about Aunt March in my video.

Yeah,

No,

That's another thing.

If we admire her for being rich and not married,

Where did she get the money?

You know,

If she's not married,

Why she wants these girls to get married?

Like,

I'm not getting any answers to these questions.

I have no idea what her agenda was.

To me,

It just feels like she's trying to capitalize in all these real woman fandoms.

Yeah,

She is.

She kind of wants to say,

Oh,

Yeah,

No,

Women should be single and that's how they can be happy and then profit off of their own work,

Which,

You know,

Isn't ideal in some senses.

But it also rings really wrong for me because the whole idea was that Aunt March was this really lonely character because she was in a big house by herself with nobody.

And I think even 1994 acknowledges that.

There's just like,

Well,

You know,

She was like,

Wow,

How awful was it for her to be in this big house all by herself?

And Marmee kind of,

This is a line from,

You know,

1994,

Is like,

Oh,

Well,

She couldn't use her resources and distribute them to people.

She couldn't share them.

She had all this.

She was sitting on all this and didn't share it.

And so for me,

I'm just kind of like,

Well,

It's not that the March family is entitled to Aunt March's money,

But it's just like,

Well,

If she wanted this for the girls,

Why could she not share it?

But in addition,

It's the whole idea of Aunt March is that she's not happy in her current position.

That's why she needs a companion.

That's why she needs one of the sisters to come sit with her because she literally has nobody apart from maybe Aunt Carol to come see her.

So it's like,

Oh,

Like,

This is isn't it awesome she gets to be old and rich and single?

And I'm like,

That's not how we portray her.

There's this quote from Louisa May Alcott when she was in her 50s.

She envies her sister's marriages and she writes that she's lonely.

So in a way,

She kind of became Aunt March and not the job that she wrote.

And that's really sad.

It is really sad.

And then we have Greta Gerwig who says that she's like Louisa May Alcott's expert.

God,

I don't think she even likes little women.

Not every time I read her interviews.

It's like she doesn't pay any attention to what happens in the book.

I don't think this individual read Little Women or even likes it.

She's just like,

I'm subverting everything in this story.

And it's like,

Well,

Then where's the essence of the thing that you were adapting?

I recently met an episode about Bette.

Then I read all the studies about Bette.

And a lot of people,

Especially now after the 2019 film,

They're like,

They praise Greta Gerwig for giving Bette this ability to be a concept pianist.

So Bette can capitalize her talent same way as Joe and Amy do.

And this gives Bette the value that she needs.

And I'm like,

That means that women's only value is if we have some kind of talent that you can capitalize.

But the whole idea was that of this novel was that if you are a good person,

That is enough.

You are like,

Just be a good and moral person in this world.

And that's enough to contribute to the world and be serviceable.

And help others and care about communities,

Be conscientious of your community.

It was never like,

Oh,

You should profit off of your gifts.

You should monetize your abilities.

That was not the idea.

The only reason these two girls,

Joe and Amy,

Are trying to monetize their abilities is because they want to earn for the family.

Their family was always number one.

It was never about like,

Oh,

I should partake in capitalism and earn money and just become a rich mister.

That was never the point.

So.

And in the book,

Like,

Two most failed characters,

Aunt Marge and Laurie's grandfather,

They are the most unhappiest people in that entire novel.

Louisa May Albert,

I read that.

The time when she wrote that quote,

She was making $50 million a year,

Like more than currency.

She was fairly rich.

And then she writes in her journal how unhappy she is.

Greta Gerwig.

I don't even have words.

How much did this cost her at this point?

What's wrong with you?

She doesn't get this story.

That's why,

Like,

You know,

When people say,

Oh,

Modernize the material,

Modernize the material.

I'm like,

I think you made it worse.

In all adaptations,

It was always like,

OK,

Just be a good person.

Be giving to other people.

If you've got resources,

Then share them.

It's the opposite of capitalism.

There's so much emphasis on charity,

Right?

Christian charity.

And I feel like that really paramount idea is missing.

It's absolutely missing from the Greta Gerwig adaptation.

Barely there.

Especially when it comes to,

Like,

Joe and Professor Bear.

Because there's so many people who are like,

Joe should have married the young and erotic Laurie.

And it's so funny.

If you read the book,

Joe is not into Laurie at all.

And Laurie's pretty bad in the book a lot of times.

But he totally glitches the light so many times.

With multiple of the sisters,

Too.

Like,

He's an absolutely awful person at times.

That's the problem,

I think,

Is that a lot of people have a certain idea of little women in their heads,

Of how the story goes in their heads,

And they don't actually go back to the source material and see her intentions.

Yeah,

I mean,

Like,

To say nothing of,

Like,

The ending.

It's also,

Like,

Even the based idea of what the book values and is about.

None of that is respected.

I mean,

I think one of the things in particular that gets made is the portrayal of Marmee.

I think,

You know,

She's.

.

.

I feel like she's made of paper in 2019.

She's not,

Like,

Anything of,

Like,

The strong individual that I see her as.

She doesn't keep these people strong.

I don't get that sense at all.

I think I read a comic saying that she wanted Marmee to be,

Like,

A happy hippie.

And I'm like,

Oh,

These are during the Civil War,

And she helped these poor people,

And she was,

Like,

Early American social worker.

Where does the hippie comes from?

She was a hippie,

Then she wouldn't be doing any of this stuff.

She would not do it.

You know,

Marmee is all about.

.

.

She is all about having morals,

Servicing,

And paying service to your community.

You serve other people.

That's always what she was.

.

.

I mean,

She could have had unconventional ideas,

And which would not be surprising given that she married Mr.

March.

But she had to be a very tough individual because she had to see her kids be poor when Abel had been rich.

And so she had to put up with a lot of hardship,

And then had all these very strongly held beliefs,

Which is why when she just seems like this kind of cool mom,

I hate it.

I absolutely hate it.

I'm like,

This is not the moral center of the family.

You're just trying to be the cool mom.

And they have.

.

.

And I said this in my video that I made a couple.

.

.

A few years back.

I feel like they took all of the strength out of Marmee,

And they put it in Jo,

Because they wanted Jo to be perfect at everything.

It felt so unrealistic,

Because Marmee's husband is at the war,

Beth gets ill,

Amy is in other parts of the world.

Like you said,

She felt like a very one-dimensional character.

I didn't see any depth there.

And I could say the same about all the characters,

Really.

Maybe Amy was closest to the book,

But even there,

There wasn't that much growth,

Because they cut out Laurie's arc.

I never get the sense that I know these characters very well.

I mean,

In like,

You know,

Most other adaptations,

I was like,

Okay,

Well,

I know who this character is.

And everyone more or less ends up in a different place.

But I never really end up with that sense in the 2019.

I think even with Meg,

I think there's a lot of sense of,

Oh,

We're going to take this arc somewhere,

But then we don't complete it.

Except with Meg,

Right?

She has this whole like,

Oh,

I'm not happy with my current situation.

Yeah,

Like it's not great.

But then in the film,

It's just like,

Oh,

They made up.

It's fine.

End of story.

It's the same with Jo.

She has this thick speech,

How lonely she is.

And then she's like,

Marmee's like,

What about the nice guy you met in New York?

And she's like,

Yeah.

And then she sends a letter to Laurie.

Yeah,

Yeah.

No,

It's not that.

It's not just this.

No,

Like,

What is this?

What is this?

She's sad about Professor Bear,

It seems.

Marmee has observed this.

But then why is she writing to Laurie?

What happened?

So people were trying to justify this to me in my YouTube comments and being like,

Well,

She felt so lonely that Laurie was kind of her resort.

She wanted so badly to not be lonely that she wrote to,

That this is why she decided she would take Laurie back.

And I'm like,

No,

But she was not into Laurie.

One of my friends wrote this recently that in 2019 film,

It was all promoted how feminist it is.

But then the last 10 minutes of the film,

It's really two sisters fighting over a guy who's not even a great guy.

Because his arc isn't there.

Yes,

It's just like,

Well,

What should I say about him?

I don't know.

He's Timothy Chalamet,

Right?

Then there's like,

Oh,

Jo didn't want to marry.

Well,

Now,

In this moment,

She wants to marry Laurie,

Apparently,

When she sends a letter.

So where was the part of her not wanting to get married?

And then in the book,

That never happens.

In the book,

Jo always says no to Laurie.

Yeah,

Well,

No,

She's not into him.

No,

That's like,

She went under no circumstances of wanting to marry Laurie.

She doesn't even do that.

I mean,

She kind of like maybe contemplates it,

But she barely even contemplates it in the book.

And so I'm just like,

Okay,

So the film wants her to be so lonely that she reaches out to Laurie.

But then,

And other people are like,

Oh,

But she realizes that she doesn't need a man to be happy.

I'm like,

Where did she realize things?

The only place in which she might realize it is when she's like,

Oh,

Amy took the guy that I actually wanted.

So,

Oh,

Well,

I'm gonna be alone now.

She has no agency in that decision.

Yeah,

And that doesn't make any sense because the movie doesn't really have a story on when it tries to feed to all these different narratives.

So it's like you said about Jo writing,

Like she wrote and she became the writer,

That's it.

Yeah,

The loneliness problem fixed.

Like she became a creator and it fixed her loneliness.

But of course,

As we can see with Louisa May Alcott's actual life,

It wasn't a thing.

That wasn't what happened.

No,

And unlike when people say that,

Oh,

Liz Merkle didn't care about marriage and Little Woman was just like her masterpiece.

Laurie's based on a real person.

Friedrich is based on a real person.

There's an entire love,

This sort of tension between Jo and Friedrich and Laurie.

It's like one of those clues in the novels in this book.

If Louisa May Alcott didn't have any kind of experience with men,

How did she gain up with the story?

When I read Little Woman 2019 film guy,

There was this whole chapter,

How Greta Gerwig wanted to make mockery of Jo's marriage.

Oh,

Like,

Oh,

It makes me,

It makes me mad.

Oh,

It makes me so mad.

It's like they deliberately made it into a cliche.

Oh,

He spit and made it superficial and added no depth to that relationship.

But it's like,

Basically they had to make him a superficial character to justify Greta Gerwig's narrative.

And it makes me angry because she just wants the version of Jo's arc that exists in her head and nothing else will suffice him.

I just concluded that Greta Gerwig doesn't actually like little women at all.

She doesn't,

She isn't- Yeah.

And then you just have to wonder what her agenda was because she's married to a man who is 14 years older.

She has a son of it.

And then she hates that Jo gets married and gets to be a mother of a bunch of boys.

And then she was always like,

Oh,

I am Jo March.

And then she hates it.

She,

Yeah,

I must be Jo March.

And then she hates,

Yeah,

She absolutely hates on the arc.

And I got this really ridiculous comment once and someone being like,

Oh,

Well,

Maybe they should have included Professor Verne there.

But like,

They should have made Jo a lesbian where,

And then marrying the professor out of appearances so that he could verge for her.

And I'm like,

Jo literally has children with this man.

Like,

If their marriage was a facade,

Then why is she having all these kids?

And if the marriage was facade,

Why there are all these making out scenes in the pub between them?

Yeah,

Right.

There are these making out scenes between them in Jo's boys,

And he's 17 years old.

Uh-huh,

Yeah.

Well,

People don't like to pay attention to that because Romance does not belong to old people.

It belongs to these young,

Romantic,

Meet,

Hug guys.

So that's what makes me angry.

I want to read more interviews of Greta Gerwig,

But I feel like I might blow a gasket if I read the things that she says.

I have the 2019 film guide.

I read it once,

And I threw it in the garbage because I got so angry.

And then later on,

I was like,

Why did I throw that away?

And I had to send messages to some of my little woman friends who had the book,

And I think asked them to clarify some of the quotes.

I got so mad,

But it's so weird because in the earlier draft,

There was a German flick there,

And it didn't have this vague ending.

It was more closer to the book.

And then suddenly,

She just decided to change it.

Yeah,

No,

I think I got a comment from somebody saying,

Well,

You know,

I think it was meant to be a bit different,

But because of maybe something going on behind the scenes in production,

They had to kind of scramble the footage around and kind of slap a,

Like a,

This is our label on it and justify it as an artistic decision because maybe they just kind of didn't have a lot of good footage they had filmed,

And so they had to reorder it and change up the ending and then justify it.

So that's another possibility.

I mean,

It's very possible that Greta Gerwig is just kind of lying off steam because it's to kind of justify why the film is the way it is,

Has kind of passed it off as a massive feminist work.

And that's the other thing.

A lot of my friends said to me that there was this shoot with Emma Watson,

The scene where Meg has this breakdown with the children and with the coat and the money and,

You know,

But Emma Watson couldn't perform that well.

She couldn't deliver the lines.

So they had to cut out that scene.

And it's just like what you said,

Meg's art feels incomplete with the movie because they introduced the part of the silk,

But then they don't go through with the whole chapter.

Yeah.

So it's because Emma Watson's performance,

I think.

Yeah,

I remember you mentioning this to me.

And when I read the Little Women film guide,

They actually speak about this scene like it was there in the film.

So in a way,

I felt that the book itself was sort of incompleted because you have all these mentions of these scenes in the original script.

And then suddenly you have these scenes from the final movie of Greta Gerwig making fun of Joseph Flake's marriage.

So everything feels very messy.

A lot of stuff feels weird and inconsistent where you just have,

Flake starts to have an arc and then doesn't have one.

Laurie gets scolded about not being like,

Hardworking and such,

But then he never goes and does it.

They just kind of,

It's like a lot of these couples just getting together anyway,

Even though there's clearly something that's been introduced that's not been paid off.

Yeah,

No,

It is very odd,

But I don't know,

Maybe because the structure of the film is so confusing that people aren't willing to overlook it.

With this chapter,

In the end,

When Jo assesses these things to Aunt Marge and Aunt Carol,

She kind of puts herself above them.

And it's weird because people say that,

Oh,

Here Jo is a feminist in this chapter,

The way she puts herself above the aunts.

And then these same people complain that they don't take her to Europe.

Yeah.

Yeah,

I mean,

People generally don't root for these two aunts,

But what do people have in mind for Jo when they want her to go to Europe?

Well,

What do you think she's wanting to do in Europe except be a companion for these two old ladies?

Like,

Is this a great future you imagine for Jo Marge if you admire her so much?

It really blows my mind.

Yeah.

Last night when I was like,

Thinking what our discussion would be like,

That's sort of the thing to my mind when I was thinking this part where Jo sort of says that she doesn't like to speak French and she doesn't want to go to this fair and she thinks she's so great.

And then the next chapter,

Which is called Consequences and Marge tells to everyone that Amy gets to go to Europe and then she says to Jo that,

Well,

You didn't really seem to be that into France.

You said that you don't like French,

Of course.

Then I was thinking,

There's so many people who say that,

Oh,

Jo needs to be rude and mean and immature person and that makes her a feminist.

There's this irony because in the book,

Jo feels these consequences of being rude and immature,

Which means that she doesn't get to trip to Europe.

But then in these movies,

Jo doesn't feel these consequences.

Because being feminist does not mean being rude to people.

Feminism should be about equality and how does being rude is equality,

Creates equality.

It's not a misogynistic situation here because Jo is not being put up against a man in this particular situation.

Like even now,

If someone were picking a candidate to go on a trick with them,

You would kind of pick the person that you get on best with and you think would get the most out of that opportunity.

It's not a misogynistic thing.

I think some people will probably be like,

Okay,

Well,

Jo does not fit into the aunt's idea of femininity and what a woman should look like.

And I'm like,

No,

Jo literally thinks French is a stupid language.

Why would you want to take someone to France if they speak the language?

It's not a situation of misogyny.

It is just someone learning,

Oh,

Well,

If you are careful with your words,

Then you deny yourself of opportunities like this.

And also this is just,

It's generally tough job interviews work,

Right?

Yeah.

So people are like,

Jo would have just like thrived in Europe.

Like she needed to,

She had to read to these two old ladies and keep them company and go to parties,

Right?

And probably go to these social events.

Like she would hate it.

Yeah.

And because so,

And also something else I was Googling was the little rhyme that the parrot dings at the end is the cross-patched prose of that.

So I was like,

Okay,

This little piece was put in there for a reason.

So apparently it was a nursery rhyme.

Apparently cross-patch is sort of a,

Usually a word for a cross or ill-tempered person,

Usually a girl or woman,

Sitting and spitting.

It kind of is an analogy of it's a kind of Jo being a disagreeable person,

You know,

See her and spitting,

But she does do a lot of domestic tasks and they kind of see her as a bit of like a ornery,

Disagreeable individual.

And so,

You know,

And then of course Aunt Arch is like a most observing bird.

Us.

Which I find so funny.

So it really just wants to drive that point in.

So I think our conclusion is that Amy and Jo are not too different.

They just have different point of views to life.

Yeah.

Yeah,

They do.

They do,

They do.

They ultimately have very similar intentions.

Actually do care,

Put their family first.

They,

They,

Yeah,

They just have very different methods of approaching the world and society.

And throughout,

Even though they disagree this chapter,

The discussion is very respectful between the sisters.

Yes,

It is,

It is.

Yeah,

No,

They,

They have a very mature dynamic between them,

Which I think gets ignored a lot.

I think,

You know,

The most recent adaptation kind of wants to put that resentment between them.

And whereas it's not there,

It's not,

It's not the same.

No.

And I think you can see that Jo feels bad for hurting Amy because she knows that these social events are important to her.

Yeah.

And then Amy also knows that she,

She brings Jo out from her comfort zone.

Yeah,

No,

They are doing this.

This part where Jo says these things that she doesn't like French,

You're going to get this impression that she's been sort of holding her tongue with the ad quite a long time.

Yeah,

And she's,

It's all coming out now.

It's all the resentment isn't coming out now.

It even kind of offends me because I study linguistics,

Right?

You don't know the language.

You shouldn't say that about a particular language because they always work in their own way.

So I kind of sympathize with the ads a lot in this chapter.

Yeah.

And I don't know if that's either the way Jo feels about French.

I think she just might say this to annoy the ads.

Yeah,

That's,

Yeah,

That is possible.

Yeah.

She's just in a bad mood.

She's,

She's talking out of.

Well,

It was great talking to you once again.

Yeah,

No,

It was great talking to you.

And we always have something to say.

Like maybe 10 pages,

This is almost four hours.

Oh my,

Like,

Yeah,

There's so many things in these books that we could just speak about them forever.

Yeah,

No,

For sure.

No,

It's a very,

It's a very rich piece of work.

Yeah,

For me,

I wasn't sure at first,

How long is our discussion going to go over this?

Well,

In my edition,

It's,

I think,

13 pages.

As it turns out,

We just have some,

There's just so much room for discussion.

Yeah.

I'm surprised.

I thought this would be maybe two hours.

It's really nice aspiration for us to be like,

Well,

Let's bring more people into these reading worlds.

And I hope we can do that.

Just one listener at a time.

Yeah,

I had maybe,

Well,

One Finnish person who was listening to this English version.

She had read Little Women after she had listened to it.

So I was like,

That's amazing.

I inspired somebody to read Little Women.

And then someone else,

I think they were American.

They read Little Men for the first time after receiving this podcast.

No,

I mean,

To my shame,

I have not read Little Men yet.

I need to read the rest of that series,

As well as Louise's other books.

Yeah,

That's the goal for this year.

Yeah,

I'll be taking that.

Well,

First I go through all these chapters in Little Women.

Then I do some chapters in Little Men and then in Girls' Voice.

And then we analyze all of them so I don't run out of work.

Yeah,

Everyone.

Yeah,

Yeah.

That's a good idea.

So I bet I'm about to head off soon.

But it's been a really nice time,

Again,

Talking with you.

And we always have really great conversations.

Yeah,

We do.

Some of the best real-world conversations on the internet.

Yeah.

Yeah,

I like it.

I like to think so.

Yeah.

All right.

Have a great day.

Okay,

You too,

Lina.

See you later.

Bye.

Thank you so much for listening.

That was our chat.

Take care and make good choices.

Bye.