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3.98 AVERAGE
3.98 AVERAGE
What a wonderful book to start out the new year. This book came highly recommended and it certainly did not disappoint. I simply adored each and every page. [a:Gene Stratton Porter|4730132|Gene Stratton Porter|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg] is a new author for me and I look forward to reading my books by her.
One bright spot in the difficult early quarantine days of new school and life routines was the chance to return to a daily read-aloud practice with my middle-school daughters. Probably our most beloved routine in earlier school times, when we were home together full time, was our breakfast reading. We read so many books and had so many fascinating discussions and used it as the jumping off point for our studies of history, writing, language, science, poetry, and geography. This time, with their days circumscribed by a different kind of schedule, it took us ages to get through a relatively short book. But oh, it was fun!
A Girl of the Limberlost is in a small mental collection of books which I feel very strongly saved me in my own difficult and lonely childhood. Elnora’s relationship to her cold and overprotective mother was something I immediately understood as an eleven or twelve year old, as well as Elnora’s determination to work twice as hard and be three times as cheerful and basically do every single thing in her power to make the one person who should have loved her best, see her and acknowledge her. Add in the magic of friends with incredible resources and a romantic subplot which then takes over the story, and my own middle school heart rejoiced. The book was both a validation of something dark and unsayable in my own life, and an extremely rosy American bootstrapping version of Poor Child Overcomes and Wins the Heart of Rich Man. And all against the backdrop of a magical Midwest swamp, forested with ancient trees and teeming with rare moths. It was romance and science and heroism and a smart and plucky heroine and I was in love.
Thirty years later, reading it aloud (which shows all the underseams of sentences, beautiful and awkward and ugly) with my daughters (who are widely read and excellent critical thinkers), I had a very different response to the story. Of course I did. I’m no longer spending sleepless nights plotting my escape from a father whose life was a complex web of religion and lies and a mother whose days were spent carefully cultivating the myth of his tragic greatness. I haven’t needed a story to give me total and magical escape in a long, long time. And that’s the wonder of stories. They really can save us. The right words sometimes show up at the right time, and then later, when they aren’t needed as a lifeline any longer, it’s easy to feel disappointed, when on closer inspection, it’s not actually a stupendous work of literature.
A Girl of the Limberlost has elements that are still wondrously described. Moths are ever about in all their secretive and short-lived beauty. There is a bright thread of longing for courageous friendships and integrity of purpose. And of course, there is the echoing betrayal of a mother whose heart is so fully in service of a man (and a man whose own choices are in service of his secrets) that her daughter’s childhood is the seeming proof of Jung’s theories on shadows and unlived, unhealed parental lives, which is then extremely conveniently solved and tied up with a little Victorian-scented bow. There are also plenty of saccharine passages: the typical white American Calvinist and nationalist point of view of 1909, and an erasure of the people whose long-ago life and prosperity in the beautiful Limberlost ends up paying directly for Elnora’s education and life after pain.
Another reason we took so long in finishing this—and maybe it was the real reason—was that the conversations this book prompted at our breakfast table were far-reaching and yet very much of this particular moment in time and neatly intersected with our ongoing family discussions of belonging and place, story and voice, historical contexts and how we consider art. In that respect, the reading was five stars. For Gene Stratton Porter’s book, however, I’ll award three.
A Girl of the Limberlost is in a small mental collection of books which I feel very strongly saved me in my own difficult and lonely childhood. Elnora’s relationship to her cold and overprotective mother was something I immediately understood as an eleven or twelve year old, as well as Elnora’s determination to work twice as hard and be three times as cheerful and basically do every single thing in her power to make the one person who should have loved her best, see her and acknowledge her. Add in the magic of friends with incredible resources and a romantic subplot which then takes over the story, and my own middle school heart rejoiced. The book was both a validation of something dark and unsayable in my own life, and an extremely rosy American bootstrapping version of Poor Child Overcomes and Wins the Heart of Rich Man. And all against the backdrop of a magical Midwest swamp, forested with ancient trees and teeming with rare moths. It was romance and science and heroism and a smart and plucky heroine and I was in love.
Thirty years later, reading it aloud (which shows all the underseams of sentences, beautiful and awkward and ugly) with my daughters (who are widely read and excellent critical thinkers), I had a very different response to the story. Of course I did. I’m no longer spending sleepless nights plotting my escape from a father whose life was a complex web of religion and lies and a mother whose days were spent carefully cultivating the myth of his tragic greatness. I haven’t needed a story to give me total and magical escape in a long, long time. And that’s the wonder of stories. They really can save us. The right words sometimes show up at the right time, and then later, when they aren’t needed as a lifeline any longer, it’s easy to feel disappointed, when on closer inspection, it’s not actually a stupendous work of literature.
A Girl of the Limberlost has elements that are still wondrously described. Moths are ever about in all their secretive and short-lived beauty. There is a bright thread of longing for courageous friendships and integrity of purpose. And of course, there is the echoing betrayal of a mother whose heart is so fully in service of a man (and a man whose own choices are in service of his secrets) that her daughter’s childhood is the seeming proof of Jung’s theories on shadows and unlived, unhealed parental lives, which is then extremely conveniently solved and tied up with a little Victorian-scented bow. There are also plenty of saccharine passages: the typical white American Calvinist and nationalist point of view of 1909, and an erasure of the people whose long-ago life and prosperity in the beautiful Limberlost ends up paying directly for Elnora’s education and life after pain.
Another reason we took so long in finishing this—and maybe it was the real reason—was that the conversations this book prompted at our breakfast table were far-reaching and yet very much of this particular moment in time and neatly intersected with our ongoing family discussions of belonging and place, story and voice, historical contexts and how we consider art. In that respect, the reading was five stars. For Gene Stratton Porter’s book, however, I’ll award three.
A Wonderful Read for All Ages!
Elnora’s mother holds a grudge! And, she just won’t let go. Elnora does everything she can to please her mother, but try as she may—nothing works. Her mother just can’t let go of the emotional pain of having lost her husband when Elnora was born. The child is just too much of a reminder of what she could have had in her life if he had lived.
Life was hard in 1909. Money was tight. Even though Elnora’s mother could sell some of the timber on the land (and be set for life) she refuses to do it. Again, it’s that old nagging reminder of her husband and why they bought this place to build a life. It’s a living memorial in her mind. She won’t hand over a pittance to Elnora—not even for clothes to go to school.
The plucky teenager won’t let that stop her. She wants ever so much to go to school. Her whole heart is wrapped up in that dream. The first day, her mother sends her off intentionally in clothes that look ridiculous on her. Of course, she is teased and ostracized from all the girls for looking silly in her old fashioned clothes and her clunky boots. Most girls would clam up and not go back to school. But, not Elnora! She is so determined to succeed. She is determined to find “some way” to make this work. And, that is when things begin to change in her family.
From the time she was quite young, Elnora had been collecting butterflies and moths from the forested swamps around her house. The Limberlost had been her playground and refuge; and, she cultivated a wonderful love of nature that was quite unusual for girls of that time period. With a deep passion and ingenuity, she comes up with a plan to not only get the money for school, new clothes, and books, but also to mend her mother’s broken heart.
Why not follow Elnora to the Limberlost to find the healing magic of the woods and learn how one determined young girl lays the groundwork for her future and all those around her. If you love books like Little House on the Prairie, Little Women, Anne of Green Gables and Cheaper by the Dozen, you will certainly fall in love in the Limberlost.
Elnora’s mother holds a grudge! And, she just won’t let go. Elnora does everything she can to please her mother, but try as she may—nothing works. Her mother just can’t let go of the emotional pain of having lost her husband when Elnora was born. The child is just too much of a reminder of what she could have had in her life if he had lived.
Life was hard in 1909. Money was tight. Even though Elnora’s mother could sell some of the timber on the land (and be set for life) she refuses to do it. Again, it’s that old nagging reminder of her husband and why they bought this place to build a life. It’s a living memorial in her mind. She won’t hand over a pittance to Elnora—not even for clothes to go to school.
The plucky teenager won’t let that stop her. She wants ever so much to go to school. Her whole heart is wrapped up in that dream. The first day, her mother sends her off intentionally in clothes that look ridiculous on her. Of course, she is teased and ostracized from all the girls for looking silly in her old fashioned clothes and her clunky boots. Most girls would clam up and not go back to school. But, not Elnora! She is so determined to succeed. She is determined to find “some way” to make this work. And, that is when things begin to change in her family.
From the time she was quite young, Elnora had been collecting butterflies and moths from the forested swamps around her house. The Limberlost had been her playground and refuge; and, she cultivated a wonderful love of nature that was quite unusual for girls of that time period. With a deep passion and ingenuity, she comes up with a plan to not only get the money for school, new clothes, and books, but also to mend her mother’s broken heart.
Why not follow Elnora to the Limberlost to find the healing magic of the woods and learn how one determined young girl lays the groundwork for her future and all those around her. If you love books like Little House on the Prairie, Little Women, Anne of Green Gables and Cheaper by the Dozen, you will certainly fall in love in the Limberlost.
So this is a book that I read when I was in middle school, and certain images from it have always stayed with me, along with particular feelings that the author describes. My favorite of which was the lunch box that Wesley buys for Elnora, and how carefully they prepare foods for each of its compartments. When Elnora graciously gives it all away, I am pained by her generosity, thinking to myself, Giving away someone else's generosity is not, in itself, generous! But that's an aside.
There are all these little moments of tragedy, and they are accompanied by little glimpses of redemption, in a way that felt supremely satisfying when I was 12, but now, twenty years later, felt a more cliche and predictable, like watching an old rom-com from the 90s. It doesn't make it bad; it just makes it less poignant. In the end, the saving grace of the plot are the descriptions of the Limberlost Swamp and the moths, which are just perfectly perfect.
There are all these little moments of tragedy, and they are accompanied by little glimpses of redemption, in a way that felt supremely satisfying when I was 12, but now, twenty years later, felt a more cliche and predictable, like watching an old rom-com from the 90s. It doesn't make it bad; it just makes it less poignant. In the end, the saving grace of the plot are the descriptions of the Limberlost Swamp and the moths, which are just perfectly perfect.
Childrens' books like [b:A Girl of the Limberlost|17567|A Girl of the Limberlost|Gene Stratton-Porter|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166810228s/17567.jpg|1194469] remind me of the instruction manuals that come with furniture that you have to assemble yourself. They are assembly instructions for morality. Life is so easy, and there are little stick people on the pages to show you how it is all done successfully. I adored [b:Little Women|1934|Little Women (Little Women, #1)|Louisa May Alcott|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1309282614s/1934.jpg|3244642] when I was a kid, for example, but in recent years I've tried to re-read it a couple of times, and I can't get past the part where Marmie makes the girls give up their Christmas breakfast so that the starving German children won't die of cold and hunger. It's so simple! If we give up a little of what is ours and have kind of a crappy Christmas but pretend it's fun, our parents (and God, by association) will love us. It's not that I disagree with the message that unselfishness makes us better (and even happier) people, and I know if I ever have a daughter I will read her Little Women. I just think that the delivery is too simplistic to be very honest, and it kind of gives me the creeps. I had that same creepy and confused feeling reading A Girl of the Limberlost. I would not say I'm appalled at anyone who loves this book, and the person who recommended it to me is a dear friend, but I can't let this reading pass without noting how uncomfortable it makes me.
This book was written 100 years ago - about a generation after Little Women. While Little Women is a quintessential example of American morality lessons, A Girl of the Limberlost is American capitalism through and through. The central struggle of the book is a basic Cinderella plot, wherein the beautiful Elnora has been caged in the Limberlost forest by her mother, who became bitter and mean after the death of Elnora's father. They own a huge amount of land and timber (note word choice), where Elnora catches moths and butterflies and communes with nature. Elnora, however, is basically a genius (on top of being the most naturally beautiful girl anyone has met), so she wants to go to high school in the nearby town, and her stingy mother will not buy her the clothes and books necessary to do so. All of this we know within the first few chapters of the book, and it's pretty obvious whose side we're on, right? Gotta go with Cinderella, not the evil mother.
[a:Stratton-Porter|1372693|Gene Stratton-Porter|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1238819887p2/1372693.jpg] makes it very obvious that the reader is intended to see how selfish and unreasonable the mother's argument is for not giving Elnora the fancy clothes she wants (no, sorry, needs), and Elnora is presented as a purely heroic character, without any intention of irony that I could detect. It was very conflicting, then to be 100% on the mother's side of the argument. I'll give you a selection of how the argument is characterized throughout the book to see if you agree. This is from a moment in which Elnora runs in a panic to her friend, the Bird Woman, because her mother didn't buy her a new dress for graduation:
"Elnora," she said, "Forgive me, but tell me truly. Is your mother so extremely poor as to make this necessary?"
"No," answered Elnora. "Next year I am heir to my share of over three hundred acres of land covered with almost as valuable timber as was in the Liberlost. We adjoin it. There could be dozens of oil wells drilled that would yield to us the thousands our neighbors are draining from under us, and the bare land is worth over one hundred dollars an acre for farming. She is not poor, she is - I don't know what she is. A great trouble soured and warped her..."
Kind of creepy, no? If you love your kids, you'll kill the forest. And this "Drill, baby, drill!" theme runs through the whole book. Elnora denudes the Limberlost of moths because she can sell them to pay for school. At the same time, she represents nature within the book because she loves the forest and knows everything about animals and plants. So, we learn, if we really love and understand nature, we use it to get us the stuff we want. I think there's a cartoon version of this story on Fox News starring Sarah Palin. It kind of makes me mad that a tree died to print this book. It was also a reality check for my own behavior (in the opposite way of what was intended) because it always seems vague to me when people talk about the ramifications of our behavior on people 100 years from now. This made it much more real because I kept wanting to get in my time machine (patent pending) and fly back to get this ridiculous girl not to replace the forest with farms and oil wells. I hope no one feels like that about me in 2109.
Aside from my problems with all of the basic messages of the book (and my problem with a side story that makes me very uncomfortable about a very Dickensian street urchin and his family), it had a fairly engaging plot. I'm a sucker for love stories to the point that even if I really dislike everything else, I still want to see the love story play out in a book. This one also had the bonus of every woman in the story learning that if she devoted her entire existence to her husband and kids, she would find true happiness. *shudder*
This book was written 100 years ago - about a generation after Little Women. While Little Women is a quintessential example of American morality lessons, A Girl of the Limberlost is American capitalism through and through. The central struggle of the book is a basic Cinderella plot, wherein the beautiful Elnora has been caged in the Limberlost forest by her mother, who became bitter and mean after the death of Elnora's father. They own a huge amount of land and timber (note word choice), where Elnora catches moths and butterflies and communes with nature. Elnora, however, is basically a genius (on top of being the most naturally beautiful girl anyone has met), so she wants to go to high school in the nearby town, and her stingy mother will not buy her the clothes and books necessary to do so. All of this we know within the first few chapters of the book, and it's pretty obvious whose side we're on, right? Gotta go with Cinderella, not the evil mother.
[a:Stratton-Porter|1372693|Gene Stratton-Porter|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1238819887p2/1372693.jpg] makes it very obvious that the reader is intended to see how selfish and unreasonable the mother's argument is for not giving Elnora the fancy clothes she wants (no, sorry, needs), and Elnora is presented as a purely heroic character, without any intention of irony that I could detect. It was very conflicting, then to be 100% on the mother's side of the argument. I'll give you a selection of how the argument is characterized throughout the book to see if you agree. This is from a moment in which Elnora runs in a panic to her friend, the Bird Woman, because her mother didn't buy her a new dress for graduation:
"Elnora," she said, "Forgive me, but tell me truly. Is your mother so extremely poor as to make this necessary?"
"No," answered Elnora. "Next year I am heir to my share of over three hundred acres of land covered with almost as valuable timber as was in the Liberlost. We adjoin it. There could be dozens of oil wells drilled that would yield to us the thousands our neighbors are draining from under us, and the bare land is worth over one hundred dollars an acre for farming. She is not poor, she is - I don't know what she is. A great trouble soured and warped her..."
Kind of creepy, no? If you love your kids, you'll kill the forest. And this "Drill, baby, drill!" theme runs through the whole book. Elnora denudes the Limberlost of moths because she can sell them to pay for school. At the same time, she represents nature within the book because she loves the forest and knows everything about animals and plants. So, we learn, if we really love and understand nature, we use it to get us the stuff we want. I think there's a cartoon version of this story on Fox News starring Sarah Palin. It kind of makes me mad that a tree died to print this book. It was also a reality check for my own behavior (in the opposite way of what was intended) because it always seems vague to me when people talk about the ramifications of our behavior on people 100 years from now. This made it much more real because I kept wanting to get in my time machine (patent pending) and fly back to get this ridiculous girl not to replace the forest with farms and oil wells. I hope no one feels like that about me in 2109.
Aside from my problems with all of the basic messages of the book (and my problem with a side story that makes me very uncomfortable about a very Dickensian street urchin and his family), it had a fairly engaging plot. I'm a sucker for love stories to the point that even if I really dislike everything else, I still want to see the love story play out in a book. This one also had the bonus of every woman in the story learning that if she devoted her entire existence to her husband and kids, she would find true happiness. *shudder*
This was one of my favorite books growing up. I re-read it very recently and it still holds the same charm for me. I could totally relate to Elnora Comstock and the trials she went through with her mother. I tried to model my independence and pride in my own work after her.
emotional
inspiring
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I loved this book! It isn't really a sequel to Freckles, but it would be best to read Freckles before reading this one. You can download this book for free to your Kindle. I love it!
Sweet story. Initially, I would have liked to see it in the hands of a more sophisticated writer. But then I remembered it was for young adults at the turn of the century. The writing grew on be though.