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A review by linda_don
A Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton-Porter
2.0
Well, it was free.
Take all the myths about the childhoods and general character of Presidents Lincoln and Washington and actualize them into an early 20th century female character, and you have Elnora.
She's beautiful, hard-working, kind, beloved, honest, self-educated, good with children, great with animals, and some kind of nature genius in general. She loves to look after the moths, the birds, the trees... and did I mention that she repeatedly demonstrates that she has no qualms about selling the land her family owns for lumber and oil profits? So maybe not that much of a genius after all. That's pretty much a D in Environmental Science right there--if you're feeling generous.
The deeper you get into the book the more it feels like a social tract on ideal femininity. Edith, Elnora's foil, is a glamorous town girl. She's depicted as selfish because she considers herself first, ambitious because she wants social standing above all else, and narrow-minded because she doesn't care to better herself in any way that won't help her own ambition.
(Plus, she doesn't really care about providing her future husband with, and I paraphrase, edible food and red-faced babies. My kind of girl!)
At the end of the book, deprived of her fiance and the respect of her peers, Edith is forced to take stock of her values. Heartbroken, she starts thinking long and hard about why she acts like she does, and concludes by blaming--surprise, surprise!--her mother. Charge: not incubating the right domestic values within her house and home.
On a side note, there's another female character in the book, Angel, who is just about as perfect as Elnora with the added bonus of already having married and had four babies. I think Virginia Woolf might have appreciated this, had she been the type of person to have the bad judgment to read this book, which I suspect she wasn't.
To cut off a rambling review, this book is a collection of thinly veiled, simplistic social mores masquerading as fun story about a feisty girl growing up by a swamp who likes moths. Gets me every time.
Take all the myths about the childhoods and general character of Presidents Lincoln and Washington and actualize them into an early 20th century female character, and you have Elnora.
She's beautiful, hard-working, kind, beloved, honest, self-educated, good with children, great with animals, and some kind of nature genius in general. She loves to look after the moths, the birds, the trees... and did I mention that she repeatedly demonstrates that she has no qualms about selling the land her family owns for lumber and oil profits? So maybe not that much of a genius after all. That's pretty much a D in Environmental Science right there--if you're feeling generous.
The deeper you get into the book the more it feels like a social tract on ideal femininity. Edith, Elnora's foil, is a glamorous town girl. She's depicted as selfish because she considers herself first, ambitious because she wants social standing above all else, and narrow-minded because she doesn't care to better herself in any way that won't help her own ambition.
(Plus, she doesn't really care about providing her future husband with, and I paraphrase, edible food and red-faced babies. My kind of girl!)
At the end of the book, deprived of her fiance and the respect of her peers, Edith is forced to take stock of her values. Heartbroken, she starts thinking long and hard about why she acts like she does, and concludes by blaming--surprise, surprise!--her mother. Charge: not incubating the right domestic values within her house and home.
On a side note, there's another female character in the book, Angel, who is just about as perfect as Elnora with the added bonus of already having married and had four babies. I think Virginia Woolf might have appreciated this, had she been the type of person to have the bad judgment to read this book, which I suspect she wasn't.
To cut off a rambling review, this book is a collection of thinly veiled, simplistic social mores masquerading as fun story about a feisty girl growing up by a swamp who likes moths. Gets me every time.