March – by Geraldine Brooks – independent book review – Historical Fiction (United States)

MARCH, winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, is a well-researched, deeply emotional, and imaginatively rich portrait of “Mr. March”, the absent father in Louisa May Alcott‘s (1832-1888) semi-autobiographical book, LITTLE WOMEN. Awarded four stars on Goodreads.

As author Geraldine Brooks explains in her Afterword, she had no shortage of quality research material to work from. Because she used Louisa May Alcott’s actual father, educator Amos Bronson Alcott (1799-1888), as a model for Mr. March. And not just by reading Bronson Alcott’s own extensive journals, but also by drawing from mentions of him by his famous Concord, MA neighbors — philosophers Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) and Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), and author Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-64).

Cleverly combining historical nuggets with her own dramatic license, Brooks creates Mr. March as an admirable, complex, financially naive, self-absorbed idealist who, like many men, succumbs to the American Civil War’s “call to glory.” Of course, March finds war anything but glorious and the passages describing his experiences are profoundly difficult to read. Though serving as a chaplain and teacher, he does not escape the violence, beatings, rape, and murder that were inherent in both the lives of enslaved people and the nature of war.

Brooks also transforms the saint-like Marmee from LITTLE WOMEN into a fully three-dimensional woman. One who at times feels stifled, angry, unappreciated, and jealous, and struggles to practice the very values she has taught her four daughters.

The author also crafts a wonderful back story to the Marches. How the couple met and courted and how a once well-to-do March lost his fortune. Skillfully, in less than 300 pages, Brooks has not just fleshed out these two adult characters but also explored a number of rich themes of the period – including the carnage of war, the meaning of courage, the abysmal state of medical care in the 1860s, the nature of love, the foundations of a strong marriage, the brutal reality of life as an enslaved person, and the devastating impact of survivor’s guilt.

It beautifully written with a style that feels as though it was composed at the same time as LITTLE WOMEN, instead of some 150 years later. The only reason I did not give it five stars is because it felt a bit slow to me for the first third. Highly recommended, especially for those who have a deep affection for the March family.

More about the author, Geraldine Brooks.

You may be interested in my review of another remarkable book by Brooks, HORSE.

Or my review of LITTLE WOMEN, which I read recently for the first time.

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