?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,200 - $ 1,800
Alcott, Louisa May (1832-1888) Autograph Letter Signed, undated, post-1868. Single wove bifolium sheet inscribed over four pages in brown ink to a Miss or Mrs. Thurston, written in response to a fan letter praising Little Women, with original folds, signs of handling, unfolded dimensions: 8 3/4 x 7 in.
Miss or Mrs. Thurston Dear Madam,
As I don't [have] your proper address I must be a little formal in the beginning, but I thank you very much for your kind note, for these tokens of interest from strangers are among the pleasantest consequences of story writing.
My "Little Women" have much astonished their Momma by making many friends for themselves, & she can only account for it by the grain of truth that lay at the bottom of the little story.
The praise & value most you have given me, in saying that my effort to do something toward putting simpler & healthier food before the little people has been made evident at least, though very imperfectly carried out.
I have such a love and reverence for children that it makes me heart-sick to see the trash offered them, when there is so much that is true & fresh & helpful in their own innocent hearts & lives, if wiser, older heads would only learn how to shadow it forth in [hearty crossed out] plain words for their pleasure & instruction. The little people have taught me more than I can ever teach them, & my greatest satisfaction is the friendship with which they honor me.
"Jo" is not myself any more than the others are my sisters, only suggestions of the four real girls. I consider her a failure, for she was meant as a warning, & to my surprise naughty, riotous, peppery Jo turns out to be the favorite. I'm afraid it's a proof of natural depravity in the rising generation.
