Sex and Jo March, by Leslie Wilson

The March girls and their mother:
Jo is top left (as you'd guess)

I wish I could remember who it was wrote a piece about the sexuality of girls in the nineteenth century, in particular referencing Jo March in Little Women. Jo famously couldn't understand why her sister Meg wanted to marry John Brooke and said: 'I wish I could marry Meg myself and keep her in the family.' The author of this article, which unfortunately I have failed to find in an Internet search, then went on to argue that a restricted-meat diet kept nineteenth-century girls from achieving puberty till seventeen or so; hence Jo's lack of understanding (at least she's not considered to be an incestuous lesbian, as someone averred about Jane Austen.)

I do feel a little uneasy about arguing with something I can only remember in my head, for I know only too well how facts can morph in one's memory; do any of my readers remember the article? But I have been thinking about this for ages, and have been re-reading not only Alcott, but Susan Coolidge on the subject, as well as a biography of Alcott. So I shall go on to reflect on the teenage sexuality (which is considered a modern phenomenon) in Little Women/Good Wives et seq, and What Katy did at School, and also on why I think Jo's creator made her so opposed to flirting, and also why she was married off to Professor Bhaer instead of to Laurie.
Incidentally, I have never heard of a German called Bhaer. He should have been called Baehr or Bähr, which is a fairly ordinary German name, and Alcott must have reversed the letters round, just as people sometimes write Kohlrabi as Kholrabi, though Kohl is the German for 'cabbage' and the name means 'Cabbage turnip'. So if you do misspell in this way; please don't. It is incorrect and gets on my nerves. But enough of the vegetable digression.

Louisa May Alcott aged 20
author unknown. Published 1909 or before

In Little Women, it seems to me (and this is a view shared by Harriet Reisen, author of The Woman Behind Little Women) that Jo represents an alternative role-model for girls (as she has for generations of readers). She rejects the demure feminine role-modelling espoused by her sisters Meg and Amy (Beth seems to me to suffer from a depressive illness; she reminds me so much of my grandmother.) Jo wants to ride, to act, to have adventures, to write, and not to be bothered with convention. She has 'unfeminine' rages and wishes she had been a man. She is, in fact, very like her creator. Being sexually interested in young men, in those days, meant being tied down, and Jo did not want to be tied down. So she sees young men as friends and comrades, playmates, in fact, and gets on with them very well.
Though Katy Carr turns into an Angel in the House and is far from a feminist role-model, she is horrified when she goes to school to find that many of the other girls are romantically obsessed with the young men at the nearby college, and starts a Society for the Suppression of Unladylike Behaviour (ugh!) Other girls, like her vapid cousin Lily, are madly sending out flirtatious signals to men they hardly know, obsessed with clothes, and even a child of thirteen declares that she is 'in love.' This is far from the demure stereotype of nineteenth-century girlhood.

Teenage girls' dance: from Danish Punch, 1879

I doubt if the book would have been written if such behaviour was not common; and indeed, in Little Women, Meg is invited to stay with rich friends who dress her up in sexy clothing, squeeze her into corsets, and make her over in their image, with the express purpose of flirting, which she does, though afterwards she is ashamed of herself. Nor is Meg uninterested in the male sex, and her younger sister Amy likes to hold court too - no matter how ladylike the manner she does it in.

Amy and Laurie

On our side of the Pond, incidentally, there was the correspondant to the 1880s' Girls Own Paper who was corresponding with two young men through the blinds of her bedroom window, and wrote for help when they got too ardent. All she got was a telling-off, though.
I know the age of puberty is considered to have got younger in the twentieth century and maybe was even higher in the nineteenth, but I suspect that is a teensy bit irrelevant. I 'flirted' with teenage boys when I was aged seven or so; it was definitely a romantic feeling, though I had no idea of acting on it in any way, and I was lucky that the boys I was keen on respected this. I think it's quite normal to feel that kind of love well before puberty. A restricted diet, however, was definitely the lot of the Alcott girls; since their father Bronson was too sensitive to earn a living properly, they were virtually starved in their youth, which didn't help their adult health.
It's interesting (and related to this) to reflect on why Jo might have wanted to 'keep Meg in the family.' It is actually a sentiment Louisa expressed when her eldest sister Anna got married. Louisa wanted independence and to earn a living; but her parents were heavily dependent on domestic help from their daughters. Her mother was often ill and her father, as I have said, toured the country speaking, but never brought any money home. The year Anna married was also the year the younger sister Elizabeth (Beth) died, which meant the parents needed Louisa and she had to come home to help them. Reading Good Wives, one finds Jo, after Beth's death, suffering in her role as prop and support to her bereft parents. Anna's marriage was a threat to Louisa's autonomy, and that was probably why she gave the sentiment to Jo.
Jo March was meant to be an independent woman, earning her living just like her creator, but Alcott's readers demanded a romance for Jo, so she gave her 'a funny one.' When she herself did have a kind of romance later in life, it was with a younger man; but the bizarrely-named Bhaer is older, and another version of Bronson Alcott. As one who always falls in love with her male romantic leads, I can imagine that Alcott didn't want to make Bhaer attractive; it might have destabilised her. So Bhaer (bah, what a ridiculous name!) has to be a cuddly oldish man, a kind of gigantic teddy bear with moral stuffing. (They made him sexy in the film, of course.)

Jo and Bhaer (Bah!)

At least Jo does achieve literary fame and fortune later in life, though celebrity becomes quite a burden to her. One can only sympathise. Jo's later tribulations at the hands of autograph-hunters (Jo's Boys) are an exact account of what her creator endured and were perhaps included in the hope that the fans would read and desist. Like Jo, Alcott was often reduced to pretending to be her own parlour-maid, in order to escape the attentions of intrusive worshippers.

Illustrations from Little Women and Good Wives are from my own copy, published 1911 Seeley and Co Ltd, by H.M. Brock. I do like the portrayal of Jo in them, though not the one of her smooching with the bizarrely-surnamed old man.

I do recommend Reisen's The Woman Behind Little Women; it is a fascinating book. And if anyone CAN remember the article about Jo and female sexuality, and tell me the author, I would definitely be very grateful!

Singing History with Anglo-Polish songsmith Katy Carr, by Clare Mulley

Sometimes art and music provide a much more immediate and powerful connection with the past than history books, or the biographies that I write. This month I would like to dedicate my blog to another wonderful ‘History Girl’: the truly original and talented Anglo-Polish singer-songwriter Katy Carr. 

Singer-songwriter Katy Carr

I first met Katy when she came to the National Army Museum to hear me lecture about Krystyna Skarbek, aka Christine Granville, the Polish-born countess who was the first woman to work for Britain as a special agent during the Second World War, and the subject of my biography 'The Spy Who Loved'. Sporting a retro-chic 1940s look, topped by felt hat and red lipstick, Katy stood out among the audience, like an elegant ghost straying in from the post-war London streets. (The only other time I have been so struck by an individual member of an audience, was when WinStan Churchill, aka Stan Streather, professional Churchill doppelgänger, once turned up in a polka-dot bow-tie to hear me talk at the Imperial War Museum’s Churchill War Rooms.)
You can watch my National Army Museum lecture here: Clare Mulley talking about Krystyna Skarbek at the National Army Museum

Over lunch in the pub afterwards with our mutual friend, Paweł Komorowski, who is a distant cousin of Krystyna Skarbek, I began to learn what made Katy tick. Raised in Nottingham, Katy’s East Midlands accent belies her knowledge and passion for Poland, her mother’s country. This is a woman with a mission to communicate not just the culture and history of Poland, but the individual, and very personal stories, that compose and reflect the nation’s character.

Katy has released four indie-folk music albums, the last of which, the hauntingly brilliant Paszport, was produced in Poland and Britain in 2012. Described as ‘an epic, poetic journey through her past and that of her mother’s nation’, Paszport is dedicated to the Polish experience in the Second World War. Its sixteen songs explore the themes of love and loss, patriotism and resistance, hope and struggle through the prism of Poland’s modern history.

Paszport album cover

Paszport is full of wonderful tracks. The bitter-sweet ‘Mała Little Flower’ was inspired by Irena Gut Opdyke, a Polish Catholic girl who not only saved the lives of twelve Jews by hiding them in the basement of an SS officer’s house, but who went on to join the Polish resistance with the codename ‘Mała’, which means ‘Little’ in Polish. This song is dedicated to the memory of Irena’s fiancé, Janek Ridel, who was killed in action the day before their wedding in May 1944.
Watch the video here: Katy Carr, 'Mala Little Flower'

The song of Katy’s that I find most moving, however, is ‘Kommander’s Car’, which tells the story of Kazik Piechowski. Kazik was imprisoned by the Nazis for being a Polish Boy Scout at the start of the war and sent on the second transport to Auschwitz in June 1940. It would be two years to the day that Kazik and three fellow political prisoners would realize a plan to steal SS uniforms and drive out of the camp in the car belonging to its infamous commandant, Rudolf Höss. The song, beautifully illustrated here by South African born artist and illustrator Galen Wainwright, manages to convey the emotional truths as well as the factual story of Kazik and his friends’ bid for freedom.
Watch the video here: Katy Carr, 'Kommander's Car'

Two stills from the music video for 'Commander's Car'

Katy had no idea that Kazik was still alive when she recorded the song, and she was thrilled when he got in touch, inviting her to meet him in his home city of Gdansk. Kazik had not only survived the war, but also seven years imprisonment by the Soviets afterwards, for his involvement with the Partisans and Polish Home Army following his escape from Auschwitz. ‘It is very difficult to make a film about Auschwitz’, Kazik, now in his 90s, told Katy. ‘But this music video, through the use of the symbols and artwork and music, is bringing something new to the world.’ 

Katy and Kazik’s meeting was documented by British film-maker Hannah Lovell in a short film: Kazik and the Kommander's Car short documentary

Kazik and Katy at a memorial in his local Gdansk park

‘Kazik is my inspiration’, Katy told me earnestly, ‘meeting him changed my life’. This is not just some flip patter. Kazik not only inspired Katy to learn more about her Polish roots, he showed her the importance of memory and reaching out to share stories. Kazik has written two books and many articles about his experiences, inspired by the words of the Polish poet Zbigniew Herbert, ‘You did not survive simply to live, you have little time left, you must give the world the truth’. Katy now also tours schools and local community groups to bring Kazik’s story to new audiences, and to foster stronger relations with local Polish communities across Britain. It is work that has earned her the prestigious Polish Daily Award for Culture as part of their ‘People of the Year’ awards in 2013.

Last year, when my biography of Krystyna Skarbek was published in Poland, Katy and I flew over to Warsaw together, where Katy is something of a star! Paweł came with us too, to generously help promote the book and to toast Krystyna in her homeland. The launch was held at the wonderful Warsaw Uprising Museum, where Katy has performed in the past with her band, The Aviators. However, for me the night before was just as special. Paweł’s wonderful aunt Joanna had invited us over for dinner to meet family and friends including his mother, Babcia. After some fine barszcz czerwony (Polish borscht) and far too much good Polish liquor, Katy got out her ukulele and treated us all to some traditional songs like ‘Hej Sokoły’ - in which you can hear my faintly ludicrous ‘Hej’s’ towards the end! A camera, balanced on a wineglass, recorded the lot: Katy and Babcia Sing 'Hej Sokoly'

Katy singing with Babcia

There is a lot of talk about immigration at the moment, and this month Polish Foreign Minister, Radek Sikorski, who also came to the Warsaw launch of the Polish edition of my book, blogged that ‘if Britain gets our taxpayers, shouldn't it also pay their benefits?’ I certainly believe that Britain is all the richer, in every sense, for remembering, celebrating and building on our historic connection with Poland during the Second World War. With singer-songwriters such as Katy Carr, I hope that another generation will hear these stories.

I am absolutely delighted to announce that Katy is now working on a song about Krystyna Skarbek for her new album, Polonia. Polonia will mark the 75th anniversary of the start of the Second World War, and the beginning of Poland’s long loss of independence which Krystyna and the Polish Free Forces fought so hard to regain.

Me, with Katy holding The Spy Who Loved