MovieChat Forums > Little Women (1994) Discussion > Beth's death

Beth's death

posted 8 years ago by fleurfairy
2 replies | jump to latest

I re-read the novel and realized something that I could grasp now as an adult. That however much sadness there is in Beth's death (Chapter 42 "The Valley of the Shadow"), there is a great deal of comfort in it. I find this line so profound

"...feeling with reverent joy that to their darling death was a benignant angel, not a phantom full of dread."

It struck me how people in Alcott's generation much have took comfort in that chapter because they would have undoubtedly been in the same situation at points in their lives. Most everyone in those days lost children, friends, and siblings who died young. Beth's death was a gift to readers. A hopeful scene which shows us that death doesn't have to be violent or tragic or final. Death can be embraced and it can bring peace.

[–] gianna0526 8 years ago

There are some fictional deaths you never quite recover from, Beth March was one for me.

[–] UdoConstantini (117) 3 years ago

Life changed SOOOOOO much between the mid-19th and mid-20th centuries (okay, I guess that can be said of any jump of a century). Prior to the 20th Century, it was pretty standard to have many children alone for the reason (lack of birth control might have been another) that infant mortality and death at a young age were so much more common then. My siblings and I (there are four of us together) were born in the late 1950's and early 1960's, and at that point many people (at least in my parents' social circles) considered four to be too many children, preferring two or one. They didn't have to worry as much that their children would be lost to disease.

I don't want to wade into the current vaccination controversy, but it is a matter of historical fact prior to the development of vaccines in the 20th Century, there were many common diseases that either killed people or seriously undermined their health, which are now no longer a threat.