Louisa May Alcott as Poet: Transcendentalism and the Female Artist

This essay presents Louisa May Alcott's conception of an artist, one that gives nineteenth century women access to that title. Based in her poetry, Alcott's notion of art both draws from and resists Transcendentalist theology as it counters sentimentalist cliches about women writers. Ellen Sturgis Hooper is revealed as a major influence on Alcott.