Little Women / Good Wives - do you think Laurie still loved Jo, or Jo loved Laurie, when they married other people?

Wait I missed all that! I only read Little Women. Oops... Off to get Good Wives on my Kindle...

Noooo! Meg and John were perfect for each other.

Beth should have married John Brooke.
Jo should have married Laurie.
Meg should have married the prof.
Amy should have died.

Amy grew up overnight when her only daughter was born sickly, if I recall correctly.

And I have to say that I was utterly convinced by the marriages - I think Jo would have been all wrong for Laurie - and he wouldn't have been able to give her the secure foundation that Professor Bhaer gave her - she wouldn't have grown into the woman that she did, if she'd married Laurie. I can't see Laurie wanting to run a school full of rambunctious boys either, not living in it as principal and house parents, in the way that the professor and Jo did, nor would Laurie have been capable of putting the bad boys back on the straight and narrow, as Jo and the professor did.

I'm also pretty sure I remember bits from Jo's Boys where Laurie refers to Amy in the most loving and devoted of terms, and it seems to me that Jo's affection for Laurie is that of an older sister - after all, what woman would want to be married to someone she considers to be 'my boy'?

No!!!!
That book really crushed me. Jo and Laurie were meant for each other- they were soulmates from childhood. He was too flighty but she had just the right Puritan streak to calm him down. I never could stand Amy- she was such a spoilt brat.
I always thought the Professor was a bit creepy. I think Jo was scared of her sexual feelings towards Laurie and settled for a father figure that she loved in a more balanced way. Victorian women were not expected to have strong sexual urges- it wasn't considered proper.

I agree that Jo and the Professor were really in love but that Laurie settled for Amy. I think they were probably happy enough, though.

I think Laurie would have had Jo, but Jo would never have been happy with Laurie. They would have had blazing rows and he would have had an affair with Amy eventually. Jo would have been in prison for murder by the time she was 40.

Jo and the Prof were meant to be together, a perfect match in temperament. He brings her down to earth and she wakes him up.

Amy settled for Laurie. If they were home in America I think she would have said no.

I agree that Amy was a 'fallback' option to keep him in the March family.

Remember the scene where he is trying to reach the luxurious red rose and settles for the little, easily reached white ones instead. It is symbolic of his 'settling' for Amy, there is no doubt she is second best.

I think the Prof probably died a good few years before Jo and she ended up having a passionate love affair with Laurie. Amy would have turned to drink and other men by this stage due to her husband's neglect and obvious preference for her sister.

supressed? do i mean repressed? i don't know. anyway - Laurie and Jo would have been blisfully happy in a platonic kinda way. The Prof never quite did it for me.

I'm fairly sure Laurie was a suppressed homosexual.

Jo and the Prof were meant to be, I also think Amy was a rebound

I think Jo & the Prof were happy but I agree about Laurence. Unconvinced. & all that continuing emphasis on his being 'her boy'. You wonder what Amy made of it all!