Little House on the Prairie: Pa - selfish or mad?

[gramercy]

I'm reading the Little House books to dd. When I read them years ago I thought the pioneering life sounded very exciting.

Now, as a lily-livered adult, and seeing things from the point of view of Ma, I keep getting wound up about Pa. I mean, he had four daughters, one of whom was blind, another in poor health, and he keeps moving around trying to start farms from scratch. WTF? It's clear he loves his dds, but brawny blokes they are not, and it just seems ludicrous that he persisted in trying to forge a life that was just not manageable.

Anyone agree that Pa was a pain?

Ah yes, I was thinking 2 boys died, but of course, there was Laura's own son.

Can anyone recommend a definitive boigraphy? I have seen one or two on Amazon, but couldn't work out which was the best.

Ooh, good question, Essene. I'd like to read one too.

I always felt very sorry for pa. Making all these decisions with such harsh consequences, the responsibility and guilt too probably must have been so heavy.

oh god it was such a shock to read little house on the prairie to dd... it was SO BORING. and racist, and sexist and all the other 'of its time' stuff... but the unrelenting, descriptive tedium of the writing really made me want to chuck it. i felt like i could have dug my own well or made my own shitty door latch by the end.

My dd (aged 12) persistently refused and refuses to read them Aitch. I did insist she start with the first chronologically (Big Woods) and I know that is the one I hardly ever re-read as a child so perhaps I was a fool to make her start there, but I wanted her to know Laura from the start. I am gutted that she doesn't know her. I know, I know, I am taking my obsession too far!

get her the dvds...

Are you mad? I spit upon the dvds.

I have read 'big woods' to dd, who is quite similar to me and delighted in the descriptive tedium detailing the process of maple syrup collection!

Thank you for the link, I will be searching for the others now as I thought it all ended at plum creek.

It is a good insight into late 1800s life in the US. There was one girl they met who was married at 14 I think in one of the books that they came across. The husband decides when they will move (no women's rights). Also as with all people in poverty the importance of the children getting work at a fairly young age is uppermost.

I am reading a book about native Americans which in part spans that period and you see the Indians from a different perspective.

I certainly enjoyed the books as a child and read them to our children.

People were being given free land in Indians' territory so not surprisingly they kept pushing West in the hope of making good. I do not think there was an easy life in the East so it was not so much that he was choosing poverty for them as trying to forge a better life.

What it does illustrat is that if women are educated (and in those days they were more likely to be if there were no brothers in the family) they can rise up, do better. Laura became a teacher. It is the same today.

let's hope that there's a different perspective on native american life - the portrayal in LHOTP is racist beyond belief. yes, of it's time etc etc etc but not appropriate to read to young children.

It reflects how people were then in the UK and US. It is a hisotry book and it is very very vaulable to read to children as it gets you talking to them about the role of women and how women worked even then and how Indians were regarded and ownership of land and the like. Not all modern books raise so many issues. In those days the Indians were regarded almost as a different type of species, like dogs almost. Mind you the book I am reading about them gives many examples of how they also treated other tribes and groups and that was pretty horrendous too.

In the later books the few Native Americans left are portrayed in a slightly more sympathetic light (one local chief comes to warn them that a hard winter is coming) but bearing in mind it may be of its time but it was published in 1935, not the 1890s or 1900s.

Laura, like Ma, only taught school until she got married of course. And it wasn't considered quite proper for them to help with the farming, hence the poor woman having to sit on the claim with a 5-year-old for the whole summer. Interestingly, this woman works as a dressmaker despite being married.

Xenia, I think the girl (Dorcas?) was actually married at 13. Ma Ingalls and the girls are somewhat horrified by this idea.

Actually what I found interesting reading them is how similar they were to my mother's childhood (she was born 1940), rural Midwest, going to Town twice a year, no running water, gas lamps, some kids still going to school barefoot when she was in high school, slates and chalk in a one-room schoolhouse, same handwriting, and maple syrup parties.

Meanwhile more urban areas were living 'Grease'!

The family actually moved even more than is told in the books (which I think were written more by Laura's daughter than Laura herself) and Pa tried his hand at other things too- butcher, hotel keeper. I loved them as a child and then tried them on dd who rebelled utterly at endless slaughter of wildlife. The flaws are endless, once you begin to look.

I think anyone looking at their own family history can find parallels. They were dirt poor many of the pioneers.

My dad's step-dad went to school barefoot in California suburbs in 1930s, too. They were too poor to do anything else, he used to hustle pool as a teenager to get some money. Same portrait as in To Kill a Mockingbird. Kids who couldn't eat any lunch, etc.

You might all enjoy Half broke horses by Jeanette Walls

It's about her grandmother who came from a poor mid western famille and is based on her true life but involves a fair amount of imagination.

It is scary how little people owned back then and how much we all take for granted now. If you read the 'you know you're hard up when ...' thread then compare with these books, even the least wealthy in our society are well off by comparison

I loved these books as a child, read them over and over and have saved them for DD (she's too young at the moment). I thought the TV version was dreadful having read the books first. I think they are a fascinating insight into what life was like in America 150 years ago, but would re-read them myself before letting DD try them I think, to see if I still feel they are appropriate. I'd love to read a decent biography too.

For those that enjoyed them, This is a very good read in a similar vein.

Just looked it up - Little House was 1869 - 1870. I mentioned some girl they met in an early marriage. Yes it might well have been aged 13. It is a while since I read them. I think. Laura was born in 1867. She started teaching just before she turned 16 and married at 18.
My grandfather was born not too long after that - 1880 and left school at 12 (in the UK) due to illness. His grandmother was widowed at 23 with 5 children including twins.

Anyway it is certainly a good description. People are write who say Laura wrote the books in the 1930s/40s looking back to her childhood in the late 1800s. So I suppose her perspective is how people were in the 30s not 1890s but I still think it is a very good description of how it was.

Someone asked about who wrote the books this explains some of the controversy over who actually authored the books. Certainly the last one which Rose wouldn't have edited is very different in tone...

And Laura's later life was so sad. Life was really tough back then.

Yes, they seemed to be doing reasonably well when they set up home together. Almanzo had a pretty flourishing farm (with bonus trees) and a share in a good business in town. Pa was doing okay too and then - bam. It all went to hell in a handcart.

Great article, Chresto. Rose Wilder Lane seems like such an unlikely person to have Book-Laura and Book-Almanzo as parents. (Not sure about the real ones of course).

Its like a loss of innocence reading what's reported about the people you think you know through the books, and the awful relationship Laura and Rose had.

I had the same feeling on reading about LM Montgomery (Anne of Green Gables author) suffered with depression, had an unhappy marriage and possibly committed suicide . It made be read the books very differently and I was struck by how stifling society was then for an intelligent woman, and how much she had to conform.

Enid Blyton did not exactly have a rosy family life either. Perhaps it's best not to know, although Laura's daughter sounds amazing, travelled to Albania and all over and very into economics and tax issues. Wonderful.

Or Noel Streatfeild, or Louisa May Alcott ... bit of a theme really.

I agree, Rose sounds amazing but she seems to have no connection to the world described in the books. You can't imagine Ma deciding to nip off to Albania for the spring fashions ...

I love the books but the real Charles Ingalls doesn't sound like a very pleasant character, from what I've read he was a real right wing survivalist nut. Better not to read too much about our favourite children's authors sometimes! Saying that, I'd love to read or research and write something about Joan Aiken.