Editing Louisa May Alcott (section)

=== Juvenile and domestic fiction ===
Alcott had little interest in writing for children, but saw it as a good financial opportunity.{{Sfn|Delamar|1990|p=80}} She felt that writing children's literature was tedious.{{Sfn|MacDonald|1983|p=71}} Alcott biographer Ruth K. MacDonald suggests that Alcott's hesitance to write children's novels may have arisen from the societal perception that writing for children was a means by which poor women made money.{{Sfn|MacDonald|1983|p=71}} Her juvenile fiction portrays both women who fit [[Victorian era|Victorian]] ideals of domesticity and women who have careers and decide to remain single.{{Sfn|Eiselein|Phillips|2016|p=10-13}} In her domestic stories she focuses on women and children as characters, and some of the adult characters discuss social reform, such as women's rights.{{Sfn|Keyser|1993|pp=xi, xiii–xiv}} The child protagonists are often flawed, and the stories include [[Didacticism|didactics]].<ref>{{Harvnb|MacDonald|1983|p=95}}; {{Harvnb|Eiselein|Phillips|2016|p=9}}</ref> Though her juvenile fiction is largely based on her childhood, she does not focus on the poverty her family experienced.{{Sfn|Stern|2000|p=32}}