The March sisters live and grow in post-Civil War America.
– I shouldn't mind living in such a fine house and having nice things… Oh, it doesn't seen like Christmas this year without presents.
– I'm desperate for drawing pencils...
– I wish I didn't have to work for Great-Aunt March... That crabby old miser.
– And you, Beth... What's your Christmas wish?
– I'd like the war to end so father can come home...
– Oh, sweet Beth. We all want that.
– Still sulking? Beth, where did I put my manuscript? Beth? No no!!
– I didn't do it!
– I'm going to kill you!
– Jehosephat!
– How could you do this to me?
– Jo, stop it! You're hurting her. Jo, Jo, let her go. What's happened?
– I hate you! I hate you!
– Jo! Don't touch it, come, just let it go.
– You're dead! You're nothing! I never want to see you again!
– It's a very great loss and you have every right to be put out. But don't let the sun go down upon your anger. Forgive each other. Begin again tomorrow.
– I'll never forgive her.
– I'm sorry, Jo.
He is as poor, as one might imagine an itinerant philosopher to be. Yet, as the weeks go by, I see he is unfailingly generous to all of us who lives in the house. I am grateful to have a friend.
Some books are so familiar that reading them is like being home again.
– I fear you would have a long engagement, three or four years… John must secure a house before you can marry and do his service to the Union.
– John? Marry?... You mean that pokey old Mr. Brooke?... How did he weasel his way into this family?
– Jo! John has been very kind to visit father in the hospital every day…
– He's dull as powder. Meg, can't you at least marry someone amusing?
– I'm fond of Mr. Brooke. He's a good man. He's kind and serious... And I'm not afraid of being poor.
– Marmee, you can't just let her go and marry him!
– I'd hardly just go and marry anyone.
– I would rather Meg marry for love and be a poor man's wife than marry for riches and lose her self-respect.
– What do we think of the boy?... Is he a captive like Smee in Nicholas Nickleby?... He looks lonely.
– You don't think he'll try to call?
– Maybe. He has a secret! A tragic, European secret.
– He's had no upbringing at all, they say. He was reared in Italy among artists and vagrants.
– Doesn't he have a noble brow? If I were a boy, I'd want to look just like that. Imagine, giving up Italy to come live with that awful old man!
– Jo, please don't say "awful". It's slang.
– I'd be terrified to live with him.
– Who cares what people think?..
– I do. It's nice to be praised and admired...
– I couldn't help but like it. I only care what you think of yourself. If you feel your value lies in being merely decorative, I fear that someday you might find yourself believing that’s all that you really are. Time erodes all such beauty, but what it cannot diminish is the wonderful workings of your mind: Your humor, your kindness, and your moral courage. These are the things I cherish so in you. I so wish I could give my girls a more just world. But I know you’ll make it a better place.
– Is it father?
– Teacher struck me. He put the limes out into the snow… May Chester said my limes were for the homeless. So I said she wouldn't get any from me. So she told Mr. Davis they were in my desk, and he struck me.
– I'll beat the tar out of him!
– Jo, we must not embrace violence... I will write him a letter.
– That'll show him.
– It's an appalling school. Your spelling's atrocious. Your Latin absurd.
– Mr. Davis said it was as useful to educate a woman as a cat…
– I'll strangle Mr. Davis!..
– "Mr. Davis... What right have you to strike a child? In God's eyes we are all children. If you hit and humiliate a child, – the only lesson she will learn is to hit and humiliate".
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