Emily and I combined our powers and had an in-depth chat about Laurie Lawrence, his character arc and the lack of it in every-single-little-women adaptation. In the novel, Laurie starts out as a very idle and sometimes pretty misogynistic figure and it is thanks to Amy he becomes a better person, b...
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150 Year Laurie Problem
Niina Niskanen/ Little Women Podcast
Summary:
Emily and I combined our powers and had an in-depth chat about Laurie Lawrence,
his character arc and the lack of it in every-single-little-women adaptation. In the
novel, Laurie starts out as a very idle and sometimes pretty misogynistic figure and
it is thanks to Amy he becomes a better person, but these elements of him are not in
the adaptations.
Friedrich Bhaer is based on philosopher Henry David Thoreau. Louisa was in love
with him and he appears in literal disguise in all of her novels. He is also based on
Alcott's favourite writer, the German poet Goethe. Unlike Greta Gerwig lies to
millions of people, Jo and Friedrich never argue in the book, and Friedrich is the one
who helps her to become a writer. Laurie is partially based on Alcott's ex, Laddie
Wisniewski, and her friend Alf Whitman. She had a maternal relationship with both of
these men who were younger than she. One of the goals of the Little Women
podcast is to examine these relationships, and how Little Women adaptations ignore
their significance.
The 150-Year Laurie Problem
Hello friends and welcome to the Little Women Podcast. A podcast series on all
things Louisa
May Alcott and Little Women. This is a special episode. A collaboration between me
and book tuber
Emiloid. Emily and I discovered that we had lots of similar opinions and thoughts
about Little
Women and our first conversation lasted four hours!
This episode has been heavily edited :) and we had so much fun that we are
probably going to do
more collaborations in the future. I hope you guys enjoy this. This is Small Umbrella
In The Rain:
The Laurie Problem.
Emily: Hello I am Emily. I am also known as Emiloid. I run a booktube channel by the
same name
and I am also a big fan of Little Women the novel and also a great fan of discussing
,the adaptations
as well.
Niina: I am Niina. Hello everyone I am a blogger on YouTube and I am the host of the
Little Women podcast. I do gender studies on Little Women and have been lately
focusing mostly
on the male characters.
Emily: Great
Emily: Also I am relatively well-known for my channel for a review I did on the
newest Little
Women adaptation.
Niina: Which was a really good review.
Emily: To say the least. Openly critical of the film and Niina reach out to me because
we have a lot of
the same perspectives on the book and the films. I am very honoured. I am flattered
that you
asked me because I found your blog when I was preparing for my video.
Niina: So nice because it was a really big surprise for me how many people reached
out after I
published it. You always learn new things when people reach out to you like that.
They share their
views and it´s been a pleasure.
Emily: Yeah. I had lots of people reaching out to me ”wow I am so grateful that you
have reflected
my views on this film” and it feels like they finally got presented. Before I even knew
you I
remember thinking about your blog post like, ”wow this person agrees with me”
because you really
love professor Bhaer and this film did not have professor Bhaer in it, pretty much.
You know, they
didn´t have our professor Bhaer in it.
Niina: Yeah, where is our professor Bhaer?
(laughter)
Emily: Yeah, where is this beautiful relationship?
Emily: Today you wanted to discuss Laurie.
Niina: Among other things, yes.
Emily: Yes, among other things.
Emily: So we are going to do one video on this channel. On Niina´s channel and then
,one video on
my channel, where we will be discussing Jo and professor Bhaer but you will
probably find that our
discussions will go in different directions.
Niina: Very likely.
Emily: We have lots of feelings about these adaptations and this book. Alright, how
about we
start out talking about the Laurie model. By the way, I just watched the 2017 series
last
night.
Niina: oh you did?
Emily: I think I agree with a lot of what you said about it. I like what they expanded
but the ending is
very rushed.
Niina: It is. I felt like the writer should have had four episodes to do it properly.
Emily: Yeah. Somehow they managed to expand on some things but somehow the
ending was just
really rushed. I was so surprised at the end.
Niina: Yeah and it did not build enough for the two couples. That bothered me.
Emily: They didn´t really think through the whole process for Jo and professor Bhaer
and
suddenly the school is established and they don´t build up on that. It was a bit weird.
You sent me a
bunch of articles and blog posts about this subject and you had done a very deep
dive into his
character.
Niina: I think my biggest problem with all of Laurie´s presentations in the films is
that it never follows
the book´s narrative. This is something that reflects the way people read Little
Women. I
find it very problematic, to say the least.
Emily: I know I remember you said that basically, Laurie has to go through a whole
growth process
in the book, I guess we should preface it by saying that a lot of the adaptations
idealize him. What
you said in your blog post. He is kind of this young, pretty guy who is in love with Jo.
We are
, supposed to feel bad for him but what the adaptations leave out is how immature he
really is and
actually how horrible he is sometimes.
Niina: One of my blog readers, she wrote a very eye-opening review about Little
Women how Jo
and Laurie, the ideas that they feed to each other, they end up harming each other
on a
long run and that is something that people constantly ignore.
Emily: Yes! I think a big example is, remember when Laurie was like ”Ah I don´t want
to go to
university and Jo is like just run away you don´t have to go to the uni and Meg is like
”No, don´t
tell Laurie, not to go to uni. No, you need to do it”. At that point, I was like wow these
two are not
a good influence on each other at all.
Niina: Laurie was the kind of character that he always did what he was told to do. He
always wants
to do what he is told not to do and he has this constant inner conflict because of it.
Emily: That is true. He kinda reminds me a bit of me, I don´t think he appreciated a
lot of the
privilege he had at the start because he is like ”I don´t like uni” because he is sort of
expected to fit
into a certain mould in the society what he doesn´t properly appreciate. He was just
sort of a
party boy in college and messes around and everything. He doesn´t know how to be
a
productive member of society. He doesn´t understand what that means.
Niina: When Jo gets older, it starts to bother her. That he doesn´t take responsibility
for
himself. She is like a little mother to him. She is always taking care of him and it is
quite sad the
way Jo feels bad that he has all these privileges that she doesn´t have.
Emily: He kinda represents a lot of the things that she can´t have but he takes them
for granted. I
think you might have pointed this out in your blog post but Jo is very much taking
care of him
because he is looking for a mother. He really kind of falls in love with her, or he
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