Moods

A girl marries the older, steadier of two men she loves, and the other comes back. Alcott wrote "Moods" before "Little Women", had it cut by a publisher who wanted it shorter, and rewrote it eighteen years later to restore what she meant. It is the book she cared about most and the one her readers refused; the argument in it about marriage is far harder than anything in the Marches. Fifty-six plates by painters from Turner to Cassatt trace the rivers, coasts and quiet rooms where Alcott's marriage argument plays out.