A Little Princess

A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett

While listening to the audiobook, I couldn't help but hearing Patrick Doyle's soundtrack to the 1995 movie. It seemed to do a great job capturing the emotions in this tear-jerker. In the book, Sara's has her move from India to boarding school in England. He spares no expenses from his vast fortune for her. She also has a smart intellect, kind heart and a great imagination, making her popular with the other students. Alas, one day his solicitor arrives to tell the headmistress that the father has died and lost his entire fortune in a failed diamond mine. She is now reduced to being a servant girl.

She accepts her fate and works hard. She still tries to keep her dignity and manners. She observes the families nearby. One day a little boy gives her a coin, thinking she is a beggar girl. She wanted to return it, but accepted it because she knew it meant a lot for him. Another day, she found a coin on the ground near a bakery. When the baker said she could keep it, she bought buns - and gave most of them to a beggar child that was worse off than her.

In addition to running errands, she would continue to work at the school. She would officially help younger girls with their lessons. Unofficially, she would help friends and tell stories. She also got along well with the servant girl.

Some people from India move next door. She is able to communicate with the native Indian servant in his language when his monkey escapes. He later secretly returns the favor by making things better for her in her servants quarter. Later we learn that the person that moved in next door was her father's friend. His diamond business had succeeded magnificently, but not after giving him health problems. This neighbor had heard that his friend's daughter was at a boarding school and was eager to find her so that he could give her half the fortune. He was looking in France and Russia, not knowing that she lived next door. They finally do connect when Sara returns the monkey (again). Sara is now able to leave the boarding school and assume her great wealth. Some of her first actions are to hire the fellow servant away from the boarding school and to give money to the baker to feed any child-beggars that ask. (And her she finds that the first child she helped is now employed by the school.)

The book is a riches-to-rags-to-riches story with plenty of tear-jerker moments. A person's character can be shown with how they deal with different circumstances. Despite being destitute, she continued to work hard to help others. However, even with optimism, there is still a limit to how much pain can be endured.

The Jungle

I had managed to avoid reading the Jungle through school. However, I had read plenty about it, about how it was an example of muckraking journalism that exposed the horrible conditions in meat-packing plants and the vile filth that has being passed off as meat. However, the actual novel was much different. Compared to modern "food" literature, like Fast Food Nation, this novel is rather tame. We hear about "sick" animals being passed off as meat, and second hand stories of workers becoming part of animal products. Now we have mad-cow diseased, E. coli and Salmonella, along with horrid conditions for immigrant laborers in the food-production industries. Hmm.. Guess things haven't changed much. But, at least the children of the jungle immigrants can now get fat at McDonalds while toiling in light-service jobs. The main focus was the struggle of an immigrant man in an oppressive system. He tries honest labor. His wife and child die. He tries the freedom of hoboing around the country. He tries being a party hack and a criminal. He even tries being a strike-breaker. No matter how much success he has, he is eventually beaten down. Finally, he stumbles in to a socialist meeting and finds his nirvana. This would make a nice pro-socialist ending, but the novel keeps going and rambles on and on about socialist ideology. And, then, socialism doesn't seem that good after all. Oops, maybe it would have been best to stop when ahead. The first part of the novel is fairly believable. However, as the novel goes on, the coincidences and chance happenings greatly stretch the limits of credibility. (He just happens to run in to a rich, drunk boy who invites him to dinner and gives him $100? And he runs in to a "budy" in prison that is willing to lead him on a life of crime?) With just a few of the events in story, it would have remained within the realm of the possible. But with so many, it strains the imagination.