A Little Princess by Frances Hodges Burnett
A Little Princess by Frances Hodges Burnett
This is a fiction book about Sara Crewe, the daughter of Captain Crewe. I loved this book and found it to be very heartwarming and inspiring.
Synopsis: The book starts out when Sara Crewe is seven years old. Her mother died when she was an infant and her father is an officer in the British Army. Her father sends her to an all-girls British boarding school when she is seven. She is doted upon and loved dearly by her father, and he pays the headmistress, Miss Minchin, for special treatment for Sara, including a private room with a personal maid and a separate sitting room, along with a private carriage and pony.
But despite all these luxuries, Sara remains unspoiled, and is always kind and generous and befriends Ermengarde, Lottie, and Becky. On her eleventh birthday, Sara has a party to celebrate with all her friends. Miss Minchin finds out that Sara’s father has lost his fortune investing in diamonds and died of jungle fever. Sara is left penniless.
Miss Minchin takes away all of Sara’s possessions except for an old black dress and her beloved doll, Emily, and forces Sara to live in an attic and work as a servant. For the following two years, Sara is starved and forced to be a servant, but she remains kind and gracious. Mr. Carrisford moves into the house next the boarding school, and he was Captain Crewe’s partner in the diamond mines. Being delirious, he thinks all the money is gone and abandons Captain Crewe.
However, he finds out that the money is not gone and that he is very rich and returns to England to find Sara. One day his pet monkey wanders in Sara’s attic, and his servant goes into the attic to rescue the monkey, and the servant tells Mr. Carrisford about “the little girl in the attic.” Finally, after the monkey visits her attic again and Sara returns it to Mr. Carrisford, he finds out that Sara is Captain Crewe’s daughter, and he was her father’s friend.
Mr. Carrisford informs Miss Minchin that Sara’s fortune is restored and that she is the heiress to the diamond mines and that she will be living with him from now on. Miss Minchin threatens legal action if Sara does not return to the school and that she will not see any of her friends again, but Sara refuses and is adamant that she will be living with Mr. Carrisford. Becky becomes her personal servant.
Review:
“I am a princess. All girls are. Even if they live in tiny old attics. Even if they dress in rags, even if they’re not pretty, or smart, or young. They’re still princesses.”
“Whatever comes,” cannot alter one thing. If I am a princess in rags and tatters, I can be a princess inside. It would be easy to be a princess if I were dressed in cloth of gold, but it is a great deal more of a triumph to be one all of the time when no one knows it.”
Despite the circumstances Sara was in, she remained kind and compassionate and generous. We all experience hardships in life and to remain positive and kind throughout these is a triumph.
“Perhaps to be able to learn things quickly isn’t everything. To be kind is worth a great deal to other people. Lots of clever people have done harm and been wicked.”
“She liked books more than anything else, and was, in fact, always inventing stories of beautiful things and telling them to herself.”
I can wholeheartedly relate to this because I have always loved books and reading and am very passionate about books.