Under the Lilacs

M.A. Donohue's "Complete Edition" of Louisa M. Alcott's 1878 children's novel, given as a Christmas gift in 1936 — inscribed on the front endpaper in a careful hand: 1936. Merry Xmas to Jeanne, Daddy.

The novel itself is Alcott in a more pastoral register than Little Women — the story of two girls, a stray circus dog, and a runaway boy looking for his father, set in a New England summer that reads as idyllic even by Alcott's standards.

The Donohue "Complete Edition" reprints were the mass-market Alcott of the 1920s and 30s, widely sold and not often preserved with the dust jacket intact. This one has its original purple pictorial jacket — worn at the edges and corners, but present and holding color. Exact publishing date of this edition is unknown but please note inscription date. Edition is more likely between 1905-1920 in publication.