The Author Of 'Little Women' Was Just In It For The Drugs

Louisa May Alcott's Little Women is the most wholesome book they forced you to read in eighth grade. The novel and its sequels were pleasant stories, mostly about domesticity and valuing virtue over wealth. And then you learn that Alcott wrote them for the same reasons most pop songs are made: money and drugs, baby.

Alcott called Little Women "moral pap for the young," and admitted that she wrote the book solely for the boatloads of cash it would net her (hence all those sequels).

Yes, Alcott wrote stories about how unimportant money was because those made the most money. And when she wasn't telling kids about the nobility of starving to death, she was getting high on opium -- a drug she used for most of her life. Today she'd probably be considered an addict, but since she lived in polite 19th century society, she was just "well-medicated."

Much like those less-than-tasteful nudes you posed for in your 20s, Alcott tried to cover up her earlier, racier work when Little Women became popular. She created a brand out of being a wholesome, responsible woman who preferred smiles to dollars, but in reality, she was dedicated to making that paper, and exchanging that paper for poppy. So who knows, maybe there's a classic novel or two inside 50 Cent. We just haven't given him the chance.

Seriously, check out some of her earlier work. Hoo boy.

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For more, check out Bats Won't Fly Into Your Hair (Like In The Movies) and Door Knobs Weren't Invented Until AFTER The Civil War.

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