A Girl of The Limberlost

I don't want to make it sound like it's perfect, but it is an awfully good story, a hopeful story, an inspiring story, and I never would have read it if I hadn't seen it on the 1001 Children's Books You Must Read list. A Girl of the Limberlost is the story of a girl, Elnora Comstock, who desires above all things to go to high school. Elnora's mother, sadly, seems determined to thwart her every attempt to do so. Elnora meets tremendous obstacles and nevertheless finds ways to overcome them.

A Girl of the Limberlost addresses caring for nature and the abilities of women to achieve, both of which must have been astonishing to the readers of the time when it was first published in 1909.

There are many quotes I enjoyed reading:

‘“I believe the best way to get an answer to prayer is to work for it,” muttered Elnora grimly.'

“What you are lies with you. If you are lazy, and accept your lot, you may live in it. If you are willing to work, you can write your name anywhere you choose, among the only ones who live beyond the grave in this world, the people who write books that help, make exquisite music, carve statues, paint pictures, and work for others. Never mind the calico dress, and the coarse shoes. Work at your books, and before long you will hear yesterday's tormentors boasting that they were once classmates of yours.”

“To me, it seems the only pleasure in this world worth having is the joy we derive from living for those we love, and those we can help.”

“There never was a moment in my life,” she said, “when I felt so in the Presence, as I do now. I feel as if the Almighty were so real, and so near, that I could reach out and touch Him, as I could this wonderful work of His, if I dared. I feel like saying to Him: ‘To the extent of my brain power I realize Your presence, and all it is in me to comprehend of Your power. Help me to learn, even this late, the lessons of Your wonderful creations. Help me to unshackle and expand my soul to the fullest realization of Your wonders. Almighty God, make me bigger, make me broader!'“

“The world is full of happy people, but no one ever hears of them. You must fight and make a scandal to get into the papers. No one knows about all the happy people. I am happy myself, and look how perfectly inconspicuous I am.”

“The Limberlost is life. Here it is a carefully kept park. You motor, sail, and golf, all so secure and fine. But what I like is the excitement of choosing a path carefully, in the fear that the quagmire may reach out and suck me down; to go into the swamp naked-handed and wrest from it treasures that bring me books and clothing, and I like enough of a fight for things that I always remember how I got them. I even enjoy seeing a canny old vulture eyeing me as if it were saying: ‘Ware the sting of the rattler, lest I pick your bones as I did old Limber's.' I like sufficient danger to put an edge on life.”