March by Geraldine Brooks is a historical fiction novel set in Civil War-era America. Published in 2005, it was a winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2006 and the feature of several Best of the Year lists. The novel is based on Louisa May Alcott’s 1868 classic novel Little Women; however, where Alcott’s novel expressly follows the lives of four sisters on the home front, Brooks’ focuses on the hither unseen “shadow” of the novel: their father, Captain March.
Captain March is a Union Army Chaplain who is sent to the battlefront at the onset of the novel. Through passages written in the form of letters to his daughters, Brooks examines Captain March’s changing perspectives of the growing conflict as he interacts with others along his journey.
Brooks’ reveals from the outset that Captain March has a secretive past revealed primarily through flashbacks to his younger years during the first few chapters. These passages provide insight into his internal fears as he faces this shrouded past while also dealing with the reality of war.
On the front, Captain March experiences personal tragedies directly on the battlefield and engages in debates with his superior officers concerning morality. Recognizing that the Northern army’s strategy went against his notions of right and wrong, he finds himself sympathizing with the slaves and the Confederate South, an act that is ultimately frowned upon by his peers.
The majority of the novel, however, takes place off the battlefield and in the Marches’ house in Concord, Massachusetts. Here, we learn of the family’s financial struggles and the costs of war on their relationships, moral skepticism, and hopefulness. We meet a new character, Marmee’s hired help, a runaway slave, and his young son. As Captain March grows to love and protect this new family, he rediscovers his forgotten humanity and, though he despairs at his distance from his own children, writes to communicate his present location and to express his love for them.
Geraldine Brooks’ thought-provoking and original narrative allows her readers to experience the Civil War through a unique perspective; one of enlightenment and empathy, rather than bitterness and blind patriotism. Through the pages of March, Brooks draws the reader in with her vibrant characters and beautiful prose, making sure no detail goes unnoticed with nuances that bring our present world slowly closer to the realities of a past life.
