Pollyanna
1913
When eleven-year-old Pollyanna Whittier is orphaned, she's sent to live with her formidable Aunt Polly in a sleepy New England town. The aunt is everything cold, proper, and resplendently unaffectionate; the niece is everything relentless, sunlit, and stubbornly glad. Pollyanna's secret weapon is the "glad game" her father taught her: find something to be glad about in every circumstance, no matter how dire. What begins as an almost absurd exercise in positivity becomes something quieter and more unsettling - a child's determined refusal to let the world's disappointments win. The town softens. Her aunt thaws. But beneath Pollyanna's bright smile lies something more complicated: a girl who has learned to survive through sheer, uncompromising hope. A century of cultural shorthand has reduced "Pollyanna" to a byword for naive optimism, but the novel itself is far more interesting than that reduction suggests. Porter writes with gentle humor and genuine pathos about what it costs to be the person who always smiles. The book asks an uncomfortable question: is relentless positivity a gift or a wound? Its answer is neither simple nor sentimental. This is a story about the stubborn, almost radical act of choosing joy in a world that doesn't always deserve it - and what happens when that choice becomes too heavy to carry.
Editions
X-Ray
“Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change.””
— Eleanor H. Porter
“Beware; for I am fearless, and therefore powerful.””
— Eleanor H. Porter
“Life, although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it.””
— Eleanor H. Porter
“I do know that for the sympathy of one living being, I would make peace with all. I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy the one, I will indulge the other.””
— Eleanor H. Porter
“There is something at work in my soul, which I do not understand.””
— Eleanor H. Porter
“If I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear!””
— Eleanor H. Porter
“I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel...””
— Eleanor H. Porter
“Even broken in spirit as he is, no one can feel more deeply than he does the beauties of nature. The starry sky, the sea, and every sight afforded by these wonderful regions, seems still to have the power of elevating his soul from earth. Such a man has a double existence: he may suffer misery, and be overwhelmed by disappointments; yet, when he has retired into himself, he will be like a celestial spirit that has a halo around him, within whose circle no grief or folly ventures.””
— Eleanor H. Porter
“I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy the one, I will indulge the other.””
— Eleanor H. Porter
