Recently, while rereading Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown, I realized how many of my favorite literary heroines are writers, or aspiring writers. This surprised me, actually, because I’ve read or heard somewhere that books about writers aren’t very interesting.
Now, that statement probably came from an article or book urging writers to get out and live life, instead of living in our own heads all the time – sound advice. But I disagree with the statement itself – because I find all these writer girls utterly fascinating. Here are my writerly heroines, inveterate scribblers one and all:
1. Betsy Ray, who writes on tablets from her father’s shoe store, with “a real theatrical trunk” for a desk
2. Anne Shirley, who writes “pretty, fanciful little things” (after she graduates from tear-jerking Story Club tales)
3. Jo March, who frequently “falls into a vortex” and scratches away in her garret
4. Cassandra Mortmain, who sets out to “capture the castle” and writes her way through a very exciting summer
5. Emily Byrd Starr, whose “Jimmy-books” are fascinating collections of miscellany
6. Penelope Wallace, who daydreams for quite a while but finally gets down to writing
7. Juliet Ashton, who finds a book idea – and love of all kinds – on Guernsey
8. Julie Wallace, who writes for her father’s newspaper, scribbles poetry at odd moments, and fights for what she believes in
9. Harriet the Spy, whose notebook is both hilarious and honest
Did I miss any? Any writerly heroines you adore?
cakes, tea and dreams 
I don’t know if you missed any, but you named a whole bunch of MY favorites 🙂
Love Love LOVE Cassandra Mortmain and Juliet Ashton. Harriet the Spy will forever be ruined for me by the movie, though 🙂 Many of my real-life heroes are aspiring writers, too!
Anne Shirley FTW.
I am such a die-hard Green Gables fan – and I raised another. Kristina has read EVERY book L.M. Montgomery wrote (even though I did not raise her in Canada). My job here is done. 😉
Also, the image of Cassandra writing with her feet in the sink is one of my favourite, and a lovely way to open a book.
You’ve picked another of my favourites in Jo March – a misfit of her time, she inspired me when I felt like a misfit in mine.
Thank you for the happy-book-memories!
Does Matilda count? I like to think that she would write well once she… well… learned how to write. 🙂
I loved Harriet the Spy. After I read it I bought a composition book, hid in the corner of some fences in the lot across the street and waited to hear the neighbors talk about their secrets. I waited a long time. I practiced all my whackiest handwritten fonts. I waited some more. I gave up.
Matilda is definitely a writer at this point. I bet she changed her name to JK Rowling. Yeah, probably…