A Little House Sampler

A Little House Sampler written by Laura Ingalls Wilder and Rose Wilder Lane. This collection is comprmised of Lauras early autobiographical pieces along with stories and essays by Rose. This is a vivid and personal testament to nearly one hundred years of American life and history as seen by Laura and Rose.

This thread is to discuss A Little House Sampler...

I agree, Christina! I really enjoyed this book!

I've skipped around so much in this book that I'm not sure what
all I have read and what I haven't!

All of Laura's writings were enjoyable (if I read them all!)
and all the pics are great.
I liked seeing the pic of Laura and Almanzo in Florida.
That pic isn't commonly seen.
I was so glad to hear that Laura didn't like Florida-
that the climate made her sick.
Why was I glad?
Because the same thing happened to me
when I tried to live in a humid place!
I felt like such a wimp for not being able to handle it
but then when I heard that tough Laura Ingalls Wilder
couldn't handle it either-
well, I felt a little bit better after that! :CoolSign:

I have to admit that I have a hard time
appreciating Rose Wilder Lane's writings. :think:
She seemed to have something about her
that reminds me of ....? is it bitterness?
It's hard to pin point. :think:
As far as a writing talent- it's definitely there.
I guess I tend to compare her with her mother
who seemed to be free from any bitterness
or a bad attitude.
It's a good lesson not to compare I guess.

Holly

Prairie Wind wrote:

I've skipped around so much in this book that I'm not sure what
all I have read and what I haven't!

All of Laura's writings were enjoyable (if I read them all!)
and all the pics are great.
I liked seeing the pic of Laura and Almanzo in Florida.
That pic isn't commonly seen.
I was so glad to hear that Laura didn't like Florida-
that the climate made her sick.
Why was I glad?
Because the same thing happened to me
when I tried to live in a humid place!
I felt like such a wimp for not being able to handle it
but then when I heard that tough Laura Ingalls Wilder
couldn't handle it either-
well, I felt a little bit better after that! :CoolSign:

I have to admit that I have a hard time
appreciating Rose Wilder Lane's writings. :think:
She seemed to have something about her
that reminds me of ....? is it bitterness?
It's hard to pin point. :think:
As far as a writing talent- it's definitely there.
I guess I tend to compare her with her mother
who seemed to be free from any bitterness
or a bad attitude.
It's a good lesson not to compare I guess.

Holly

Hey, Holly! You are so much like me! I don't like humid weather either and much less extreme hot weather. I love winter.

And I think exactly the same about Rose's works: she seems to have a great bitterness toward the world. You've choice the word greatly. She was very intelligent, but she was too proud about how bright she was, and I've never liked these kind of people. Her writings are great, but they have something of snobbish on them, and I can feel (it's a disgusting feeling) that she is showing up all the time...

Laura's writing was so different. She enjoyed life a lot, and never tought that life was unfair to her. She already knew, by her own experience, that life was bad and good moments in it, and that she must enjoy the good moments to death and try to go through the bad ones the better way possible, ready to enjoy a new good moment if it happens a new one should come. THis is the think I like the most in Laura's writings work.

I think that reading "The Little House Sampler" makes you to realize that Rose DIDN'T WRITE the Little House books as Holtz claims. Mother and daughter's styles are just TOO different.

Vanesa. :think:

Right! Of course a published writer like Rose would know some tricks but Laura's goodness flows through her writings and Roses' does not. Poor Rose.

I really liked this book a lot.

I've read several books with writings by or about LIW, such as Anderson's "Little House Reader" and the Collections by Hynes (sp?), but the "Little House Sampler" I liked most. I loved to read works by Laura and Rose side by side and the biographical notes by Anderson, which introduced every writing, made it a real pleasurable reading.
The IMO most interesting part was Rose's story about this family in Florida, which I didn't knew before. Even if the storyline is fictional, I guess the strange and dark atmosphere must have been what she (and her mother) actually felt during the Wilder's stay near Westville, FL.
Alltogerther I only can recomment the "Sampler". *all thumbs up*

I'm really interested in "The little House Reader", that I couldn't purchase. Does someone knows it's content? It's similar to "The Little House Sampler"?

Vanesa.

I haven't heard of the Little House Reader.
There's always new books coming out though.
I'd love to have them all!
I have heard of the Little House Primer-
could that be it?

Holly

No; It's "The Little House Reader" and it's an old publication by now. There also is about Laura's and Rose's writings. I believe that one of its particularities is that it includes Laura's poetry.

Vanesa.

Okay- yes! Now I remember it! If I remember correctly, it is a rather large book and it includes some of Laura's "farm women' type of articles. I checked it out at my old library years ago.

I wonder if the girl here (forget her name!) with the large book collection has it? did you look at Amazon Books?

Oh, I think you mean me, lol. Yes I do have The Little House Reader. I'll have to get it out of my bookcase and read it again.

Okay- yes it's you! I'll get everyone strait eventually- maybe!
Can you tell Vanesa what the book is like?

It's funny, when I lived in South Dakota, the libraries there hardly had anything on Laura! I sort of expected sections of the library dedicated to her or for her to have sort of a celebrity status but- nope! The best library selection I ever found was in Washington State, USA

Holly

The Little House Reader is a collection of writings that describe different parts of Laura's life. The first chapters include writing from each of Laura's family members that have been published or found in her collection of papers. There is a section of writings and poems that Laura wrote as a teenager. These were school assingments and random thoughts about life and the people around her.
The next sections include articles about moving to Mansfield and Laura writes all about building their dream home as well as writing for the Missours Ruralist. These articles are all about living and working in the Ozarks. Laura writes articles about her hometown of Mansfield. These articles are all quite interesting.
I highly recommend this book. As I mentioned earlier, I haven't read this book for quite some time and now just skimming through it makes me want to sit down and read it again. Good job winter is coming, I can see Laura and I curled up together for the long winter months ahead, can't wiat to read it all again!

Wow, did you post that from Amazon?

I got the pic from Amazon but skimmed through the book and wrote what you see above.

Thank you for the review...I think It's worth reading, then! The problem is that we had had a money devaluation, so the book cost to us three times (or now I think that there must be four) times its real prize. It's the difference of change who did it. Before 2002, I used to buy a lot of foreign books (that's why I have a pretty huge collection on Laura's lore), now I can't. But maybe making some ecconomies I could through this one! I'm hungry of it, since I read the "Little House Sampler" and I found it great! Laura knows how to write..that's for sure! I never understood why indeed there is people saying that she didn't write the "Little House Books"...There is proof enough she did, and that her writing style was VERY different from Rose's one. :think:

Vanesa.

That's a shame that your $$ is at such a low rate right now. Our Canadian dollar has caught up to the American greenback and we are only points of a cent apart at the moment. I hope things get better for you Vanessa so you can continue making your library grow.
In the meantime, try checking out your local library. I know it's a long shot but they might just have an old copy hanging out just waiting for you to come in and read it. Good luck!

I will try to go check there. But I doubt they have a single Laura's book. It's one of the only author I NEVER seen translated in Spanish in Argentina. I know that Lauar's book are sell in Spain , but not here. And we have books in English in our book shops and libraries...but Laura seems to be a banned author. But maybe I could lucky, for once I found an used volume of "Farmer Boy" and I bought it. It was the first Laura's book I read, and it decided me to order the whole "Little House Collection"

Vanesa.