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Sara Crewe arrives at Miss Minchin's boarding school in London as its richest pupil, the beloved daughter of a captain in India, and is treated like a…
Sara Crewe arrives at Miss Minchin's boarding school in London as its richest pupil, the beloved daughter of a captain in India, and is treated like a princess. When news comes that her father has died penniless, she is sent to live in a cold attic and work as a servant. Sara decides to behave like a princess anyway, kind and dignified, whatever happens to her.
Context and significance
Published in its full form in 1905, A Little Princess is a story about imagination as a way of surviving hardship, and its magical turn in the attic is one of the best moments in children's literature. Frances Hodgson Burnett also wrote The Secret Garden.
About the author
Frances Hodgson Burnett (1849–1924) was born in Manchester. After her father's death the family emigrated to Tennessee, where as a teenager she began selling stories to magazines to support them. She became one of the most successful writers of her day, and Little Lord Fauntleroy (1886) started a fashion for velvet suits for boys.
She lived between America and England, and the walled garden of the house she rented in Kent inspired The Secret Garden (1911). Together with A Little Princess, it remains one of the best-loved children's books ever written.