At 18 years old, Jerusha Abbott is the eldest child stuck in an orphanage with every other kid’s responsibility on her shoulders. Her life takes a pivotal turn when an unnamed man, who is a trustee of the orphanage, pays for her college education being impressed by one of her essays.
He decides to pay a handsome amount to her at regular intervals in return for letters written to him by Jerusha without any expectation of a response. The reader gets a visual of how Jerusha’s life unfolds as she steps into a new phase of her life. She addresses him as daddy long legs for she catches a glimpse of his (long) legs as he leaves the orphanage one day.
Gripping till the last page where the identity of the benefactor is revealed, this epistolary comingof- age classic is relatable to the extent that the reader can live Jerusha’s life through her letters. Her relationship with the anonymous benefactor as she grows, learns, explores and thrives, makes the reader an active yet a passive participant in her story.
About the Author
Jean Webster, birth name Alice Jane Chandler Webster, was an American writer best known for her fiction bestseller Daddy-Long-Legs, which was also successful in stage and motion picture adaptations. Born 24 July 1876 in Fredonia, New York, Webster, known to be related to Mark Twain (granduncle), attended Vassar College, where she became interested in orphanages and social welfare and began to pursue a career in literature.
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