The marvelous multiple endings of Little Women

How did Little Women land its ambiguous ending?

For this writing prompt, we're looking at how an ambiguous ending can invite deeper engagement... especially with the moral issues of a work. Spoilers ahoy!

Friends, we can't stop thinking about that final note of Little Women. While there's active disagreement (On the internet. Jeez.) among audience members as to which one ending Jo's character experienced, we are more excited about the narrative strategy that gives the gift of both lives.

A reminder to those who've seen it and a spoiler to those who haven't -- the ending of the film splices the final trajectory between two moments:

1. Jo is in negotiation with the publisher of her semi-autobiographical novel over whether her protagonist must marry at the end, AND

2. Jo is chasing after Professor Bhaer to declare love and end up as a happily married straight lady.

Is Jo's romantic scene with Bhaer merely the imaginary ending Jo writes to appease her editor? Or can they both be happening? We think the answer is intentionally withheld. We also think it doesn't matter. If we see them both -- if we feel them both -- they are both real to us.

And then, let's talk also about the difference between what is intriguingly ambiguous and what is merely vague. Vague is a blank page and no picture -- like if the movie ended before either the kiss or the argument with the editor. But ambiguous is two fully realized possibilities, fighting for brain space. There's power in that. There's paradox. And there's depth. Even without a conclusive answer, an ambiguous ending can satisfy, where a vague one never will. And even if we do get a final answer -- if one image beats out the other -- we keep both imaginings.

One of the more exciting craft elements to this ending is that the justification for the ambiguity is a function of the narrative -- the plot! -- itself. Both Jo's identity as a writer and her propensity for writing her own domestic life into her stories seed the potential for the ambiguity here... as does her waffling on her refusal of Teddy's proposal. In this sense, the ambiguous ending is an extension of a tension in the film's narrative arc and feels organic because of it.

This sort of ambiguity can happen in a novel, too. Susan Choi's Trust Exercise, which won the National Book Award, lands on a decisively ambiguous note, opening up brand new questions about the nature of narrative, art-making, character, truth. Like in Little Women, the main characters in Trust Exercise are artists, people who push at conventions in life; they also push at the conventions in narrative, which the narrators themselves acknowledge rarely map people's lived experiences. Because of this meta-awareness, the ambiguous ending is, like in Little Women, portended by what came before. It manages to make the point that, in the end, a deftly handled ambiguity might just bring you closer to truth. (We're trying to talk about the book without spoiling the magic for you, so if you haven't read it yet, it may be worth your time.)

Prompt: Pull out a story you've been working on and throw away its ending. (Or, you know, save a version, but play along here just for fun.) Think of the absolute worst thing that could happen to the protagonist and write it out. Then think of the best thing and write that out. Once you have the two extremes, write a new ending that incorporates one element of each. This is a subtler take than we've been talking about, but still useful. If you're brave, go ahead and include two distinct endings -- but make sure they are specific and particular -- and let them live as equals. Make them both true by refusing to choose.

Recommended viewing and reading: The following series, films, or novels land on an ambiguous (but not vague) ending note: Lost, Inception, Clue, Big Fish, Miracle on 34th Street(1947 version), and Written on the Body by Jeanette Winterson.

Talk to us on Twitter: Use #reprompts to tell us about the ambiguous endings you find on TV. Or maybe the ones you imagine.

Reflection: The ambiguous ending in the film gives the audience both the independent Jo and the non-lonely Jo. Then consider the framing -- that audiences in 1868 wouldn't accept an unmarried heroine. Suddenly, the audience must make a moral decision. Which ending should we root for? What does it say about us if we want the construction of heterosexual romance/marriage that we've been trained to expect? Can we hope Jo ends up with Bhaer without seeing ourselves as less liberated than our own heroine? The film doesn't require an answer, but pressing us to ask the questions is a powerful twist.

The ending of David Foster Wallace's long essay, "Up Simba," about following John McCain on the campaign trail in 2000, pushes the reader into a similar quandary. Throughout that essay, DFW reminds his readers that establishment Republicans want young conservatives to stay home because they are far less likely to toe the party line. The easiest way to keep these voters away from the primaries has been to foster disillusionment, making them see all candidates as false and dishonest. Over and over, DFW reminds readers that their own cynicism has been weaponized against them. By the final passage of the essay, however, DFW -- who has been truly charmed by John McCain's perceived authenticity and "rogue" status -- begins to suspect that McCain himself has been involved in a dirty campaign trick exploiting a young person. A twist!

But then Wallace pulls his punch in the final note of the essay. He declines to take a position and instead pushes the reader into an ambiguous space. Is Wallace a fool, too easily won over by a slick down-home candidate? Is McCain as dirty as the rest -- thereby validating the young voter's cynicism? Ah, but if the voter's cynicism keeps them away from the polls, the Old Guard at the top gets exactly what they want. It's an untenable, morally complex position that calls the integrity of the entire election process into question, and Wallace leaves the reader right in the middle of it.

How else could you use an ambiguous ending to force a reader to interact with the work, to take a position?

The Minneapolis Storytelling Workshop is a project of writers Erin Kate Ryan and Allison Wyss, who also have books coming out.

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Minneapolis Storytelling Workshop is a project of professional writers Allison Wyss and Erin Kate Ryan. All rights reserved.