DADDY LONG LEGS

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.

Jean Webster (pseudonym for Alice Jane Chandler Webster 1876 - 1916) was an American writer and author of many books including Daddy-Long-Legs and Dear Enemy. Her best-known books feature lively and likeable young female protagonists who come of age intellectually, morally, and socially, but with enough humor, snappy dialogue, and gently biting social commentary to make her books palatable and enjoyable to contemporary readers.