A Little Princess study guide

Sara

Sara is a thoughtful, story-loving pupil whose father's death and ruin turn her into a dependent worker. After gaining a secure home, she remembers Becky and uses her wealth to feed hungry children, showing that comfort does not erase her concern for others.

Key chapters: 1, 7, 18, 19

Miss Minchin

Miss Minchin heads the school and flatters Sara and her father while privately judging the girl spoiled. Her resentment after the French lesson and her eventual loss of control over Sara show the insecurity beneath her authority.

Key chapters: 1, 2, 7

Becky

Becky is a hungry, exhausted scullery maid who finds kindness and a place in Sara's stories. Secret comforts later restore them both, and Becky happily attends Sara after her circumstances improve, keeping their connection alive beyond hardship.

Key chapters: 5, 16, 19

Ermengarde

Ermengarde is a struggling pupil whose friendship with Sara grows through kindness, imaginative games, and shared feelings. A secret visit repairs a misunderstanding, and their attic prison game shows how friendship can make room for shared invention.

Key chapters: 6, 8, 9

Lottie

Lottie is a motherless four-year-old who accepts Sara's patient comfort after a tantrum, making Sara her pretend mother.

Key chapters: 4, 5, 9

Ram Dass

Ram Dass is an Indian servant who treats Sara with careful respect despite her poverty when he retrieves a runaway monkey. He helps prepare and carry out the secret attic transformation, turning sympathy into practical relief.

Key chapters: 11, 14, 19

Mr. Carrisford

Mr. Carrisford is Captain Crewe's investment partner, who finally recognizes Sara as the dead friend's daughter he seeks. His explanation of the attic surprises and support for feeding hungry children connect Sara's rescue with further acts of care.

Key chapters: 17, 18, 19

Wealth and treatment

Sara's movement from wealthy pupil to dependent worker shows how strongly money shapes her treatment at school. The changed response to her new clothes, followed by the end of Miss Minchin's control, suggests that outward status often receives the respect a person should already have.

Where it shows: chapters 1, 7, 16, 18

Imagination and comfort

Imagined heaven and the attic prison game show how stories offer comfort without removing pain. Sara's response to hunger also points to imagination's limits: mental distraction helps her endure misery, but her later plan to provide food shows that bodies still need practical care.

Where it shows: chapters 4, 9, 13, 19

Practical kindness

Cake, shared buns, and the planned attic comforts show kindness taking material form rather than remaining a feeling. Sara's later arrangement to feed hungry children extends the same pattern, suggesting that care becomes meaningful through attention to another person's immediate needs.

Where it shows: chapters 5, 13, 14, 19

Inner dignity

Sara's idea of being a princess works as a standard for conduct rather than a claim about fine clothing. Her emphasis on restraining anger, together with the classroom punishment, suggests that dignity depends on how she responds when other people deny her respect.

Where it shows: chapters 6, 10, 11

Emily

Emily works as an imagined companion during separation and loneliness. Sara's anger toward the doll, followed by tenderness, shows both the strain of needing that companionship and her wish to preserve it.

Chapters 1, 2, 10

The attic

The attic works as both a place of confinement and a space for imagined companionship. Its secret transformation shows care reaching Sara where she has experienced hardship.

Chapters 9, 15

Fine clothes

Clothing works as a visible marker of status that changes other people's responses to Sara. The contrast between rags and new clothes suggests a gap between outward appearance and inner worth.

Chapters 11, 16

Sara, Chapter 5. Sara speaks to Becky as she welcomes the exhausted servant into her stories. Her words suggest that social position does not establish a difference in human worth.

Sara, Chapter 6. Royalty works here as a model for behavior rather than simply a sign of wealth.

Sara, Chapter 11. Sara asserts her inner royalty when classroom punishment tests her dignity. The contrast with her rags shows her effort to separate personal worth from outward treatment.