Perseverance
This novel emphasizes the importance of persevering in the face of adversity, suggesting that rewards will come to those who not only survive periods of trial or trauma but who maintain their sense of self and their principles. Sara not only remains alive and functional while mistreated at Miss Minchin's seminary, but also continues to treat others with kindness and politeness no matter her circumstances. Moreover, she casts aside feelings of anger and the desire for vengeance in order to survive. Ultimately, this perseverance is richly rewarded. In this novel, hardship is temporary, as long as it is survived. Thus Captain Crewe, who is unable to persevere through his own business downturn, never reaps the rewards of his kindness and business savvy—but Sara, who manages to live through the consequences of her father's death, is able to experience the ultimately happy turn his business dealings take.
Friendship
In the world of A Little Princess, friendship is not an issue of mere amusement, but a matter of life and death. Sara exemplifies the book's definition of a good friend by aligning herself with Becky, Lottie, and Ermengarde, even when they cannot offer her anything beyond their own affection. Later, though, these characters repay Sara by helping her survive, providing food, comfort, books, and news. The novel emphasizes the importance of friendships between unlikely and diverse groups of people, regardless of age, class, and personality, showing how people from different backgrounds often have a great deal to offer one another.
Class
In this novel, class and money are related but distinct concepts. Sara, though she is at times very wealthy and at other times very poor, remains high-class regardless. This is partly due to her powers of imagination, but she also bears very specific signs of upper-class Britishness, among them her accent, carriage, and educational attainment. These signs signal to those she comes in contact with that, no matter her level of abject poverty, she is not a "beggar." The category of money, for Sara's society, is ever-shifting—as evidenced by Captain Crewe's excitement over owning diamond mines and by Sara's sudden financial downfall. The category of class, though, is immutable and essential. High class status here is both a privilege and a responsibility. Sara, because of her origins and her upper-class behaviors, is considered deserving of a luxurious lifestyle. At the same time, she considers it her duty to help others. Depending on who these "others" are, though—in part depending on their class status— helping them might mean employing them, as Sara does Becky. Lower-class characters are seen as deserving of empathy and basic necessities, but are destined to work and are portrayed as happiest doing so.
Colonialism
Contemporary readers are likely to interpret this book's attitudes about colonialism rather differently than the author intended. Many of Sara's privileges, along with her idyllic childhood in India, are a result of her role as a beneficiary of British colonialism on the subcontinent. The book assesses these privileges somewhat uncritically, evoking nostalgia towards Sara's luxurious upbringing in India and implying that "natives" of India, such as Ram Dass, are uniformly delighted to act as servants for Europeans. As a matter of fact, many children's authors from this period took it upon themselves to promote the goal of empire-building. Therefore, portrayals of happily servile colonized peoples and verdant, exotic locales can be understood not simply as uncritical descriptions but as somewhat intentional political statements.
Education and Children's Rights
Miss Minchin's school is considered quite a reputable institution among Sara's contemporaries, but readers might notice some major differences between this school and most current ones. For one thing, students like Ermengarde are openly mocked for failing to keep up with lessons. The headmistress is openly abusive to students and treats them differently depending on their families' wealth and status. At the start of the novel, Sara is housed in a luxurious room and has a maid; her classmates live in slightly humbler conditions, while Becky, who is not a student but an employee, is nearly starved to death. To a degree, both the novel's narrator and characters who witness these occurrences find them upsetting. It is generally agreed, for instance, that children employed by the school should be better cared-for and that students should be treated with greater kindness, regardless of their age or level of intelligence. However, the novel does not offer critique of some broader practices, such as employing children or offering superior conditions to those of wealthy backgrounds. While today's educational institutions might prize equality among students, and while child labor is generally considered cruel in almost every situation, Burnett's early twentieth-century novel expresses the contemporary view that differences between children exist and are acceptable, as long as everyone is provided with basic necessities and kindnesses.
Imagination
For Sara, imagination is both a pastime and a weapon. She has several continuing fantasies throughout the novel: she imagines that her doll, Emily, can understand her, that she is a princess with the ability to distribute "largess" to people in need, and that she is imprisoned in the Bastille during the French Revolution. Some of these fantasies help make her situation seem less dire, while others, such as the one about being locked in the Bastille, actually make her situation seem more dramatic and worse than it truly is. But in both cases, fantasy allows Sara to narrativize her situation, placing it in context and viewing herself as a heroine rather than as a powerless child. This narrativizing gives Sara the motivation she needs to maintain self-control and treat other people with kindness. Therefore, fantasy and imagination help Sara (and the friends she helps with her stories and flights of fancy) maintain her sense of self. In this way, it is essential to her survival, and keeps her from being completely dominated by the unimaginative and cruel Miss Minchin. Imagination here also allows individuals to pass on values to other people, especially children—for instance, Donald Carmichael is moved by a Christmas story he hears to give four pennies to Sara.
Grief
When we meet Sara Crewe, she has not yet lost her father. Her mother has already died, though, long before the events of the book take place. In spite of this loss, Sara feels her mother's presence in various ways. For one thing, she speaks French, her mother's native tongue, and in this way maintains a tangible connection to this figure. Furthermore, she turns the memory of her mother into comforting fodder for her fantasy life, spinning tales about her mother and Lottie's mother watching their daughters from heaven. These fantasies make Sara happy, but they also help her relate to and bond with Lottie, another motherless child. In this way, grief is itself a kind of gift, giving those who experience it the ability to support and help one another. At the end of the novel, Sara enters the care of her father's former business partner. Mr. Carmichael is uncannily similar to Mr. Crewe. He is also an Englishman living in India, he addresses Sara as "Little Missus," and he makes a fortune from diamond mines. These parallels are easily explained in the book's plot, but they also suggest that Sara has not truly lost her father. In the world of A Little Princess, mourned-for loved ones stick around to take care of those they have left behind, if not always in expected ways.
