Product Description
My Antonia is a classic tale of pioneer life in the American Midwest. The novel details daily life in the newly settled plains of Nebraska through the eyes of Jim Burden, who recounts memories of a childhood shared with a girl named Antonia Shimerda, the daughter of a family who have emigrated from Bohemia. As adults, Jim leaves the prairie for college and a career in the east, while Antonia devotes herself to her large family and productive farm. When he returns Jim sees that although Antonia is careworn, she remains "a rich mine of life, like the founders of early races,". Full of stirring descriptions of the prairie's beautiful yet terrifying landscape, and the rich ethnic mix of immigrants and native-born Americans who chose to restart their lives there, My Antonia mythologized a period of American history that was lost before its value could be understood.
This new edition provides a critically up-to-date introduction and detail notes which put the events and themes of the book in full historical context. Also included are Cather's original and revised introductions to her novel.Amazon.com Review
It seems almost sacrilege to infringe upon a book as soulfuland rich as Willa Cather's My Ántonia by offeringcomment. First published in 1918, and set in Nebraska in the late 19thcentury, this tale of the spirited daughter of a Bohemian immigrantfamily planning to farm on the untamed land ("not a country at all butthe material out of which countries are made") comes to us through theromantic eyes of Jim Burden. He is, at the time of their meeting,newly orphaned and arriving at his grandparents' neighboring farm onthe same night her family strikes out to make good in their newcountry. Jim chooses the opening words of his recollectionsdeliberately: "I first heard of Ántonia on what seemed to be aninterminable journey across the great midland plain of North America,"and it seems almost certain that readers of Cather's masterpiece willjust as easily pinpoint the first time they heard of Ántoniaand her world. It seems equally certain that they, too, will rememberthat moment as one of great light in an otherwise unremarkable tripthrough the world.

Ántonia, who, even as a grown woman somewhat downtrodden bycircumstance and hard work, "had not lost the fire of life," lies atthe center of almost every human condition that Cather's noveleffortlessly untangles. She represents immigrant struggles with aforeign land and tongue, the restraints on women of the time (withwhich Cather was very much concerned), the more general desires forlove, family, and companionship, and the great capacity forforbearance that marked the earliest settlers on the frontier.

As if all this humanity weren't enough, Cather paints her descriptionsof the vastness of nature--the high, red grass, the road that "ranabout like a wild thing," the endless wind on the plains--with strokesso vivid as to make us feel in our bones that we've just come in froma walk on that very terrain ourselves. As the story progresses, Jimgoes off to the University in Lincoln to study Latin (later moving onto Harvard and eventually staying put on the East Coast in anotherneat encompassing of a stage in America's development) and learnsVirgil's phrase "Optima dies ... prima fugit" that Cather usesas the novel's epigraph. "The best days are the first to flee"--thiscould be said equally of childhood and the earliest hours of thiscountry in which the open land, much like My Ántonia,was nothing short of a rhapsody in prairie sky blue. --MelanieRehak ... Read more

Customer Reviews (325)

My Antonia
I have to admit I had no inclination to read anything about prairie life in the mid-1800's but the story turned out to be rather engaging in its own way. We see this life on the prairie through the eyes of young Jim Burden who comes to live in Nebraska with his grandparents. Arriving at the same time is an immigrant family from Bohemia, the Shimerdas.

The Shimerdas live a very meager existence having been taken advantage of by the man who sold them their property. The Burden family feels compelled to help them. Soon Jim and the Shimerdas' daughter Antonia who is the only one of the family who speaks any English, form a friendship that will span several decades. Jim narrates from his boyhood to 20 years later when he pays a visit to Antonia on her farm.

I liked this story even though nothing really exciting happens in it. I think the liveliness of the characters, especially the title character Antonia appealed to me. She maintains such spirit even though her life is incredibly hard and fraught with tragedy. Also amusing were supporting characters such as Lena Lingard who is a country girl like Antonia but whom the townspeople look down upon for her forward ways. This bothers Lena not one bit and she continues to follow her own path and actually ends up being quite successful. The story doesn't have a happy ending per se but I would describe it as a content one.

My Antonia is not the most enthralling book I've ever read but it did give me a window into a time in our history I knew nothing about so I appreciate it for that.

A Dark Prairie Story
I've read this book before, and I forgot how truly beautiful it really is.Jim is an Eastern boy, sent out West to live with his grandparents.getting off the train in Black Hawk, the small town nearby their farm, he meets up with a poor immigrant family from Bohemia (today part of the Czech Republic), and is particularly struck by one of the daughters, Antonia.They ride together to their respective farms, and the friendship between the two families is struck.

Antonia's father is an artist, but upon arrival in the US, he is stripped of all his monies.The family struggles and lives in a sod house in horrid conditions, exacerbated by the inability of the mother to keep a decent home.But there is little that can keep the exuberant and spirit filled Antonia down.Her beauty, charm and innocence makes her beloved by many, but especially by Jim.This story is told by Jim, and through hi voice, Cather paints a lovely portrait of a tough young woman, her physical and emotional person strengthened by hardship, but tempered by wistfulness and an innate appreciation of beauty.

The writing in this story is absolutely lyrical.I was tearful through the last chapter, some of the passages were like poetry.Although this is not a sad story, it is a story of a pioneer woman, and a reminder that our country was built on the backs of immigrant families and women like these to become the bread basket of the world.It is easy to forget that in our currently xenophobic state here in the US.Another classic that should be read in high schools throughout our country, as both a history lesson and a lesson in beautiful writing.

Poignant tale of Nebraska prairie life and relationship
My Antonia is a double bildungsroman: both narrator Jim Burden and titular Bohemian immigrant Antonia Shimerda grow and mature on the Nebraskan plains. Jim tells of his next door neighbors, the Shimerdas, and talks about their one fascinating daughter in particular, Antonia. Antonia and Jim quickly become companions and friends, with Jim appreciating Antonia's zest for life despite her poor conditions as an immigrant's daughter. Antonia's spirit persists throughout the whole novel, but soon, Jim and Antonia's paths split. In this story of love and friendship, Cather's backdrop of Nebraska countryside sets the tone for simplicity and genuine emotion.

Oxford World's Classics? How did this even get published?
I read this 8 years ago because I was forced to to fulfill an English Honors requirement, and the book still haunts me until today. I continually refer to this as "the worst book I have ever read" in conversation, and have met MANY others who agree. And there are so many terrible books out there today! The biggest crime is just that this one is called a "world classic", which honestly seems like the overstatement of the century.

There is more plot in a directions manual for assembling a piece of furniture than there is in this entire novel. Willa abandons the plot to describe the prairie, the grass, the cows, anything. Even she is so unengaged in the plot that she wanders away from it, looking for other ideas.

Now, there are times when a descriptive book is necessary. Once again, if you are reading a set of directions, but to spend pages upon pages describing landscape without any regard to plot or character development (everyone remains one dimensional and Antonia is only background music to the symphony Cather writes on the splendor of blades of prairie grass...) leaves you feeling like you've honestly wasted your time. You feel cheated. You stop and say, "okay, now I'm 70 pages into the novel and...nothing has happened." And that is why people hate this book.

Now, I'm sure many "enjoy" this based on the hype. The fact that this book got published, let alone highly reviewed, astounds me. I would not give this anything greater than a C- if a 12 year old wrote this. I think that this is an example of people believing it should be good because it is old and widely read, and so institutions blindly add this onto school reading lists with actual great books, like Shakespeare, Dickens, Twain, Poe, Chaucer,etc. This book belongs no where on that list!

As for metaphors and descriptions, I enjoy poetry, and I enjoy it when it is labeled as poetry and not disguised as a novel with no direction or purpose.

Please spare yourself the agony and read the one-star reviews on here before purchasing. If you have to read this book for school, however, I hope that you can somehow join with me and the others in getting this off the classics list...

A remarkable story
On the surface, this book tells a perfectly ordinary story, about children who grow up in the remote plains, move to town as youths, and, as adults, careen apart and sometimes reconnect.What makes the book remarkable is the honest way the characters relate to each other and to the land itself.As I see it, the book becomes a meditation on the endurance of memory and nature.Cather builds the story in layer upon layer of shared and separate personal history that, while set in an older time, we will all recognize.

Highly recommended, although it's not likely that teens or young adults will fully appreciate it. ... Read more

Product Description
A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays is presented here in a high quality paperback edition. This popular classic work by Willa Sibert Cather is in the English language. If you enjoy the works of Willa Sibert Cather then we highly recommend this publication for your book collection. ... Read more

Product Description
This story is about Thea Kronborg, an ambitious young heroine who leaves her hometown to go to the big city to fulfill her dream of becoming a famous opera star. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (47)

The Song of the Lark
Good.Wanted the other one she wrote, too, but it doesn't seem to be known.

Song of the Lark
I thought it was really good at first then about half way through it got pretty slow and too much detail about music and then the ending fell a bit short.I am glad I read it, but it was a long book that lost some steam along the way...

By Far the Best Willa Cather Novel
I am working my way through all of Cather's novels and short stories, and while I found O Pioneers had the best twist, I have to say the Song of the Lark is by far her best work and my favorite. It was probably the 6th or 7th Cather novel I read, so I had several to compare it to. The characters are wonderfully developed, as is the story. I don't even know how much more I need to say but that you should read it and I think you'll find it's her best. The descriptions of the Cliff Dweller ruins, and the time the character spends there, as well as her romantic life are the things I loved best about this novel. I've actually been thinking about reading it again, and I never do that--it's just that good.

art forarts sake
The SongOf The Lark is Cathers third novel and is her longest novel.The length is the biggesta very good n of the book it feels padded at times but overall the novel is very good. Thea Kronborg the protagonist is a small town music teacher who throught the death of her lover gets an inheritance that enables her to leave her small Colorado town and move to Chicago to develope her signing voice. She succeeds in doing so but her singlemindeddevotion to her music leads to frustration and other negative consequences in her personal life. This potrait of the aridness of small town life and the obsessiveness of an artist totally dedicated to excellence in her art is a very good novel only some padded scenes that go too long or are needlessly repetitive keep it from 5 stars

Not read yet
I haven't read the book yet, but they've asked me to review it so I'll just say that it looks very interesting and I'm looking forward to finishing the book I'm reading now so I can dive into this one. ... Read more

Product Description
The book has no illustrations or index. Purchasers are entitled to a free trial membership in the General Books Club where they can select from more than a million books without charge. Subjects: Fiction / Literary; Fiction / War ... Read more

Customer Reviews (27)

An American Treasure
"One of Ours" is a brilliant, beautiful book. Willa Cather, that most painterly of authors, describes life in the American heartland with such glorious detail that even this city born-and-bred woman can see the wheat fields and hear the running of Lovely Creek. Cather describes emotional landscapes with equal skill. We feel what Claude feels: the closeness of his life, his restlessness, his acceptance, and finally his overwhelming need to leave. Other reviewers here have expressed their opinions on "One of Ours," wondering whether Cather had been blinded by altruism or seduced by the dream of patriotism. I am not concerned with her motivation. It is enough for me to read words such as these, when Claude has said goodbye to his mother and is being driven off to leave for the war. His mother watches from the window as the car fades from view:

"As they neared the crest of the hill, Claude stood up in the car and looked back at the house, waving his cone-shaped hat. She leaned out and strained her sight, but her tears blurred everything. The brown, upright figure seemed to float out of the car and across the fields, and before he was actually gone, she lost him. She fell back against the windowsill, clutching her temples with both hands, and broke into choking, passionate speech. 'Old eyes,' she cried, 'why do you betray me? Why do you cheat me of my last sight of my splendid son!'

It is beautiful, true writing. It is exactly right. I can't recommend "One of Ours," or any of Willa Cather's books, with enough enthusiasm. This author deserves, demands, needs to be read.

One of Mine!!!
Incredible...Insightful...Internal. If you want to know what it is like to grow up in the Midwest as a young man - READ IT!

I read this book over twenty years ago and it has stuck with me on all those pathways of time.Cather's did an incredible job identifying and relating the internal strife that young men often find within themselves and presenting them in an engaging story.Not only is this a book for entertainment, but over the years I have found this book to be a guidepost for the mind and soul of men.

This book should be used to teach the Today's society tells boys that their rough nature is unnatural and needs to be medicated and then bombards them with idolatry of muscle-bound Neanderthal who signed the multimillion dollar sports contract or sleazed his way to a powerful political appointment - this book helps them understand that they are fine just the way they are.That being a man is to recognize their restlessness and learn how to harness it.That being a man is to embrace idealism and intellect.That being a man is about seeking more than what is before them and not settling for things which society has set before them as "normal".It is also wonderful to see an author, having just gone through a horrible time in history, embrace patriotism and national pride.

Bottom line is that this book needs to be read by parents and children alike....it is truly a Classic.

Great storytelling
When one reads a novel such as One of Ours, it's hard not to think of those who have died giving the ultimate sacrifice fighting for freedom. And yet war is such a horrible experience for all those involved, most often the youngest and most vibrant of society.

This novel tells the story of Claude Wheeler, who is impatient and unenthusiastic about his life on a Nebraska farm.He has little enthusiasm for farm work, merely tolerates his family and feels a constant sense of agitation. Until, that is, the US enters World War I.All of a sudden, as if it's a revelation, Claude feels a sense of duty, a sense of belonging, a sense of raison d'etre. The slow moving pace of the early part of the book reflects, I believe, Claude's attitude with how slow and meaningless his life had been thus far. Cather makes use of this beginning section of the book to expertly develop his character as well as the long list of supporting characters.

During the latter part of the novel, when Claude experiences war, Cather's imagery was so real and so emotionally provoking that I had a hard time believing that she had never been to war. As the reader, I felt like I was there in the trenches with Claude or walking alongside him.Towards the climax of the book, when Lt. Claude Wheeler arrives to take over at a trench, the description of what he found was visually and emotionally graphic: "The stench was the worst they had yet encountered, but it was less disgusting than the flies: when they inadvertently touched a dead body, clouds of wet, buzzing flies flew up into their faces, into their eyes and nostrils.Under their feet, the earth worked and moved as if boa constrictors were wriggling down there, soft bodies, lightly covered..."Words so descriptive that as the reader, I found myself swatting the invisible flies away and covering my nose against the stench.

Claude, who would have considered himself Christian, "wanted little to do with theology or theologians," and, in many respects, found himself leaning toward liberal ideology.However, in the climax of the book, he surprises himself (and the reader) by beseeching God in the face of tragedy and asking for nothing short of a miracle. In exchange, Claude makes his own promise with God.

Willa Cather was one of those writers who encompassed the entire package: great storytelling, exquisite writing, memorable characters, visually clear and exciting imagery.This is an ideal book to readaround Veterans Day or Remembrance Day in November.

I highly recommend this Pulitzer-prize winning novel to anyone who wishes to read a good story, but also for those who wish to understand that "Real freedom isn't really free," and to allow Colonel John McCrae's words from the poem "In Flanders Fields" to hit home: "We are the Dead.Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved, and were loved and now we lie in Flanders Fields."

bad publishing
This edition is unreadable because all the type runs together so that as you are reading youget wordsrun together likethis.I quit trying.I intend to read this book, not this edition because I love Cather and the subject interests me.

Horrible typography in this edition
This review is about this specific edition.The typography is atrocious.Numerous, pervasive errors are found throughout the text, usually 10-20 per page.Almost always it is two words pushed together:"butit"; "moneywas"; "toYucca"; etc.This is not the edition to get.Unfortunately I had already written in this book or I would have returned it.I do not understand how Amazon sells something like this.Again:DO NOT GET THIS EDITION!It is awful. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (15)

God and the American Southwest
Willa Cather's famous novel "Death Comes for the Archbishop" (1927) is set against the backdrop of the United States's acquisition of the New Mexico territory as a result of the Mexican War. Another less than happy historical incident also forms a boundary of the story: the forced removal of the Navajo Tribe from its ancestral home in the 1860s, with a great toll of death and suffering, followed by the return some years later of the Navajos to their current Reservation. Cather develops her timeless and asture story against the background of these events.

Cather's book tells the story of Father Jean Pierre LaTour, a French priest who has come to the Ohio Valley to do missionary work. With the United States' acquisition of New Mexico, the Church sends him on an arduous journey to Santa Fe to become the Bishop and to revitalize the Catholic Church. He is soon joined in Santa Fe by his long-time friend from his seminary days in France, Father Joseph Valliant. LaTour is scholarly and aloof, while Valliant is emotional and impulsive, a man of the people. A great deal of Cather's book centers on the friendship between the two priests. Cather changed the names of her characters, but the depiction of the two priests is historically based. Cather adopted and idealized their portrayals for her purposes in the novel. Other historical figures in the novel include the scout Kit Carson, who receives a sympathetic portrayal, and the native priest Padre Martinez, who attempts to break away from the orthodox Catholicism of Father LaTour and to found his own order. Martinez receives a less than sympathetic portrait from Cather.

Over the years of the story, LaTour and Valliant wander the deserts and small settlements of New Mexico and Arizona in an attempt to bring Catholicism to the people. During the timeframe of the book, the territory was inhabited largely by Indians and by Mexicans with only a few settlers from the States. As the book progresses, the pace of settlement quickens, as LaTour lives to regret the changed, urban character of Santa Fe where he builds a glorious cathedral. Cather is at her best in her descriptions of the landscape of the American Southwest, its distances, bleakness, deserts, heat, frost, wind, and cold. Cather offers a portrait of the Indian people, and the high mesas on which some of them lived. She shows a sensitivity to native Indian religions, which persisted through the Indians' nominal conversion to Catholicism.

With her attraction to the Southwest and its people, Cather also was greatly devoted to French culture and to the life of the mind. There are many descriptions in the book of LaTour and Valliant's love for French art, literature, wine, and cuisine and music. I had the feeling that Cather wanted to bring the best of European civilization to the New World. Yet, both LaTour and Valliant fall in love with their new homeland and LaTour declines the opportunity to spend his final years in a university position in France.

Cather wrote this book to emphasize the importance of religion in American life and in the settlement of the Southwest in particular. She had become dismayed by the increased emphasis on materialism, individuality, and sensuality that she saw in her contemporary America of the 1920s. She thus wrote a book that modified the usual picture of American expansionism to focus on religion. Today, as in Cather's day, many people overlook the role religion has played in shaping the American experience.

As a young woman, Cather had converted from the Baptist to the Episcopalian form of Protestantism. She never became a Catholic, but she studied and learned a great deal from Catholicism that is reflected in this book. She emphasizes a life of simple piety, devotion, and order, finding God in the everyday. There are many beautiful passages in the book on the Virgin Mary and her role in Catholicism, and discussions of piety, celibacy, miracles, and living a quiet contented life.


"Death Comes for the Archbishop" has always been a difficult book to classify. The work has a surprisingly modernist structure for a novel, with its lack of a plot line. The book has a historical setting, but it should not be read as history. It is concerned with a religion in which Cather did not herself believe and it shows her hero, LaTour, as enduring many moments of doubt. The picture that emerges is ultimately one of serenity and faith, but it is a harder and more complex vision than may appear on the surface.

I was pleased to have the opportunity to reread and rethink "Death Comes for the Archbishop" when I read it with a book group. Many critics prefer some of Cather's lesser-known works, such as "A Lost Lady" or "The Professor's House" to this famous novel. But "Death Comes for the Archbishop" is unquestionably a movingwork richly deserving of its place as an American classic.

Robin Friedman

Excellent, Beautiful, and Moving
Though not her best novel in the strict sense because it is really a series of interrelated stories, Death Comes for the Archbishop is another excellent Willa Cather work. Her most famous works focus on America's prairie frontier days, and this zeroes in on New Mexico in the same era with all the imported strengths. Cather again shows her profound sense of place, making a distinct area and bygone time seem truly alive. She gives a good idea of what it was like - especially how difficult it was - to adapt the enormous and challenging landscape to human use.

Western civilization's use rather, as the book is quick to remind us that Native Americans were already there with a very old culture. One of the central conflicts is between Western culture - as exemplified in Catholicism - and Native culture. This has become a historical lightning rod, with many loudly decrying the arrogant obsession with converting Natives, and the book is a fascinating peek into the process. As ever, Cather is even-keeled; her two main bishops have real faith and are generally sincere in thinking conversion best. It is hard not to sympathize with their struggles regardless of how we view Catholicism. However, other Catholic characters are variously despicable, viewing their job cynically and in it only for gain. This reminds us that humanity has good and bad specimens, warning us against sweeping generalizations and judgments. Through all this we get a fine sense of the Church's inner workings.

As all this suggests, the book is of great historical interest; anyone curious about New Mexico, the frontier, or the Catholic Church in early America will find much to engross and enlighten. Cather has a keen eye for what is worth recording about everything from landscapes to speech, and her balanced dramatizations of several real people - bishops aside, she perhaps most prominently features Kit Carson - are very interesting historically and artistically. Carson brings up another notable aspect - the book was highly unusual for a nuanced, sympathetic depiction of Natives. Cather clearly had great respect for their culture and was unwilling to dismiss it as nearly all mainstream Americans did. Indeed, they are the most generally and genuinely good of any group here, lacking others' villains and charlatans. There are some truly evil characters giving more than a hint of the Wild West's infamous dark side but also truly courageous and admirable ones who show how the great frontier experiment was even possible. All told, the varied and balanced depiction gives a lifelike picture of just what a cosmopolitan crossroads the West really was.

The book would be of little more than historical interest if it had nothing else, but thankfully there is more. The two main bishops are probably what allure most; finely and believably drawn, they have the essential humanity that makes sympathetic characters. We feel their ups and downs as we admire their strength and perseverance. Though not linear, the story itself is also intriguing and often quite moving; the intrusion of non-Natives and Catholicism had an immense effect on a culture that had been self-contained for centuries. It is a drama well worth watching from both sides, and Cather's depiction is notably nuanced. Her story runs us through a gamut of emotions, conveying everything from pathos to nature's sublime beauty to bittersweet poetic death. The setting may be very specific, but elements like these give universal significance.

Death Comes is not least notable for Cather's usual mesmerizingly beautiful prose. It is admirably concise and precise, stunningly conveying a variety of thoughts, emotions, and features - not least the landscape's natural beauty and grand scale - in remarkably few words. She paints pictures as breathtakingly epic as many novelists with far thicker books; her prose is indeed so awe-inspiring that she would be worth reading for it alone. Though she almost never gets credit, Cather is one of American literature's premier stylists, and this book is a preeminent example.

All told, Death is that rare thing in literature - a book that has great appeal for a specific set with potential for wide applicability. Though a classic, it is one of American literature's most underrated works and deserves significantly more popularity and acclaim.

Outstanding, Well-Written Novel
Willa Cather's outstanding novel "Death Comes for the Archbishop" tells the story of Bishop Jean Latour and his friend, Father Joseph Vaillant, as they travel to New Mexico in the mid 19th century to bring the Catholic Faith to the natives.The novel is based on the true stories of Archbishop Jean Baptiste Lamy and Father Joseph Machebeuf.Even the author's choice of names is appropriate: Father Latour (the tower) and Fr. Vaillant (valiant) and describes, in part, these characters.

Cather's graphic, yet artistic descriptions of the unforgiving landscape of the Southwest are part of the brilliance of this novel: "The sun was sinking, a red ball which threw a copper glow over the pine-covered ridge of mountains, and edged that inky, ominous cloud with molten silver. The great red earth walls of the mission, red as brick dust, yawned gloomily before him - part of the roof had fallen in, and the rest would soon go."Cather was a gifted artist who painted the canvas of her book with rich, sensory descriptions.

The character studies are also brilliant, from the scholarly, gentle and academic Latour to his equally gentle and faith-driven friend, Vaillant.Both Latour and Vaillant have particularly non-judgmental ways of bringing the Catholic faith to others. Secondary characters like Magdalena and Jacinto are described in such a fashion that the reader feels as if he/she knows them intimately.Kit Carson, a true life friend of Bishop Lamy, makes several appearances in the book.

This novel is not without its humorous moments. When Father Latour arrives at a large ranch to perform weddings and baptisms, Father Latour asks the owner, Manuel, "Where are those to be married?"Manuel tells him that the men are in the field, but that there is no hurry, and that he ought to baptize the children first.Father Latour's response is firm but gentle: "No, I tell you, the marriages first, the baptisms afterward; that order is but Christian.I will baptize the children tomorrow morning and their parents will at least have been married overnight."

Bishop Latour and Father Vaillant must contend with licentious priests, abusive husbands and others throughout their long stay in the Southwest. Eventually, it becomes Bishop Latour's deepest wish to see a Cathedral built in the new land.He and Fr. Vaillant come to respect the natural beauty of the land and the Cathedral becomes the first Romanesque church in the New World built in and part of the landscape.

I thoroughly enjoyed this 83-year-old novel and I understand why it is thought to be one of the author's greatest works.

In the end, this story is so thoroughly Catholic, from its characters to its setting to the very illustration of the Faith that it is difficult for me to believe that Cather was not Catholic.

Paean
Willa Cather's 1927 novel is a hymn of praise. Sung in language of radiant simplicity, it is a paean to the pioneer spirit, to the power of faith, to compassion and pure humanity, and above all to the American Southwest. And it is about life, not death. Archbishop Jean Latour goes to his rest in 1888 able to look back on almost forty years of transcendent service, since being appointed the first Bishop of Santa Fe in the newly acquired territory of New Mexico in 1850. The dates are precise because Cather based her character closely upon the life of Jean-Baptiste Lamy, the French missionary who held the office in fact, and built the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis in Santa Fe, where he is buried.

The building of the cathedral occupies a relatively small portion of Cather's book. Most of Latour's building is in human terms, visiting parishes that had not seen a priest in generations, giving hope to the poor and oppressed, and reaching out to the Indian tribes. He finds priests getting rich on the backs of their parishioners, or making free with their women; he deals with these situations with quiet tact if possible, but with firm authority if not. He is aided in his work by his boyhood friend from the Auvergne, Father Joseph Vaillant, a man of boundless energy who rides far into Arizona, and later north to the gold rush communities of Colorado, to explore the extent of a diocese so vast that neither man can truly comprehend it. Until the railroad arrives towards the end of the book, all these journeys are made on horseback, through country now trackless and terrible, now abloom with flowers in fertile arroyos, now glowing with vast mountain vistas. And above it all, the sky. "The plain was there, under one's feet, but what one saw when one looked about was that brilliant blue world of stinging air and moving cloud. Even the mountains were mere ant-hills under it. Elsewhere the sky is the roof of the world; but here the earth was the floor of the sky."

No wonder this book is displayed in shop windows all over New Mexico. Cather describes a land that is still recognizable, even in its local detail, but she distills its essence in a purer form -- no small achievement for a plains-dweller from Nebraska! No small achievement either that a Protestant author could reach so deeply into the soul of Catholicism. But her window was simply her humanity; the stories in this book (and for the most part they are stories) move, intrigue, or amuse the reader because they are not merely tales of a place, but of people in that place. Cather's canvas was the page, and her palette words -- simple words, but used exquisitely. Coincidentally, I have just been reading another masterpiece from the same time, Thornton Wilder's THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY. Cather and Wilder share the same elegance, the same simplicity, the same humanity. 1927 was a remarkable year!

a book to read and read again; especially if you are a Catholic bishop; but not just for them.For all on a journey to God
Fellow Readers,

If you like Willa Cather as an author, you will like this book, I think.That's one reason to read it.If you are a Catholic bishop, or a bishop of a Christian church, or a pastor, you would be smart to read this book and keep a copy or two on your shelf.Then live awhile and read it again.Then read it again.And share it.How can such a slim book communicate so much about a man's life with God and his community over such a lengthy time span? That's two reasons to read it.I love this book.That's three.But then who am I?

I first read this when I was heading out to New Mexico to be a volunteer teacher at a Catholic school in rural Northwestern New Mexico (near Chama)in 2000.The descriptions of the landscape, places, and people, though vivid, were not necessarily accurate to me.I had never been there and had no experiences to compare to."What the heck is an 'arroyo'?" I wondered.But having lived there for a year near an Apache reservation, in a small town filled with the descendants of Spanish conquistadores, really having "fallen in love with the place," and then having gone back twice since, including to Acoma Pueblo, the book has come alive in my re-readings.Oh, and I was a seminarian (twice!) and have spent much time either thinking about or preparing to be a priest, and working for a few of them, though I am not one.Didn't have enough of the right stuff, like the bishop and his priest-friend do have in this book.

The portait that Willa Cather paints of the Archbishop and his "family," their struggles and relationships, their spiritual/emotional growth over time, is excellent.It's a spiritual book, but also very physical.How could it not be?They travel on horseback and sleep on the ground!It affects you in the gut, the heart, and the soul.A book to treasure and recommend.A book to help guide you on the path.Two main characters - a bishop and his beloved friend and vicar general - who are worth emulating.It's really a love story about a man who loves God and God loving him, and how that man continually gives that love to others and is then loved in return by them.Did I say I loved this book?Hope you will too.

Mike Haigerty

... Read more

Product Description
Three exquisite novels by one of America's greatest writers: Alexander's Bridge, her first novel; O Pioneers!, a celebration of the frontier settlers; and The Songs of the Lark, in which an artist tries to free herself from her small-town beginnings. 6 x 9. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

If you like Steinbeck you'll love Cather!
Her style reminds me of John Steinbeck in her straightforward but playful prose, and in her poetic descriptions of nature and of characters (getting to know them by knowing their parents & grandparents first).She has less of the evil or cruel characters than Steinbeck did.

Her talent is breath-taking
Somehow, though I love to read,I had missed Willa Cather. I had already read and loved Jane Austen but it was not until I read "My Antonia" that I realized what I had missed all of these years. Willa Cather is truly a genius of the written word. To call her writing 'good' or her stories 'enjoyable' is to understate her talent. Her writing is beautiful though the stories are simple. Each place she writes about makes one believe that she lived there all her life. Her book "Saphira and the Slave Girl" would make you think she had lived there and in that time. Many of her stories are out on the prairie and seem to glow with the golden light from the sun on the fields of grain. Her characterizations are simple but profound and she often throws in a dramatic tale told by a character. And yes, this physical book is also beautiful and a joy to read. It makes one wonder about ever reading a cheap paperback again.

My Antonia
This book was very interesting had a good theme and plot.
It kept the reader on edge throughout the entire book. I would recommend it to everyone.

My Antonia
This book was very interesting had a good theme and plot.

It kept the reader on edge throughout the entire book. I would

recommend it to everyone.

Some of Cather's finest work
Like all the volumes in the Library of America series, this book is beautiful and made to last. Some readers may be bothered by the thin paper, but it allows so much to be packed into a handy book. As the title states, this is a collection from Cather's early work (her first "first novel," _Alexander's Bridge_, is missing). _The Troll Garden_ is a collection of Cather's early short stories, most in the manner of H. James and have a fin-de-siecle tone. "The Sculptor's Funeral," which depicts a town's inability to recognize achievement in any form but monetary, is perhaps the best. That and two other stories were revised by Cather for _Youth and the Bright Medusa_ (1920 an available in LoA 57 _Stories, Poems, and Other Writings_). Reading the versions side-by-side, one can achieve insight into Cather's growing abilities as a writer. However, the most rewarding read in this volume is _My Antonia_.Cather's first masterpiece depicts the lives of Jim Burden and Antonia Shimerda from their arrival in Black Hawk, Nebraska to twenty years after Jim leaves Black Hawk for a life in the East. Antonia remains in Nebraska, becomes a maid in town, and marries (twice). The theme of the book, from Jim's perspective, is aptly captured in the epigraph: "optima dies . . . prima fugit" (from Virgil's _Aeneid_). Again like all volumes in the LoA, a chronology of the authors life, a "Note on the Texts" and a few notes, containing information on allusions and translations of foreign words and phrases appear at the end of the volume. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Good reading
I am collecting the Willa Cather books as she is an amazing writer.Some of the books have duplicate stories. Don't know if this one does...but anything she writes is good. ... Read more

Product Description

This collection was designed for optimal navigation on Kindle and other electronic devices. It is indexed alphabetically and by category, making it easier to access individual books, stories and poems. This collection offers lower price, the convenience of a one-time download, and it reduces the clutter in your digital library. All books included in this collection feature a hyperlinked table of contents and footnotes. The collection is complimented by an author biography.

Customer Reviews (2)

Perfect format for the Kindle!
Perfect format for the Kindle!

I've purchased over 15 of these complete author collections from this publisher. These collections work superbly on the Kindle. Take Mark Twain collection. The collection includes huge number of Mark Twain's works all in one place, searchable and well-organized. If I would have purchased all these books separately, searching for `The Gilded Age' among hundreds of other books on my Kindle would be a nightmare. With Mobile Reference collections, I simply click `Works of Mark Twain', then click Novels> `The Gilded Age'. I can also click `List of works in alphabetical order' > `G' > `Gilded Age'. If I forget the book title but remember that `The Gilded Age' was written by Mark Twain early in his career, I can click on `List of works in chronological order' > (1873) `The Gilded Age'.

If I want another author, say, Charles Dickens, I click `Home' > `Works of Charles Dickens'. If I want Dostoevsky, I click `Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky'. I think this format is perfect for organizing books on the Kindle.

Inside collections, each book has links to chapters and footnotes. The text is nicely formatted and seems to be complete and accurate - something that cannot always be said about inexpensive ebooks. I think these collections are great bargains both in terms of saved money, time, and book organization!

Reading Cather is a joy!
Works of Willa Cather. Alexander's Bridge, O Pioneers!, Song of the Lark, My Antonia, Stories & more. Illustrated collection. FREE Author's biography and ... Published by MobileReference (mobi).

The author has a way of deceiving her readers. Willa Cather's novels are small simple looking stories when you begin and then you realize you are reading much more... ... Read more

Product Description
This Prestwick House Literary Touchstone Classic™ includes a glossary and reader’s notes to help the modern reader contend with Cather’s allusions and vocabulary.

My Ántonia, Willa Cather’s vivid portrayal of immigrant life on the American prairie during the nineteenth century, has been a favorite since it first appeared in 1918. The harsh—yet forgiving—land, the growth and maturity of Jim Burden, the narrator, the intriguing characters, and the force of Ántonia’s strength all combine to make this novel exceptional.

Cather’s style perfectly depicts the sparseness of the prairie and the desolation of the immigrants’ existence in winter and comes alive when the glory and beauty of spring emerge.

Whether you see it as a love story, an indelible portrait of a wise, enduring female character, or a coming-of-age novel, My Ántonia is deserving of its respected place in American literature. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Beautiful story, beautifully written
I can't believe that it has taken me so many years to discover this beautiful book and talented author.The story is touching and poignant, the characters are real, diverse, well-drawn, endearing and not soon to be forgotten. The writing is beautiful and transports the reader to a time of simple pleasures, daily joys and profound sorrows in the context of a wild, hard to tame, and often harsh landscape that, still and all, holds a beauty that is deep and enduring.The story tells of the lifelong love that grows between a boy and girl who meet each other and a foreign nineteeth century Nebraska landscape when life, loss and the struggle to survive bring their families together.The story is told through the eyes and voice of Jim Burden, who we meet when he is 10.It is a story of innocence and loyalty, sorrow and kindness, basic goodness and humanity, growth and change, maturity and wisdom, and in the end a lesson about holding on to that which is real and truly cherising the places, people, and memories that call your heart back home.Highly recommended !

A TIMELESS AMERICAN CLASSIC...
I first read this book when I was in junior high school. I admit that, at the time, I did not appreciate the strengths of the book and the quality of its writing. I am quite glad that I decided to give it another chance, as I now understand why it is considered to be a classic in literature. It is simply a beautifully written book, covering many of the themes that one stumbles across in life and coalescing them into a work of extraordinary breadth.

The book is the story of two young people, Jim Burden and Antonia Shimerda. They meet for the first time when Jim is ten years old and Antonia is fourteen. Recently orphaned, Jim has moved to the Great Prairie to live with his grandparents in Nebraska. Antonia, on the other hand, has been wrenched from her homeland in Bohemia, emigrating with her parents to the United States and finding herself in Nebraska. Jim and Antonia's chance encounter on a train sets the stage for the forging of a friendship and unconditional love that time will not diminish.

The book relates the harshness of immigrant life through the eyes of Jim, who narrates the events contained in the book. There is a relentless stoicism about the book, which is written in spare, clear prose. With intense imagery and descriptive exactitude, late nineteenth century Nebraska comes to life. It also relates the paths that each of the characters choose to follow, as well as the vicissitudes of life that mold and shape them in ways that no one would have imagined.

The focus of the book, which is also a coming of age tale, seems to be on the female characters and their strengths. Consequently, the book has a faintly feminist undercurrent to it, as all the women in it seem to be survivors, despite the hardships that they encounter. This is, without a doubt, a life affirming book, wrought with great feeling and a decided sense of time and place. Yet, despite its poignancy, the book is surprisingly unsentimental and straightforward. It is a testament to the author's literary talent that this book has emerged as a timeless classic. Bravo! ... Read more

Product Description
Willa Cather was an early 20th century author best known for her novels, O Pioneers, My Antonia, and Death Comes for the Archbishop.In 1906 Cather became the managing editor of McClure's magazine.As a muckraker journalist Cather co-authored a scathing biography about the head of the Christian Science church, Mary Baker Eddy.A Lost Lady is written in the third person.Niel Herbert is a young man who grows up in Sweet Water and witnesses the decline of Mrs. Forrester for whom he feels very deeply.Cather portrays the moral disintegration of a lovable woman as seen through the eyes of a boy. The West is also depicted in its decline from the idealized age of noble pioneers to the age of capitalist exploitation. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (26)

The Title says it all
A Lost Ladyis one of the best titled novels I have readIt is about the deterioration of a woman who goes from principled dignified and well respected to one who is adulterous financially unscrupulous and disrespected. The lady Marian Forrester is a well constructed charactersas are the major male character Niel Herbert and the novels closest thing to a villian Ivy Peters. The novel is subtle and nuanced but lacksthe energy of O Pioneers and My Antonia which are novels thatCather seems to put an extra amount of heart into. This is still a very good novel and I recommend it

Youthful vs Mature perceptions
A young man grows up worshiping an older, gracious woman but he can't forgive her for choosing a vigorous, full life over his youthful, staid definition propriety. You can feel his angst over his puppy love for her battling the static vision he needs from her.She however, has her own longing to keep living and loving to her fullest ability. They both find a type of peace in the end.

Cather explores how well we can actually know and understand others.As a young woman the aging heroine marries a much older man.He comes from another era, from US pioneer times, with it's unique code of men and women, right and wrong.Even though this code seems brittle from the outside he as an individual manages to see his wife as a complete person with her strengths and foibles as well as her dreams of what might have been or could be.He honors her with his more complete and intimate understanding in a way the heroine worshipping boy can't.The boy grows up and begins to see the gray where before he only saw black and white.Cather always excels at showing the range of human emotions and she does so in such few words and without maudlin emotion.

Compact and beautiful
Many other reviewers have expressed more or less my sentiments about this book, but I shall add my own voice. 'A Lost Lady' is very short but extremely rich, with the elegance of a waltz but the depth and richness of a symphony. The style is capable, but limpid and graceful; the characters are sympathetic and their experiences meaningful. Cather paints a beautiful picture of a 'golden age' in decline. This is rightfully a classic. Highly recommended for all interested in American fiction, or good literature in general.

LOST TO POSTERITY...
This is a simply written but thematically complex, metaphoric story, replete with subtle nuances. The events that transpire are seen primarily through the eyes of a boy who comes of age, a contrivance that the author successfully employed in her best selling classic, "My Antonia". Here, it is no less successful. Through the eyes of Neil Herbert, who lives in Sweet Water, a prospective railroad hub on the Western plains in one of the prairie states, the reader gets to know Marian Forrester. She is the much younger, envied wife of one of the town's more prominent and wealthier citizens, Captain Daniel Forrester, a former railroad contractor.

As Neil grows into a man, his adoration of the lovely Mrs. Forrester undergoes a change. He sees her fall from the pedestal from where he and all the townspeople have placed her and sees her, really sees her, warts and all, for the first time, when he discovers her involved in an unexpected peccadillo. It comes as a shock to him that she may not be all that she seems to be. Still, his life is closely entwined with hers, as his uncle, with whom he lives, is Captain Forrester's personal attorney and of the same social standing in this socially circumscribed backwater.

Just as Neil's perception of Mrs. Forrester begins to change in his eyes, so do the fortunes of the town and that of Captain Forrester. As Mrs. Forrester physically deteriorates under the strain of the vicissitudes of fate, so do the town and its surrounding environs. As she revives, leaving behind her old values and adopting new ones that are anathema to those who respect the traditional ones, her revival parallels changes in the town itself, as the old makes way for the new. These changes also parallel the shifts occurring on the American frontier, as social mores and personal values undergo a change, and those stalwart pioneer values give way to new ones.

Beautifully descriptive of a bygone era and laconic in its pace, this is most certainly a novel to be savored. Fans of the author will especially enjoy it.

A Captivating Novellete!
What a beautiful story!What a magnificent writer Willa Cather is.This relatively short story is sure to captivate any fan of hers who has not had the pleasure of perusing this gem yet.If you enjoyed "My Antonia" and/or "O Pioneers!", then I can guaranty you, you will simply love this novella.

"A Lost Lady" is the story of Marian Forrester and her much older, but very charming and amicable husband Captain Daniel Forrester.The Forrester's live in the small Western town of Sweet Water.The novel is written through the eyes of a young man Niel Herbert who also lives in Sweet Water and is good friends with the Forrester's.Ever since he was a young boy, Niel, along with just about everyone else in Sweet Water, is truly entranced by the grace, charm and beauty of Mrs. Forrester. She is the true embodiment, the aesthetic ideal of the perfect woman.However, as Niel grows up and becomes a young man he slowly but surely learns that this goddess is not without her flaws and short comings.In many ways,Marian Forrester, is our American version of Flaubert's Emma Bovary.However, Cather paints for us a much more simplistic, endearing, and sympathetic character than the latter in my opinion.

This is such a beautiful piece of literature.It may not take the average bibliophile long to finish this work, but the favorable impression it will leave upon you makes this one to good to pass up.My only knock, I wish the story was longer, for I was truly absorbed from the first page to the last.

5 STARS without thinking twice! ... Read more

Product Description
First published in 1926, this book is Cather's sparest and most dramatic novel, a dark and oddly prescient portrait of a marriage that subverts our oldest notions about the nature of happiness and the sanctity of the hearth. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

Story of a marriage
Willa Cather has gone deep into the minds, feelings, emotions of her characters.This short novella packs quite a wallop.The novella is seen through the eyes of Nellie Birdseye.She first meets Myra Henshawe when she is fifteen, Myra forty-five though she has always known about this lady.Myra is gossiped about by her mother and aunts so Nellie feels as though she has always known the lady.Her Aunt Lydia stays friends with Myra and goes often to New York City to visit her friend.Nellie is a favorite of Aunt Lydia who has only sons. Myra Henshawe makes only one visit to Parthia, a small town in southern Illinois and Aunt Lydia is anxious for her neice to meet her good friend.

Gossip is about Myra's elopement with Oswalk Henshawe.Myra, an orphan, has been raised by her very wealthy bachelor uncle, John Driscoll a devout Catholic.John Driscoll does a good job of spoiling his neice, his pride and joy.Myra is a pretty and popular girl.Both uncle and neice are fond of each other and both are very much alike.

Then Myra meets Oswald Henshawe.Her uncle takes a great dislike to the young man and tells his neice if she marries this man he would cut her off.She is to inherit two thirds of uncle's estate, one third is to go to the church.Myra's elopement is the talk of the town for many years.Uncle did what he promised he would do.His lovely home becomes a convent.

Myra and her husband move to New York City to a nice apartment.Nellie and Aunt Lydia visit the couple in their apartment.Nellie is impressed with their lifestyle.She delights in her New York visit.Myra loves people especially those in the arts who she invites to parties in her home. She cultivates the wealthy in order to promote her husband in his job.Oswald works as a secretary for a tycoon a job he doesn't like.He is an attractive man who likes the ladies and they like him. He would have liked to be a soldier of fortune or an adventurer, but he loves his wife who gave up a fortune for him and he wants to give her whatever she wants.Nellie finds that Myra can be two different people, the nicest, kindest person one can meet, then the meanest, most hateful one can meet.

Ten years pass.Things have changed.Nellie is living in a new, but poorly built apartment hotel in a large California city.She has taken a position as a teacher and is poorly paid.But she is young and her life can change.Surprisingly she runs into the Henshawes who have come down on their luck.They are also living in this residence of losers, of those of broken dreams.Myra is sick and in a wheelchair.Oswald must wait on her hand and foot and do all of the housework,Nellie comes in to help them out.Then Myra contracts cancer.There is a place along the beach she loves and wants to see it at dawn just as the sun comes up.She drags herself to this loved place and dies.

So who is the mortal enemy?Is it Myra who gave up a life of luxury to marry the man she loves?Is it Oswald who took her away from wealth to middle class to poverty?But Oswald has given up a life of adventure to work as a secretary in an office in order to give his wife what she wanted.Myra loved material things and wants to be surrounded by beautiful objects.And to the end Myra always regretted hurting her uncle who she had loved, old rascal that he was, and who she was so much like.Plus she could have been a help to young struggling artists who she so much admired.Or is the mortal enemy life itself that takes and beats people down, destroys dreams and hopes, steals from them youth, health and beauty?

Oswald dies sever years later in Alaska, one of the places he had always wanted to visit.Willa Cather has written a great book as she usually does.

a short bitter but good novel
My Mortal Enemy is Cathers shortest novel and a bitter one as well.This is the story of the marriage of Oswald and Myra Hemshawe as told through the mindand eyes of Nellie Birdseye whose aunt is a good friend of Myras. The two of them visit the Hemshawes inNew York and Nellie sees trouble because Oswald is indolent and gracious to all and Myra is materialistic and extremely jealous. The question is who is Myras mortal enemy is it herself is it Oswald or is it life itself The ambiguity and the well developed character of Myra are the novels strengths. Her nastiness is offputting and more devoplment of Oswald would make the book even better than it is but I give it 4stars

My Mortal Enemy
Really enjoyed this book. It is only a very short book, but but a serious essay on what really ultimately matters.

Overrated
This novel is mediocre at best, about an old married couple that are hardly unique or even interesting. I read it in a few hours and moved on to another book.

An Enemy of Mortals
Natural questions a person might have when considering whether to read this book are: What kind of work of fiction is this?Does it fit into a major category of fiction?Who is the "mortal enemy" referred to in the title?I'll address those questions in this review.

My Mortal Enemy is not a classic romance, tragedy, or melodrama. It is a narrative view, from a fallible, secondary character's perspective.Some people might be put off by the title, incorreclty inferring:"Why would I want to read a book about someone ruminating over their interactions with their mortal enemy?"I can understand that apprehension.But hopefully, if you can make it to the end of this review - you may understand both why the above inferrence is partly inaccurate, and where it is accurate - there are plenty of worthwhile and thoughful cognitive twists to make this introspective novel a thrilling read.

"My Mortal Enemy" is a novel focused on the social observations of a young person, watching a close family friend's slow cognitive journey into almost invisible and hard to describe forms of mental dysfunction.I love this book.I read through it like a thrilling page-turner.I couldn't wait to get to the end, and was not disappointed when I got there.It is brilliant, sarcastic, and wise.It shows us, if we have the eyes to perceive, the seemingly benign steps a mind takes into horrific dysfunction.

I love Cather's characterization of Oswald.Cather's rare portrayal of him as a smart and compassionate man, dealing with a spouse who does not see her own self-inflicted demises, is a rare act of literary kindness from one gender to the other.After reading her characterization of Oswald, Cather cannot be characterized as a man-hater.He is so lovingly drawn, in the regular presence of Myra's berating.

It is hard for an author to write a character more interesting than the author.All of Cather's characters are interesting - so I would have loved to have met her.Reading this novel, I sometimes think of the conversations between Myra and Nellie (the narrator) as conversations between a younger generation and an older generation.But Myra does not represent "older and wiser."She represents "older."Many people don't get smarter as they get older or after they get married, and Myra is one of those people (and it appears Avril Lavigne is one also, at least for the moment, but that's a whole nother story).Myra is intelligent.But she is also not smart enough to see where she is misguided.And she is also so tunnel-visioned and bull-headed that she will not concede where she might be wrong.And if we're going to peg her with an Achilles' Heel - an inability and general unwillingness to change has to be near the top of the list of the reasons for most of her follies.

In some ways, Cather's 'My Antonia' can be thought of a young person's recollection and observations of what happens to first loves.'My Mortal Enemy' can be thought of as a young person's discovery of how some people so easily make so many enemies.Some people are good at drawing many lovers to them.Others, like Myra and her father, are exceptional at creating enemies - even of the people closest to them.And the novel examines the social constructs and personality traits that easily create enemies.

This paragraph discusses the title of "My Mortal Enemy" and to what the title may be referring, so if you want to read the book before knowing the ending, please read the rest of this review thereafter.Who is the "My" referring to - in the title "My Mortal Enemy?"I think it can be read as several people.It could be a general "My," representing anyone.It could also specifically refer to Willa Cather, Nellie (the narrator), or Myra.Her name is "My"ra.And twice, at key plot places in the book (p. 78 and the final sentence), she says, "Why must I die like this, alone with my mortal enemy?"From Myra's perspective, she perceives Oswald to be her mortal enemy.I believe the title is intended to be interpreted in all the above ways.

So who is the "mortal enemy?"It could be most easily interpreted as Oswald.But it could also be interpeted as Myra's father who disowned and disinherited her.But I think Cather was smarter than either of those singular interpretations.This book was not intended to be some melodrama or whodunnit, where the protagonist whispers the killer's name in her dying breath.No, this is a book examining larger social and cultural rules and the real and damaging consequences of those boundaries.

Cather's lead characters are not known for their ability to adapt.Neither Antonia nor Myra are able to really see what may have held them back their whole lives.They are both brilliant, individual personalities and beauties.And it is not accurate to suggest Cather is like Thomas Hardy and is simply composing plots where no matter how hard the female leads try, fate seems to batter them down into their pre-ordained destinies.No, Cather's has more intelligent and modern perspectives.Cather wants to show the joys that are crushed by the combination of dominant social rules AND the women who follow them without questioning.Sometimes older generations, as they get older, think they have everything figured out.Myra is an example of this type of person.And Cather uses her as an example of an intelligent person who is also a fool, a fool who thinks all her enemies are the people around her, when tragically, her greatest enemy is her own thoughts, boundaries, and treatment of others.

Myra's mortal enemy is Myra.

As the book nears the end, Myra turns increasingly insentive and hostile toward Nellie, Oswald, and everyone else.She only shows mercy to her dead fatherly guardian, who never adopted her.But even her words toward him are cruel to everyone else - as she suggests he is worthy of mercy while all those who have cared for her daily for years are not worth her understanding, love or compassion.

The book implies Oswald may have had an affair with someone else after marrying Myra.But whether he did or not, is not Cather's great concern.Cather wants to stress that Myra's suspicion of Oswald's sexual or amorous feelings towards anyone else is a dominant basis for her hatred of him.Myra relies on her assumption that if Oswald ever loved another person after they married, then in Myra's moral reasoning, he should be her enemy.This charming, hard working, and loving man, who gave her years of love and compassion doing work he hated, to give her many ornate things he never wanted, is discarded and exiled from her affections.She takes extraordinary efforts to abandon him in the end to die alone.

Cather wants people to consider everything and to think for themselves.She wants people to look at the weight of these character's actions over their entire lifetimes and measure those against individual, exclusive moral standards.Cather shows us the fruit of Myra's and her father's (John's) hatreds and mistreatment of those close to them.Cather shows us what happens when some people require their loves to only love and follow them exclusively.According to several biographical accounts, Cather lived most of her adult life in love with a person who was married to another.Her writings often focus on related universal social concerns. ... Read more

Product Description
The classic by Willa Cather. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (32)

A gem, even for Willa Cather
I've read a number of Willa Cather's books, but this novel had escaped me until now.Particularly for being one of her earliest works, written when she was quite young, the novel shows a mastery of the craft and an unusual maturity.

Cather starts out slowly, building scene and character, with her signature sparse and interesting descriptions and phrases--always thought-provoking.The Professor is a particularly sympathetic character, wise and kindly.But the end of the book puts this work into a special category.The writing transforms, mirroring the transformation which occurs within the Professor at that point in his life.He rereads the diary of Tom Outland, an exceptional former student and colleague (the choice of name had to be deliberate.) In Outland's diary of his days in the Southwest, the book attains truly poetic prose and is very moving.This is followed by a remarkably deep understanding on the part of Cather of a usually later-life (if attained at all) state which the Professor undergoes.I've reread this last section several times.

Needless to say, I highly recommend this book.As to this edition, there are a few typos.Those shouldn't be too distracting, at the price.

A Book with Lots of Meaning
This is a great book with lots of hidden meaning. I am sure I didn't get them all, may read again.

Texbook review
This was a textbook for a college class.It came quickly and in good shape

A House with Many Levels
I had a hard time deciding how to review The Professor's House.The plot itself is very straightforward and easy to describe.The characters are vivid and well-defined which adds to the realism of the novel.But it seems to me that the meat of this novel is in the themes and nuances.

I have read some of Cather's short stories many years ago and only have vague memories of them other than a memory that she had exquisite attention to detail.As I read this book I found that memory to be true.The writing vibrantly presents minute details to the reader...from the shape and texture of a hand to the nature of a dress or necklace to the depiction of setting both in and out of doors.

Her characters are likewise detailed.We are held at a close third person so we don't actually get into the characters' heads, but the detailed account of appearance and action allows the reader to feel very intimate with the characters.

The layout of the book is interesting in that it consists of three "books."The first book is entitled "The Family" and follows the Professor as he works to finish his own writing while teaching and balancing the various dramas unfolding in his life and the lives of his family members.The second book is "Tom Outland's Story" and is the first person narrative of Tom, an old student of the Professor and friend of the family who is now dead (from WWI) but left behind an invention and legacy that resulted in great wealth for one of the Professor's daughters.The final book is entitled "The Professor" and is a very short wrap up of the novel which focusses on thoughts, emotions and actions of the professor after he reads and ponders Outland's story.

The overarching plot of the book is interesting if not terribly engaging.There were moments of drama and emotion that drew me in, but there were other segments that were almost boring with the mundane interactions.

As I mentioned initially, the meat of the novel though isn't the plot itself, but the themes and emotions it instills.

Looking to these themes, part of this book seems to be an exploration of emotional displacement and emotional paralysis or release.The Professor is very attached to his old house and his work and doesn't want to move into the new house with his family.Outland is almost a portrayal of a return to the past for the professor and in the end, Outland's story provides an almost existential release to the professor.The claustrophobia of the old house and the room in which the professor works serve as a metaphorical trap that is holding the professor hostage in his current/past life/behavior and causing emotional turmoil and angst from which he can't see a clear escape.

At a higher, more sociological level, the novel portrays some interesting counterpoints on society.The Professor is doing well enough off teaching at the university and does even better once he receives an award for his writing.His two daughters are well enough off as well though one is moving into the "upper class" while the other is sitting fairly "middle."The family interactions and conversations give interesting insight into the class reactions of the era and some of the internal and external results of class mobility.As the professor's daughter and son-in-law gain their wealth and rise to a higher social status, there are jealousies and even some resentment and anger both within and outside of the family.

Looking at the writing, it is clear that there are MANY levels at work in this novel.Cather's frequent use of color helps categorize different themes or values.Her descriptions of the houses, rooms and other settings set the balance between the different classes or social situations.To further illustrate that NOTHING appears to be arbitrary in this book, it was pointed out to me that there is particular significance in the name of the ship that Outland takes to the war, the name of the ship that the Professor's family returns home on, and even the book that Outland uses to study latin.

So, even though the book's plot isn't terribly engaging, I can see this work as having a lot of valuable insight into the social and mental ideas of the 1920s, many of which have relevance today especially given the almost parallel economic situation around us.

While it's not likely something I'd read over and over, it is something I can recommend to those interested in human behavior, the 1920s, or life in general.Cather paints a vivid and beautiful picture of a family...not a perfectly adjusted and blissfully happy family, but a realistic, flawed and interesting family.

very good but not five stars
The Professor's House is a very good novel but not one of the five novels by Cather that I would rate 5stars. The novel is a critical look at higher education in one way. The college in America was once a fountain of basic knowledge in the humanities arts and basic sciences. The college education at the undergraduate level was not about job training but developing intellect. The liberal arts and basic sciences were at the center of a college or university.Cather critiques the change into a job training center and the change in attitude from being motivated by a search for knowledge to being motivated by money. Even the professors are affected and it shows most clearly when the title character talks to a close faculty friend whose anger at ebeing denied money from a discovery of one of his students stuns the professorbecausehe thought his friend was a physicist to learn the secrets of the universe not make money fro mpractical applications of discoveries.The whole novel is a critique of the American emphasis on money and possessions. The professor rejects his nicer and brand new housebecause it has no soul .The main reason he consented to buy it was his wifes desire to be upscale and the financial success of his books enable that but the professor didd research out of love of knowledge which is why he so loved and admired the other main character Tom Outland who after he dies has his research as a student turned into something practical and wealth creating by oo professors son in law or one of them . He and his wife represent greed while the other daughter and son inlaw represent osmething more noble but they too are affected by a love of money they just dont have much. Only Outland the Professor ST.Peter put love of knowledge for money. The book is quite good but the middle section on Tom Outland in New Mexico so I RATE IT 4 STARS ... Read more

Product Description
Willa Cather's classic "My Antonia" is the story of the daughter of an immigrant family that sets out to farm the untamed prairie land of Nebraska in the late 19th century. Told to us from the perspective of the adoring Jim Burden, an orphan who comes to live at his grandparent's neighboring farm. "My Antonia" is an enduring American classic rich with the spirit that brought so many immigrants to this land in search of a better life and of the beautiful imagery of the midwestern plains. First published in 1918, Will Cather saw "My Antonia" as the best book that she had ever written and it is easy to see why, for it is nothing short of a masterpiece. ... Read more

Product Description
The book has no illustrations or index. Purchasers are entitled to a free trial membership in the General Books Club where they can select from more than a million books without charge. Subjects: Nebraska; Swedish Americans; Brothers and sisters; Women immigrants; Women farmers; Women pioneers; Farm life; Pioneers; Fiction / Literary; ... Read more

Customer Reviews (106)

Clinging to a Home on the Range
Her home is just a few parcels of land situated on the quaint Nebraskan plains.And Alexandra Bergman would die for it.Her father actually did--and it's up to her to pick up the pieces and maintain this homestead through all seasons: the most buoyant of summers, the most desolate of winters.Some friends and family members walk with her as others dash off into the horizon to try their luck elsewhere.If this were just a dissertation on how to grow a literal harvest or a simple atmospheric sketch with little plot or relevance, Cather might have floundered.But it's much more than that.This is a rich tapestry filled with how people can rediscover who they are and where they belong in the world, finding their identities not just in the soil but in those who help till it.The tragic climax is breathtaking as Alexandra learns that even some things can't be replanted--only the seeds of heartache, grief, forgiveness, and rebirth can be scattered in their place.

Cather was surprised when this book became popular because she claimed that she wrote it mostly for herself.But her enthusiasm for the places so dear to her is infectious in this novel.We have the privilege of experiencing joy and sorrow alongside Alexandra, fierce and resolute even when she's teetering over from exhaustion, waiting for something in her sacred fields to breathe life into her again.This is an undeniably moving tribute to the heartland of America and to one woman who isn't afraid to firmly cultivate her own sense of purpose, even if all the crops around her would wither away, never to bear fruit again.

Not quite a crashing bore, but very much a woman's book
Good points:

1. The prose in this book was very nice. It is easy to forget that the book is only just 100 years old-- but it seems even older than that. For example: The use of the word "country" to describe "countryside" instead of "nation" was something that took a few references for me to catch.

Bad points:

1. The book was overwrought with detail/ drama. It was just under 200 pages, but it read more like 300.
2. I can see that the point of the author's jumps in time was to show a characters development over some number of decades. But what I thought the book would show was the logistics of building a farm from the ground up. Instead, we went something like .....Intro........Three years later........Sixteen years later.
3. The environment seems a bit.......tribal. Was America ever this way?
4. The development of the characters was a bit lacking. Some characters were there (Old Ivar) and they seemed to act as just filler. There seems to have been a lot of foreshadowing about how something *might* happen to Ivar at the hands of the two slimy brothers, but nothing did happen. So, that brought up the question of why was he there. As far as character development, I always learned that, at a minimum, one should discuss the Speech, Actions, Appearance, Thoughts, Opinions of Others as a way of developing that character. Either that method had not been invented or if it had Cather just never got around to studying it.

In summary, this book is highly overrated (1) and I'm glad that I got it for free (2), because if I had to come off of my own money for it, it might have been worth about $2 plus the cost of shipping.

Hey! These are MY people!
Swedes homesteading on the short grass prairie! How come I'd never read this book?

Actually, this comes close to being the true story of my mother's immigrant farmer family, who were Germans of a sort. Alexandra, the powerful woman at the heart of Cather's story, the one pictured on the cover of this edition, reminds me powerfully of my great-grandmother, who was just a generation younger than Willa Cather. Alexandra's two selfish and small-minded brothers, Lou and Oscar, are spitting-images of my grandfather and his brother. Frank Shabata, the sorry husband, is 'awful close' to a portrayal of my father. The verisimilitude of Cather's characters, so fair and square in depicting both their strength and their frailty, is her best accomplishment as a writer. You won't need family photos of these characters to recognize them as real people.

The part that's not true to the history of my family as pioneers and sod-busters is also what's not true about the novel. The real people were more ordinary, lived more one-day-at-a-time, didn't have the luxury to leaping across a flat and commonplace decade from one chapter to the next. They had to get up in the morning, drudge through the day, cut their toe nails and scrape their corns, go to bed too worried about chores and bills to dream big dreams. But who would want to read about them?

"O Pioneers!" is a triple love story, starring three handsome men and two beautiful women. One couple ends up happy... as happy as they're able to be, anyway. There's plenty of passion, frustration, jealousy, misunderstanding to make a Hollywood blockbuster on the scale of "Giant". For all I know, there have been ten films of this novel already. That's weakness of the book, one way it falls short of really deserving to be called a "world's classic", that it was ripe for Hollywood when it was published in 1913, even before Hollywood was ripe for it.

"O Pioneers!" is also a love song to the Land, to the beauty and bounty of the short grass prairie. It begins with a description of the hard-scrabble homestead and it ends with a paean to the "...fortunate country, that is one day to receive hearts like Alexandra's into its bosom, to give them out again in the yellow wheat, in the rustling corn, in the shining eyes of youth!" Now that's a 'right pretty' sentiment, but it's not terribly accurate. Teachers, don't assign this book as a depiction of the history of the Midwest. Some few sodbusters may have felt ennobled by their land, but a lot more of them were plenty ready to sell to greenhorns and move farther west or south. That's the true story of the agricultural frontier in America, from colonial days through the Ohio Valley and onward to the Dakotas; those who got rich did so more by selling than by clinging to the soil. Cather herself may have loved the western skies but she wrote under the skies of eastern and European cities. Those shining-eyed Young have been fleeing to either coast since the first pioneers gave birth to them. The prosperity that Cather portrayed among the Swedes and Bohemians of Nebraska in the years before WW1 was an artifact of the world economy. It was a bubble. It collapsed soon enough. Nebraska and the Dakotas haven't thrived in the way "O Pioneers!" envisioned. Declining populations, stagnant and dying towns, narrow-minded reactionary social and political grudges against the very sort of people that Willa Cather became! The story of Alexandra and Carl ends at the brink of their future; I can almost promise you that if they'd lived as long as my great-grandmother, they'd have retired in Arizona.

But there is a resonant grandeur to "O Pioneers!"It's worth reading, in order to sense the courage and hardihood of the farmer-immigrants who built the heartland of America. It's not as colorful or touching as the work of Ole Rolvaag; "Giants in the Earth" and its sequels are the greatest 'world's classics' of the American West. It's not as honest and accurate as Hamlin Garland's "Main-Traveled Roads". It's nowhere near the epic adventure, the magniloquent sweep, of the four Emigrant novels of the Swedish writer Vilhelm Moberg. But once you pick it up, you won't be tempted to read anything else until you finish it, and once you finish it, the woman Alexandra will stick in the family-photo album of your mind.

Review of O'Pioneers
CD was in good shape but seemed to skip around chapters .. It is an MP3 so couldn't decide if it was the player we used or the CD ... used in several different players.

For a Dream, There is a Price
Cather published her second novel, O Pioneers, in 1913 at the age of 40. Together with My Antonia it is the novel for which she is best known. Years after writing the book, Cather wrote of it " Since I wrote this book for myself, I ignored all the situations and accents that were then thought to be necessary."
The book takes place on the plains of Nebraska in the late 19th Century as the Prairie is settled be Swedish, Bohemian, and French immigrants trying to eke out a living from what appears to be a harsh, inhospitable land. The heroine of the book is Alexandra Bergson who inherits her father's farm as a young woman, raises his three sons and stays with the farm through the harsh times to become a successful landowner and farmer.

The books speaks of being wedded to the land and to place. In this sense it is an instance of the American dream of a home. It also speaks of a strong woman, not in cliched, late 20th Century terms but with a sense of ambiguity, difficulty and loss.

This is a story as well of thwarted love, of the difficult nature of sexualtiy, and of human passion. There is also the beginning of what in Cather's works will become an increased sense of religion, Catholicism in particular, as a haven and a solace for the sorrow she finds at the heart of human endeavor. Above all it is a picuure of stark life in the midwest.

There is almost as much blood-letting in this short book as in an Elizabethan tragedy. Cather's picture of American life on the plains, even in her earliest books, is not an easy or simple one. Some readers may quarrel with the seemingly happy ending of the book. I don't think any will deny that Alexandra's happiness is dearly bought or that it is bittersweet.

I tendend to shy away from this book in favor of Cather's later novels. I feared that it would be conventional and trite. The stereotyping was mine,however. This is a thoughtful, well written story of immigrant life on the plains and of the sorrow pain, and strength of the American experience.

Robin Friedman ... Read more

Product Description
The beloved classic by Willa Cather. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

The true pioneering spirit
Some writers are identified with a particular country orregion, others with a specific period in history. Willa Cather is known for both. When I think of her, I think of the prairie states, especially Nebraska, and I think of the days of the intrepid pioneers of the prairies, struggling to make a life for themselves that was tenuous, at best.

Although Cather spent only a few years of her childhood on the vast prairie lands of Nebraska, she returned to those memories again and again in her most powerful and famous fiction, such as My Antonia and The Song of the Lark.

The title of one of her celebrated novels, O Pioneers! is rather unique in that it has an exclamation point at the end of it. Think about it: how many other book titles do you know that have exclamation points? That sense of breathlessness, excitement, and fierce determination which is conveyed in the very look of the title O Pioneers! comes across from the very first pages of this novel.

This is the story of Alexandra Bergson and her family who risk everything they have to carve out a home in the unforgiving Nebraska landscape.Alexandra is forced at a very young age to take on the responsibility for her mother and brothers after her father dies. Before he dies, her father makes Alexandra, his most trusted child, promise to keep the farm and to make it thrive.This she does, although at a high personal cost.

The novel is a short one and moves quickly from decade to decade.It begins with a touching scene involving Alexandra's youngest brother Emil, whose stray kitten is rescued by Alexandra's best friend, Carl. The moment is a sweet one, and all ends well; but this is perhaps the only time in the book that we see problems so easily and satisfactorily resolved.

The land is harsh and brings out both the best and the worst in people. Those with weak wills and weak values often stumble and are sometimes destroyed. The Nebraska prairie is not a place where love and gentle dreams can flourish without interference; young people particularly often find their fondest dreams tossed aside the way the blade of a plow uproots the tender prairie grasses.

There is heartbreak and loneliness in O Pioneers!,but there are also moments of pure exhilaration and veneration for the savage beauty of the land. Alexandra suffers as she tries to keep her vision of what the land can mean for her and her family.Like many of the women in the novels of Willa Cather, Alexandra rises above the ordinary, and continues with dogged determination along the path she has set for herself. The price she pays is high, but we know it is not too high, despite what has been lost. And, appropriately, the last sentence in O Pioneers! ends with this exclamatory sentence:"Fortunate country, that is one day to receive hearts like Alexandra's into its bosom, to give them out again the yellow wheat, in the rustling corn, in the shining eyes of youth!"

Fortunate, indeed!

For a Dream, There is a Price
Cather published her second novel, O Pioneers, in 1913 at the age of 40. Together with My Antonia it is the novel for which she is best known. Years after writing the book, Cather wrote of it " Since I wrote this book for myself, I ignored all the situations and accents that were then thought to be necessary."
The book takes place on the plains of Nebraska in the late 19th Century as the Prairie is settled be Swedish, Bohemian, and French immigrants trying to eke out a living from what appears to be a harsh, inhospitable land. The heroine of the book is Alexandra Bergson who inherits her father's farm as a young woman, raises his three sons and stays with the farm through the harsh times to become a successful landowner and farmer.

The books speaks of being wedded to the land and to place. In this sense it is an instance of the American dream of a home. It also speaks of a strong woman, not in cliched, late 20th Century terms but with a sense of ambiguity, difficulty and loss.

This is a story as well of thwarted love, of the difficult nature of sexuality, and of human passion. There is also the beginning of what in Cather's works will become an increased sense of religion, Catholicism in particular, as a haven and a solace for the sorrow she finds at the heart of human endeavor. Above all it is a picture of stark life in the midwest.

There is almost as much blood-letting in this short book as in an Elizabethan tragedy. Cather's picture of American life on the plains, even in her earliest books, is not an easy or simple one. Some readers may quarrel with the seemingly happy ending of the book. I don't think any will deny that Alexandra's happiness is dearly bought or that it is bittersweet.

I tendend to shy away from this book in favor of Cather's later novels. I feared that it would be conventional and trite. The stereotyping was mine,however. This is a thoughtful, well written story of immigrant life on the plains and of the sorrow pain, and strength of the American experience.

Robin Friedman

simply moving
I read this about thirty years ago in college and it is still my favorite book involving the struggle of man and nature.It is a deeply moving story, written in a simple but elegant style. Read it, savor its brilliance, and be ready to wipe a tear. The poem at the start of the book is absolutley amazing.

Not yead yet
I haven't read this book yet but they've asked me to review it so I'll just say that I'm looking forward to finishing the book I'm now reading so I can dive into this one.It looks very interesting.

O pioneers
O Pioneers! is an easy read about a strong woman immigrated to the plains of Nebraska and her struggles and love for the land, a great look at pioneer life and a very intriguing dive into human nature ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (1)

The Best Willa Cather Biography
Ideally, a biography is meant to give the reader a true feeling of what the subject was really like.For Willa Cather, there is perhaps no biography that does this better than the account of her life by Edith Lewis, who knew, and lived with, Willa Cather for well over 40 years.

At 197 pages (in the original edition) this book is short by biography standards; yet, reading it, I came away with a greater feeling of what Willa Cather was like than in all of the other biographies on her that I have read.

We get great personal details in such passages as: "I think Willa Cather never got so much happiness from the writing of any book as from the Archbishop; and although Shadows on the Rock is of course altogether different in conception, in treatment, and in artistic purpose, it may have been in part a reluctance to leave that world of Catholic feeling and tradition in which she had lived so happily for so long that led her to embark on this new novel." (Pg. 155)

Or, "...Willa Cather had a great distaste for luxury hotels...She was extremely gloomy and discontented, even resentful, the first day or two [at a particular luxury hotel], as if she had been cheated out of all the things she had come back to Aix-les-Bains to find.It was not until we removed to the plain, old-fashioned Grand Hotel down in the town...that she recovered her happy spirits."(pg. 159-160)(Indeed, Cather loved her extremely austere, pastoral summer cottage at Grand Manan, Canada; which was purposefully rustic and simple, but where she spent a great deal of time.)

Or, "When her [Cather's] brother Roscoe's twin daughters were babies, and she went out to Wyoming to visit him, she never tired of playing with them.She played with children, not as if she were a grown person, but as children play--with the same spirit of experiment, of adventurousness and unreflecitng enjoyment." (pg. 169)

Or, "She was a little tired that morning [of her death]; full of winning courtely to those around her; fearless, serene--with the childlike simplicity which had always accompanied her greatness; giving and recieiving happiness." (pg. 197)

This biography is recently back in print (I had to scour and search to get my edition), which begs the question: how could such a fine biography--written by Cather's life-long friend and house-mate--written on perhaps America's finest writer, have gone out of print in the first place? ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (1)

Pieces lack the "author"ity of Cather
WILLA CATHER ON WRITING, Critical Studies as an Art, published by the University of Nebraska Press, is a slim(20 page introduction by Stephen Tennant, 126 pages by Cather) and valuable, though selective, work. Tennant attempts, with effort, to pull the contents together by his introduction.The contents are extensive pieces Cather wrote on writers and pieces ofwriting familiar to readers. The attempt is forced and the contents arewedged into the title and purpose of the publishers or Tennant. TheContents: Four letters: On DEATH COMES FOR THE ARCHBISHOP, On SHADOWS ONTHE ROCK, Escapism, On THE PROFESSOR'S HOUSE The Novel Demeuble FourPrefaces: THE BEST STORIES OF SARAH ORNE JEWETT Gertrude Hall's THEWAGNERIAN ROMANCES Stephen Crane's WOUNDS IN THE RAIN AND OTHER IMPRESSIONSOF WAR Defoe's THE UNFORTUNATE MISTRESS My First Novels [There Were Two] Onthe Art of Fiction Katherine Mansfield Light on Adobe Walls [An unpubishedfragment] The pieces are critical and hold advice for would-be-writers.Selections read like pieces of conversation withCather on aspects ofwriting. Given Cather's talent and output, she deserves a more thoroughcollection with a more accurate title. ... Read more

Product Description
My Antonia is a classic tale of pioneer life in the American Midwest. The novel details daily life in the newly settled plains of Nebraska through the eyes of Jim Burden, who recounts memories of a childhood shared with a girl named Antonia Shimerda, the daughter of a family who have emigrated from Bohemia. As adults, Jim leaves the prairie for college and a career in the east, while Antonia devotes herself to her large family and productive farm. When he returns Jim sees that although Antonia is careworn, she remains "a rich mine of life, like the founders of early races,". Full of stirring descriptions of the prairie's beautiful yet terrifying landscape, and the rich ethnic mix of immigrants and native-born Americans who chose to restart their lives there, My Antonia mythologized a period of American history that was lost before its value could be understood.
This new edition provides a critically up-to-date introduction and detail notes which put the events and themes of the book in full historical context. Also included are Cather's original and revised introductions to her novel. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

new paperback of My Antonia by Willa Cather
My book was supposed to be new -- a purchase straight from the amazonstore. However, my copy looked used: It's front and back covers were badly creased. I would've expected this from a book that was in good but used condition. If I had known that amazon would send me a new book in such condition, I would definitely have ordered a USED copy and PAID FAR LESS for it. I feel tricked and cheated. Beware buyers! As long as amazon has your money they don't care if a customer gets what s/he paid for or not.

Ok
I had to buy this book for a Lit class I had to take at school. It was ok. I'm not much for analyzing literature but thought it was a good story.

A TRUE AMERICAN CLASSIC...
I first read this book when I was in junior high school. I admit that, at the time, I did not appreciate the strengths of the book and the quality of its writing. I am quite glad that I decided to give it another chance, as, having re-read it, I now understand why it is considered to be a classic in literature. It is simply a beautifully written book, covering many of the themes that one stumbles across in life and coalescing them into a work of extraordinary breadth.

The book is the story of two young people, Jim Burden and Antonia Shimerda. They meet for the first time when Jim is ten years old and Antonia is fourteen. Recently orphaned, Jim has moved to the Great Prairie to live with his grandparents in Nebraska. Antonia, on the other hand, has been wrenched from her homeland in Bohemia, emigrating with her parents to the United States and finding herself in Nebraska. Jim and Antonia's chance encounter on a train sets the stage for the forging of a friendship and unconditional love that time will not diminish.

The book relates the harshness of immigrant life through the eyes of Jim, who narrates the events contained in the book. There is a relentless stoicism about the book, which is written in spare, clear prose. With intense imagery and descriptive exactitude, late nineteenth century Nebraska comes to life. It also relates the paths that each of the characters choose to follow, as well as the vicissitudes of life that mold and shape them in ways that no one would have imagined.

The focus of the book, which is also a coming of age tale, seems to be on the female characters and their strengths. All the women in it seem to be survivors, despite the hardships that they encounter. This is, without a doubt, a life affirming book, wrought with great feeling and a decided sense of time and place. Yet, despite its poignancy, the book is surprisingly unsentimental and straightforward. It is a testament to the author's literary talent that this book has emerged as a timeless classic. Bravo! ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (17)

Far away from home.
This is a great book for Young Adults, especially girls.It is a beautifully written peaceful story about New France.It takes place in the period of one year, the year 1697/1698.Quebec plus most of the colony is cut off from France for most of the year due to the long cold winters and the long distance from Eusope.This is, at that time, a remote place.

This is the story of 12 year old Cecile Auclair, her father Eucilde Auclair, the town apothecary, Cecile's good friend, Jacques, the only child of a town prostitute.Cecile is being home schooled by her father a well learned, intelligent man.Her mother is dead, she died knowing she would never see France again.Cecile has had to leave her convent school to work in her father's apothecary shop.However, the family stays close to the nuns at the school plus other religous.The family's relatives live in the old country.Cecile has young cousins she has never seen.

The book begins when the last ship leaves Quebec for France in October and ends again in October when the ships leave for France.The ships begin to arrive in July and there is much excitement.When the ships come in Cecile and Jacques become excited and can't wait to get to see them.THE SHIPS HAVE COME IN1THE SHIPS HAVE COME IN1There is much new and different characters plus tales of travels.Then comes October with its beautiful autumn days then the long cold winter with the world closed away and their world closing in.

The colonists are religious for the most part and there is much written about church, nuns, priests, higher ups in the religious communities and church holidays.

The characters of the city of Quebec are close knit as need be for they are so far from home and are now in a strange, foreign land so much different from their own.There are many interesting characters who have left France for reasons they can't talk about, to get away from much that needs to be kept secret.

The love between the father and daughter is a joy to read about as is the interaction between their close neighbors and friends.Willa Cather has written a great book, but then she always does.

A trip back in time to New France
Having grown up in the US, most of what I know about the North American colonial period reflects the British experience.While I knew that the French colonized what is now Canada, I knew very little about the culture of history of New France, as it was then known.While this book is limited in is scope (the bulk of the book covers a little more than a year, and centers around a small cast of characters), it still provides a glimpse into the French colonial experience.The long, fierce winters limit the colony's contact with France, and is a dominant feature in the life in the colony.While the colonists struggle to carve out a new life, they also try to maintain the comforts of home.

This book beautifully describes the city of Quebec and its surroundings at the end of the seventeenth century.There isn't a great deal of action here, but the story serves to introduce the reader to this outpost of France on the edge of the North American wilderness.

a first rate novelabout colonial Quebec
Shadows on the Rock is one of Cather's masterpieces. This novel is set inQuebec City in the years 1697 and 1698. The main character Cecile Auclair is the 12 year old daughter of Euclide Auclair the town pharmacist.Cecile is one of the best written and most compelling of all of Cathers creations and her father is as well.There are several intersting characters in the novel. Cathers poers of description are first rate not only in describing Quebec City but also the natural landscape of Quebec.There are a lot of extra nice touches like some recountings of saints stories and the political situation in France at the time. This is a 5 star book in my opinion and I recommend it highly

Shadows on the Rock
Nothing much happens in this novel, but, it stays with you after reading it.Glad I read it.

A Novel of Old Quebec
Willa Cather wrote "Shadows on the Rock"(1931) late in her novelistic career following her more famous book, "Death Comes for the Archbishop."(1927). As is the earlier book, "Shadows on the Rock" is influenced heavily by Cather's fascination with Catholicism (a religion she did not practice), her love of French civilization, and her interest in frontier places.

Cather's novel is set in the remote world of "New France", in French Quebec of 1697. The story tells of the early French settlers and of the reasons which impelled them to leave France in search of a new life in a difficult, harsh land. Located on a forbidding cliff on the St. Lawrence River, Quebec was inaccessible to incoming ships from France or elsewhere for all but the summer months.

The main characters in the novel are Cecile Aubade, a girl of twelve, and her father Euclide, an apothecary who came to Quebec together with its governor, Frontenac. Euclide's wife had died in Quebec two years before the story begins in 1697 and Cecile is showing as caring for her father, preparing his meals, cleaning the house, and tending the apothecary in has absence.The book is a coming-of-age story for Cecile, but it differs from the usual form of coming-of-age books in its quiet flow, stress on the ordinary world of everyday, and domesticity.

Cather gives the reader a picture of the life of old Quebec through the interactions of its people with Cecile and Euclide.We meet Frontenac and two rival bishops, the pious aged Bishop Laval, the much more worldy Bishop Saint-Vallier, and a host of clergy and nuns, some devoted to mysticism and solitude.Cather also shows the reader the more secular side of Quebec in many humble people, sellers at outdoor markets, sailors, refugees from France, and fur trappers, especially a man named Pierre Charron, whose heart was broken when his sweetheart took up the life of the cloister and rigorous spirituality. Cecile befriends a seven-year old boy named Jacques, the son of a prostitute. The friendship between Jacques and Cecile receives much attention in the book.Jacques is invited to the family's Christmas celebration and places a toy beaver, made for him by a sailor, in the family creche, symbolizing the coming of Christianity to the New World.

With the exception of a short epilogue, the book is told over the course of one year of Cecile's life in Quebec.This timeframe affords Cather the opportunity of describing Quebec and its environs in beautiful detail throughout the course of the year and to watch the maturation of Cecile and her increased devotion to Quebec. The story celebrates place, rootedness, religion, domesticity, and the value of living life in the everyday. Events in Quebec are contrasted with life in France with its wars and corruption. The even flow of Cather's book tends to mask some of the instances of torture and death practiced in the Old Regime that she describes.

This novel has always been recognized as static and unexciting. But Cather's recent biographer, Janis Stout, aptly describes the book as "luminous and significant." "Shadows on the Rock" was a best-seller when it appeared, even though the book received a poor critical reception. The critics found the book showed a tendency towards escapism from the modern world and its difficulties and an attitude of sentimentality and romanticism. The book has an underlying tone of irony.The world of old Quebec is portrayed with an aura of stability and permanence while the reader knows, as Cather knows, that fifty years after the time that the book ends, France will lose Quebec forever together with its possessions in the New World.

Although this book does not rank with Cather's best work, I was moved by it and found the criticisms overdone. In its emphasis on contentment, finding joy in the everyday, and the virtues of family life, "Shadows on the Rock" has something to teach today's world.

Robin Friedman

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Product Description
Complete in one volume, here are three of the most adored works by early 20th-century writer Willa Cather. O PIONEERS! (1913) tells embodies American heroism in one pioneer woman. THE SONG OF THE LARK (1915) plots a great Wagnerian soprano's journey toward her destiny. MY ANTONIA (1918), is the story of a strong farm woman who still affirms her passion for the land after her father's suicide and desertion by her lover. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

What a writer!!
I am trying to get all Cather's books. She is an outstanding writer and describer of things.

Book Club
I needed to read O Pioneer for a book club I belong in and couldn't find the book anywhere in my small city so I logged on and found exactly what I needed on Amazon.The book was in good condition and arrived in a very timely manner.Thanks

An old classic
It is good to have a copy of Cather's writing and I'm happy to see they are still in print. ... Read more