My Antonia by Willa Cather

My Antonia by Willa Cather is the third book in author’s The Great Plains Trilogy. I found that this was another near brilliant novel that had complex characters and magnificently described landscapes. Though Song of the Lark was my favorite book of the three, I thought that this novel was almost as good. These books are called a trilogy but there no connection between the plots or characters.

This story is told in first person by Jim Burden. Jim is a New York lawyer. The vast majority of the book is supposedly a manuscript written by Jim detailing his youth growing up in and around Black Hawk, Nebraska in the late 1800s.  Jim is living with his grandparents who are initially famers living outside of Blackhawk but who eventually retire and go live in the town. Jim is intelligent and thoughtful. He befriends a Bohemian immigrant girl named Antonia Shimerda. Like the women characters in the other Cather books that I have read, Antonia is high spirited and shows a degree of physical toughness. She does heavy farm work including heading cattle and seems to enjoy doing so. She is also intelligent and tends to be very optimistic. 

The book chronicles the early life of both Jim and Antonia. We initially see them as children. As they move through adolescence the story portrays how they make friends with and socialize with their peers. The story takes Jim through his collage years and through some rough times for Antonia. The young woman becomes pregnant from the man who she is supposed to marry who runs off on her. Later Antonia marries someone else. Throughout the story there is a little romantic tension between Jim and Antonia but they never pair off together. The book ends twenty years into the future when Jim and Antonia renew their friendship. 

Both Antonia and Jim are very well - crafted characters. The story is also populated by interesting minor characters that range from colorful farmhands and malicious businessmen. Jim is a great storyteller and he likes to integrate all these diverse personalities into the narrative that centers upon himself and Antonia. Throughout the tale he observes that even though he has not seen these people in years, their memories continue to influence him.

The issue that is still debated by critics and regular readers of this book is the real nature of the relationship between Antonia and Jim. A few times in the narrative they seem to edge towards a romantic connection but then back off. During Jim’s collage years it seems that he would actually ask Antonia to marry him. Instead, he realizes that he is becoming a cosmopolitan person who will spend his life in the big cities, Antonia is very much tied to the land of rural Nebraska. 

When Jim and Antonia reestablish contact years later he tells her.

‘Do you know, Antonia, since I’ve been away, I think of you more often than of anyone else in this part of the world. I’d have liked to have you for a sweetheart, or a wife, or my mother or my sister— anything that a woman can be to a man. The idea of you is a part of my mind; you influence my likes and dislikes, all my tastes, hundreds of times when I don’t realize it. You really are a part of me.’

Like Thea Kronborg in Song of the Lark, Jim becomes a person who goes beyond small town plains life. As noted above, also like Thea, at several points he mentions that throughout this time he is reminded of his younger days on the plains. He takes rural and small - town Nebraska with him wherever he goes.  Throughout the book Antonia is tied to the land. Thus, it is no surprise that thoughts of Antonia have also stayed with him. 

Throughout the story Jim is a very passive person. He is not passionate. He is not the kind of character one would find in an emotional love story. He never feels an intense love for Antonia. Yet he feels a lifelong connection with her, even after he has not seen her for years. As mentioned above, at several points in the book he does seem like he will try to initiate a relationship with Antonia but he just does not do it. At the end he seems very satisfied with just the reestablished friendship. He shows no jealousy towards Antonia’s husband who he genuinely befriends. 

Despite this, I think that Cather meant this to represent a missed opportunity. A clue to what she was trying to get at comes fairly early on the book. A young Jim and Antonia are told a story by a dying Ukrainian. The story seems to be implausible in a realistic book of this type. The story goes as follows: After the nuptial celebrations, a wedding party is traveling home on multiple sleighs through the Ukrainian countryside. The party is heading back to their native village when wolves descend on the sleighs. In an effort to fend off the wolves the bride and groom are thrown off one of the sleighs and to their deaths to lighten the load and allow the others to escape.  A Google search shows that there is no consensus as to what this story means in the context of this book.  However, some suggest that this tale is symbolic of Jim throwing away his chance to marry Antonia. This seems plausible to me. 

Like in O Pioneers! This work is filled with wonderfully crafted prose describing natural features and phenomena. In the below passage a thunderstorm that Jim and Antonia experience as children is described,

Antonia and I climbed up on the slanting roof of the chicken-house to watch the clouds. The thunder was loud and metallic, like the rattle of sheet iron, and the lightning broke in great zigzags across the heavens, making everything stand out and come close to us for a moment. Half the sky was chequered with black thunderheads, but all the west was luminous and clear: in the lightning flashes it looked like deep blue water, with the sheen of moonlight on it; and the mottled part of the sky was like marble pavement, like the quay of some splendid seacoast city, doomed to destruction. Great warm splashes of rain fell on our upturned faces. One black cloud, no bigger than a little boat, drifted out into the clear space unattended, and kept moving westward. All about us we could hear the felty beat of the raindrops on the soft dust of the farmyard.

It is not surprising that as Jim gets older and travels the world, he feels that the locale and experiences of his youth are always with him. As the above passage indicates, Antonia is connected to these experiences. 

This book is a great read. Though not a lot of dramatic things happen, both the characters and their interactions are fascinating. The descriptions of landscapes are sublime and meld very well into the story. I have just recently discovered Cather but look forward to reading a many more of her books. 

Song of the Lark by Willa Cather

Song of the Lark by Willa Cather is considered the second of the author’s Great Plains Trilogy. However, though it takes place in the American Midwest as did O Pioneers!, the two stories are unconnected. I found this to be great character study. Along the way, Cather adds in a lot of ponderings on the things that make a person an artist. In addition, the novel is filled with musical references ranging from American and Mexican folk music to the operas of Richard Wagner. These references greatly enhanced my reading experience.

This is the story of Thea Kronborg. Thea is born into a Swedish - American family that resides in the fictional town of Moonstone, Colorado. She grows up in the early years of the Twentieth Century. Thea is special. The is smarter than most of her peers. She loves books. She has enormous musical talent. She seems to exude a charisma, even as an adolescent, that draws men to her. These men invest time and effort info promoting Theas’s future, as she slowly emerges as a successful and gifted opera singer. 

Perhaps the most important male supporter of Thea is Dr. Howard Archie. His interest in her strikes one as a little odd. Though never overtly romantic, one gets the sense that there is a subtext of attraction as Thea gets older. Late in the book, Dr. Archie himself thinks back on the relationship, 

He realized now that she had counted for a great deal more to him than he knew at the time. It was a continuous sort of relationship. He was always on the lookout for her as he went about the town, always vaguely expecting her as he sat in his office at night. He had never asked himself then if it was strange that he should find a child of twelve the most interesting and companionable person in Moonstone. It had seemed a pleasant, natural kind of solicitude. He explained it then by the fact that he had no children of his own. But now, as he looked back at those years, the other interests were faded and inanimate. The thought of them was heavy.

Dr. Archie supports Thea in her early years, helps her get set up in Chicago where she goes to study music and eventually finances her journey to Germany to properly hone her skills as an opera singer. There are many others in Thea’s hometown who are drawn to her including Ray Kennedy, an intelligent railroad brakeman who intends to marry Thea when she gets older but who is killed in a train accident. Her charisma and her musical interests lead her to the form bonds with several other adults including members of the Mexican – American community.

While studying music in Chicago Thea meets Fred Ottenberg. Fred is the son of a wealthy parents. Thea and Fred begin to fall in love until Fred is forced to tell Thea that he is actually married to woman that he has come to hate. 

Later Thea travels to Germany to study opera. The narrative then jumps forward ten years when Thea returns to America to be greeted by both Dr. Archie and Fred. Thea is becoming something of a diva and the two men are entranced by her. 

I thought that the prose here, while very good, did not reach the nearly sublime level that they reached in O Pioneers! There may have been a few passages that came close to the earlier work, but only a few. Instead, the strength of this book lies in the fact that it is a superb character study. This book is a classic and successful example of a bildungsroman. 

Thea is complex and nuanced. In some ways her development is a study in talent and the formation of an artist. As mentioned above, she exhibits enormous talent and intelligence when growing up. She is tomboyish as she is not afraid of the outdoor elements or the rougher nature of life. This roughish part of her nature reasserts itself at various points on the plot throughout Thea’s life. 

When she goes to Chicago to study music she exudes confidence, self – reliance as well as enormous drive. To Cather’s credit she has endowed her literary creation with flaws. Thea goes through a period where her detachment, calmness and confidence begins to trend into coldness and arrogance. As it sometimes happens in real life, this period seems to pass naturally. Later when she learns that Fred is married Thea is hurt but not devastated, indicating just how self - reliant that she is.

There is a duality to Theas's character. There is a contrast between the fairly tough girl who grew up on the plains and cosmopolitan woman who is honing her considerable musical talent. At one point, Thea is present at a concert where Dvořák’s Symphony No. 9 "From the New World” is played and it reminds her of her youth. Later some of Wagner’s operatic works are performed presaging the life that she in entering. 

Toward the book’s conclusion Thea comments on how her ties to Moonstone has buoyed her as an artist. She tells Dr. Archie, 

Nearly all my dreams, except those about breaking down on the stage or missing trains, are about Moonstone. You tell me the old house has been pulled down, but it stands in my mind, every stick and timber. In my sleep I go all about it, and look in the right drawers and cupboards for everything. I often dream that I'm hunting for my rubbers in that pile of overshoes that was always under the hatrack in the hall. I pick up every overshoe and know whose it is, but I can't find my own. Then the school bell begins to ring and I begin to cry. That's the house I rest in when I'm tired. All the old furniture and the worn spots in the carpet— it rests my mind to go over them.”

I found this to be an excellent book. Thera’s character and her development is at the heart of it all. She is not just complex and interesting but she is unusual. Though I did not find the prose to be as soaring as Cather’s effort in O Pioneers!, the character development makes up for it. Cather’s exploration of artistry and music is also fascinating. This novel is a fine example of American literature.

O Pioneers! By Willa Cather

O Pioneers! by Willa Cather is the story of the Bergsons, a family of Swedish immigrants who settle in Nebraska in the late nineteenth century. First published in 1913, this is a short novel and is the first book of what is known as the Great Plains Trilogy. I found the story and the characters compelling. The prose is beautifully written. Cather’s description of the Nebraska region that the book takes place in, known as the Divide, is a major feature of this book as the landscape practically becomes a character in and of itself. In some ways, this work reminds me of Thomas Hardy’s Return of the Native, and that book’s incorporation of Egdon Heath in its narrative.

The novel is segmented into sections, each section jumps several years forward. The entire story encompasses the late nineteenth century and moves into the early twentieth century. The tale begins as John Bergson, the father of the family, is dying. His parting admonishment to his family is to leave his daughter, Alexandra, in charge of the family farm. At this point, the clan consists of Alexandra, her mother and her three brothers. Lou and Oscar are older and are basically competent farmers but are flawed people with limited imagination. Emil is the youngest sibling who is intelligent and sensitive. Carl Linstrum is a neighboring boy who becomes Alexandra’s romantic interest. Marie is a lively young girl who grows up alongside the Bergsons.

The Bergson farm, as well as the Bergson’s neighbors’ farms, are failing as a result of years of bad weather. Neighbors are abandoning the area. Carl and his family move away to the city. Alexandra comes under pressure to sell the property and vacate, but persistently resists and holds out. In a turn of events, as the years go by, the region starts to thrive. Alexandra’s management turns out to be competent and energetic, and the entire Bergson family eventually prospers. Alexandra helps Emil to get a university education. For his part, Emil becomes interested in the unhappily married Marie. The two initiated an affair and serious trouble ensues. There are other interesting characters and plot threads. 

Eventually, Carl returns to the area. He is penniless. An interesting but unfortunate role reversal starts to play out. Alexandra wants to marry Carl, but her family objects because he is broke. The independent Alexandra wants to go ahead anyway, but social pressure leads Carl to set off into the world to earn a fortune before he will marry a more prosperous woman. The social interactions involving gender and money are interesting. If the roles were reversed, a wealthier man would be able to marry a poorer woman, but it is the disparity of income combined with gender that keep the two apart. The fact that it is Carl who responds to the social pressure and declines marriage is interesting. 

The characters, plot and themes are well crafted and interesting. However, where this novel really shines is in Cather’s wonderful prose. The author weaves this prose to fit and connect with various characters and themes. 

For instance, Alexandra is tied to the land. When other pioneers are abandoning it and going back where they came from, Alexandra stubbornly hangs on. She does this in the face of even her two brothers’ opposition. In this passage, Cather pulls it all together,

When the road began to climb the first long swells of the Divide, Alexandra hummed an old Swedish hymn, and Emil wondered why his sister looked so happy. Her face was so radiant that he felt shy about asking her. For the first time, perhaps, since that land emerged from the waters of geologic ages, a human face was set toward it with love and yearning. It seemed beautiful to her, rich and strong and glorious. Her eyes drank in the breadth of it, until her tears blinded her. Then the Genius of the Divide, the great, free spirit which breathes across it, must have bent lower than it ever bent to a human will before. The history of every country begins in the heart of a man or a woman.

I find the fact that Alexandra may be the only person to look at The Divide with such a fascinating love and yearning. Thus, The Divide bends its will to her, and history begins.

Likewise, Cather uses her skill with prose, people and nature to illuminate Marie’s character and predicament. This young woman has found herself trapped in a bad marriage. She once seemed to have loved Frank her husband. However, not only has Frank allowed pessimism and depression to bring him down, but he has taken his bad feedings out on Marie. This is painful and stifling to her.  She looks for some way to escape, no matter how bad it is.

Marie stole slowly, flutteringly, along the path, like a white night-moth out of the fields. The years seemed to stretch before her like the land; spring, summer, autumn, winter, spring; always the same patient fields, the patient little trees, the patient lives; always the same yearning, the same pulling at the chain— until the instinct to live had torn itself and bled and weakened for the last time, until the chain secured a dead woman, who might cautiously be released. Marie walked on, her face lifted toward the remote, inaccessible evening star.

There is a lot to the above passage. It is interesting that Marie flutters like a moth. She is a person on a chain, tied to the mundane. Symbolically, she is bleeding and weak. She still looks for release and gazes upon evening stars that seem equally inaccessible. Once again, I think that Cather’s language is superb.

This is a very good, short book. The characters are interesting and somewhat complex. The story is compelling and drives worthy themes. I simply love Cather’s prose, which is excellent and ties everything together. As I was impressed with this book, I am likely to read the remainder of the Prairie Trilogy soon.