Willa Cather
(December 7, 1873 – April 24, 1947) was an American writer who achieved recognition for her novels of frontier life on the Great Plains, including O Pioneers! (1913), The Song of the Lark (1915), and My Ántonia (1918). In 1923 she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for One of Ours (1922), a novel set during World War I.
Cather grew up in Virginia and Nebraska and graduated from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. She lived and worked in Pittsburgh for ten years, supporting herself as a magazine editor and high school English teacher. At the age of 33, she moved to New York City, her primary home for the rest of her life, though she also traveled widely and spent considerable time at her summer residence on Grand Manan Island, New Brunswick.
In 1896, Cather moved to Pittsburgh after being hired to write for the Home Monthly,[a women's magazine patterned after the successful Ladies' Home Journal. A year later, she became a telegraph editor and drama critic for the Pittsburgh Leader and frequently contributed poetry and short fiction to The Library, another local publication. In Pittsburgh, she taught Latin, algebra, and English composition at Central High School for one year; she then taught English and Latin at Allegheny High School, where she became the head of the English department.
| "The earth was warm under me, and warm as I crumbled it through my fingers...I kept as still as I could. Nothing happened. I did not expect anything to happen. I was something that lay under the sun and felt it, like the pumpkins, and I did not want to be anything more. I was entirely happy. Perhaps we feel like that when we die and become a part of something entire, whether it is sun and air, or goodness and knowledge. At any rate, that is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great. When it comes to one, it comes as naturally as sleep." |
| — Willa Cather, My Antoni |
Curious Facts
*As a student at the University of Nebraska in the early 1890s
*Cather sometimes used the masculine nickname "William" and wore masculine clothing.
*Cather's relationship with Lewis began in the early 1900s.
*Cather had destroyed many old drafts, personal papers, and letters.
*Cather admired Henry James as a "mighty master of language and the keen student of human actions and motives."
*Cather enjoyed the novels of George Eliot, the Brontës, and Jane Austen,
*She had formed and matured her ideas on art before she wrote a novel.
*In 1932, Cather published Obscure Destinies, her final collection of short fiction, which contained "Neighbour Rosicky", one of her most highly regarded stories.
*Cather suffered two devastating losses in 1938. In June, her favorite brother, Douglass, died of a heart attack.
Famous Work
| Author | Willa Cather |
|---|---|
| The Country United States | English |
| Genre | Historical fiction |
| Publisher | Houghton Mifflin (Boston) |
Publication date
| 1918 |
| Pages | 175 |
is a novel published in 1918 by American writer Willa Cather, considered one of her best works. It is the final book of her "prairie trilogy" of novels, preceded by O Pioneers! and The Song of the Lark.
The novel tells the stories of an orphaned boy from Virginia, Jim Burden, and the elder daughter in a family of Bohemian immigrants, Ántonia Shimerda, who are each brought as children to be pioneers in Nebraska towards the end of the 19th century. Both the pioneers who first break the prairie sod for farming, as well as of the harsh but fertile land itself, feature in this American novel. The first year in the very new place leaves strong impressions in both children, affecting them lifelong.
This novel is considered Cather's first masterpiece. Cather was praised for bringing the American West to life and making it personally interesting.
Literary Genre:
western fiction
Conclusion:
Willa Cather was as important as any other author, she has a lot of important works but the most important was "my Antonia" which was the third part of a trilogy, she was dedicated and she got what she wanted, no matter what.
Recommendation:
I think all of us have to read and research a little bit about her, is a woman to admire and I think she did a great job and she shows that there is no reason to don't reach what we want,
