My Antonia by Willa Cather

 

Summary (from the publisher): Willa Cather’s heartfelt novel is the unforgettable story of an immigrant woman’s life on the hardscrabble Nebraska plains. Through Jim Burden’s affectionate reminiscence of his childhood friend, the free-spirited Ántonia Shimerda, a larger, uniquely American portrait emerges, both of a community struggling with unforgiving terrain and of a woman who, amid great hardship, stands as a timeless inspiration.

Review: This is a sweeping tale that captures the life in a particular time and place, as represented to our narrator Jim Burden by Antonia. A glittering portrait of the wild American west and the harsh landscape and living but also of the beauty and simplicity of life. Jim describes how he first meets Antonia soon after her family has immigrated to Nebraska and then watches her grow up and change, but she remains fiercely of the plains in Jim's mind. 

I appreciated the rich and vivid descriptions of the American west as described by Willa Cather. She writes that "There was nothing but land: not a country at all, but the material out of which countries are made" (7). And later, "Between that earth and that sky I felt erased, blotted out" (8). The vast, undulating prairie is omnipresent in this book, a fierce and harsh master in every characters' life. Cather also does an outstanding job of describing various characters in rich detail and in ways that brought them to life fully for the reader: "When she meant to be entertaining and agreeable, she nodded her head incessantly and snapped her eyes at one. Her teeth were long and curved, like a horse's; people and babies always cried if she smiled at them. Her face had a kind of fascination for me: it was the very colour and shape of anger" (135).  

There are a lot of tragic figures in this book. People driven mad, people facing exile and persecution, people facing extreme cold and hunger and deprivation. People die or want to die. The book also sheds light on the way immigrants were looked down upon in this community. When the daughters of recent immigrants would go to town as hired girls, they were seen as great social companions but certainly not eligible marriage prospects: "But anxious mothers need have felt no alarm. They mistook the mettle of their sons. The respect for respectability was stronger than any desire in Black Hawk youth" (129). 

The book really made me admire the charming, beautiful, impetuous, and hardworking Antonia. I loved the image of her as a beautiful young girl and also the way she is portrayed as a middle-aged woman. I also liked her wise appraisal of her childhood friend, Jim, and her belief that they will always be with each other: "But that don't mean I'll lose you. Look at my papa here; he's been dead all these years, and yet he is more real to me than almost anybody else. He never goes out of my life. I talk to him and consult him all the time. The older I grow, the better I know him and the more I understand him" (206).

I read this once before, years ago and well before I started writing book reviews. I was happy to get to read it again and be able to record my thoughts this time.  

*Just a note that there is outdated language used and there are some offensive references in this book that modern readers will find racist in nature when describing a talented blind black musician: "It was the soft, amiable Negro voice, like those I remembered from early childhood, with the note of docile subservience in it. He had the Negro head, too; almost no head at all." The book is clearly a product of its time, having been originally published in 1918, but still unfortunate and disappointing to see. 

Stars: 4