My Ántonia

Favorite Book

A gentle masterpiece that doesn't beg for attention, My Ántonia is a transformative experience bringing each reader back to its pages again and again.

To write well, and simply, is a remarkable accomplishment. Even greater is the ability to capture both the complex and simple without disrupting the reader. In her novel, My Ántonia, Willa Cather finds a simplicity beyond complexity that envelops the reader in pure, untainted life. Cather brings the rugged beauty of untamed Nebraska into the hands and hearts of every reader, leaving each entirely happy and complete. For “...that is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great.”


Favorite passage:

[Book II - The Hired Girls - Part XIV]
...
“We sat looking off across the country, watching the sun go down. The curly grass about us was on fire now. The bark of the oaks turned red as copper. There was a shimmer of gold on the brown river. Out in the stream the sandbars glittered like glass, and the light trembled in the willow thickets as if little flames were leaping among them. The breeze sank to stillness. In the ravine a ringdove mourned plaintively, and somewhere off in the bushes an owl hooted. The girls sat listless, leaning against each other. The long fingers of the sun touched their foreheads.

“Presently we saw a curious thing: There were no clouds, the sun was going down in a limpid, gold-washed sky. Just as the lower edge of the red disk rested on the high fields against the horizon, a great black figure suddenly appeared on the face of the sun. We sprang to our feet, straining our eyes toward it. In a moment we realized what it was. On some upland farm, a plough had been left standing in the field. The sun was sinking just behind it. Magnified across the distance by the horizontal light, it stood out against the sun, was exactly contained within the circle of the disk; the handles, the tongue, the share–black against the molten red. There it was, heroic in size, a picture writing on the sun.

“Even while we whispered about it, our vision disappeared; the ball dropped and dropped until the red tip went beneath the earth. The fields below us were dark, the sky was growing pale, and that forgotten plough had sunk back to its own littleness somewhere on the prairie.”

93rd book for me on Mustich's list.

There is something wistful and lovely in this book that reminds me of Little Women and that is the highest compliment I think I can give to a work of fiction.

The characters were so real and complex and full of life. Can't believe I'd never read anything by Willa Cather before.

I loved this book all over again! The descriptions of the plains are gorgeous. Jim's appreciation for the girls in his sphere made me feel appreciated! And it ends happy for everyone. It is gentle and the people are strong. It is pleasant.