Customer Reviews

Early Novels and Stories: The Troll Garden / O Pioneers! / The Song of the Lark / My Antonia / One of Ours (Library of America)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

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.

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.

One of my all-time favorite books. Attractively packaged on acid-free paper. Very classic looking. And the fiction is excellent! Her stories about the Plains, the Southwest, Chicago, and Quebec are perfect works of art. I especially liked "Tom Outland's Story" contained within "The Professor's House."

I needed this book for my class and it has everything I need. Plus it arrived before all my other textbooks and was in great condition. I would recommend this seller for their promptness.

I adore the classics. It is rare if I am not currently reading a book by Tolstoy or Twain, Hugo or Voltaire, but somehow I missed Willa Cather. I recently read this entire 5-book collection and I was hooked on her writing style. She is good with the turn of a phrase, and is a skilled enough writer to take her readers into the story with her. Her writing seems so effortless. How is it that the real masters of any art form make it look so easy? Her skill is admirable and her characters unforgettable. I highly recommend her works.

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.

This author's writing never gets old or hackneyed. Death Comes for the Archbishop is one of my favorite books of all time. About values, life, and real life.

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.

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.